The White House released on Monday the image of hundreds of Afghans fleeing inside a military plane from Kabul, where the Taliban have seized power after the withdrawal of US troops and threaten, despite their promises, to impose a new fundamentalist regime and end the lives of those who helped fight them during 20 years of conflict.
President Joe Biden authorized the deployment of 5,000 soldiers to the Afghan capital to facilitate the evacuation of US personnel (thousands of people still remain there) and of "the Afghans who assisted the troops during their mission and those who are in special risk due to the advance of the Taliban ”. This operation, started last week, has allowed 1,200 Afghans to travel to the United States for now, who will receive special immigrant visas; hundreds more await your documentation.
Malala Yousafzai, an activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner, who was shot in the face by the Taliban for receiving an education, posted a video Tuesday calling on President Joe Biden to take a firm step to protect these refugees.
"It has a lot to do," said the 24-year-old activist about the responsibility of the United States and other allied countries in protecting Afghans.
Afghans evacuated by plane by the United States.
Defense one
[The Taliban try to reassure the United States about possible terrorist attacks: "They will not suffer damage from our land"]
Among the more liberal Democrats, the voices of Senator Bernie Sanders or Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have already been heard insisting that the reception of Afghan refugees in the United States be facilitated, a request to which former Republican President George W. Bush joined. who started this conflict in 2001, after the September 9 terrorist attack against Washington, DC and New York.
An internally displaced Afghan woman from a northern province, who fled her home due to clashes between the Taliban and Afghan security personnel, fans her sleeping son in a public park in Kabul, Afghanistan, on August 9, 2021. AP Photo / Rahmat Gul
"The US government has the legal authority to cut red tape for refugees during urgent humanitarian crises," Bush recalled. And even former President Donald Trump, who minimized the reception of refugees during his term, has endorsed the idea. to prioritize the arrival of Afghans.
The Pentagon has advanced that it could offer a special visa to some 30,000 Afghans, a figure much lower than the more than 80,000 who could request reception.
Hundreds of thousands will be left behind in any case, either under the Taliban regime or trying to flee by land to neighboring countries, displaced from their homes.
[USA. Evacuation of its embassy in Kabul culminates as chaos rages at the airport]
They order the destruction of sensitive material from the US embassy in Afghanistan so that it does not fall into the hands of the Taliban
Aug. 14, 202100: 29
Trump reduced the limit of refugees accepted annually by the United States in 2020 to just 15,000, the lowest number in decades, denigrating those fleeing murderous regimes such as the Taliban in the same way that he disrespected and hindered the arrival of immigrants, both legal. as undocumented.
With Biden in the White House, that limit was raised to 62,500, but the coronavirus pandemic and travel restrictions passed to contain it have left only a few hundred admitted so far this year.
At the Fort Bliss military base, in El Paso, Texas, the arrival of up to 20,000 refugees is being prepared, despite the fact that the governor, Gregg Abbott, republished and Trump ally, has in recent years been against accepting in that state to people fleeing wars and humanitarian catastrophes.
And from the conservative chain Fox News that xenophobic sentiment is also being fed: this Monday, the star presenter Tucker Carlson compared the Afghan refugees to an invading force: "First we invade them, and now we are invaded."