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A Taliban guards Kabul airport while a Pakistani plane takes off
Photo: KARIM SAHIB / AFP
Many asylum seekers were flown out of Afghanistan during the days of the Taliban's takeover of power.
But thousands still want to leave the country.
The Federal Ministry of the Interior has now started to issue acceptance letters for over 2000 human rights activists, cultural workers, scientists, journalists and other potentially endangered people from Afghanistan.
These people had been identified by the Federal Foreign Office as particularly in need of protection, along with the former local members of the Bundeswehr and other German institutions. Last Friday the complete list with the names of human rights activists and other people in need of protection was sent by the Foreign Office to the Ministry of the Interior, said the spokesman for the Federal Ministry of the Interior, Steve Alter, in Berlin.
“If someone is on a list because they have been accepted, then that acceptance applies and it is now up to the authorities to check whether the person who is actually in front of them is also the one on the list the speaker added.
Federal Interior Minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) had announced after the evacuation flights of the Bundeswehr in August that a few people among those who were flown out had presented forged documents.
List with around 2600 names
Most of the persons in need of protection reported by the Federal Foreign Office are either still in Afghanistan or have meanwhile arrived in a neighboring country.
According to dpa information, the list of those who are not former local employees, but who are to be accepted in Afghanistan due to their exposed role, includes around 2,600 names, plus close relatives.
At the same time, the United States has demanded written commitments from the Islamist Taliban related to humanitarian aid.
It is about the rights of aid organizations, women and minorities, said the United Nations ambassador to Washington, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, in Geneva at a donor conference for Afghanistan.
“Words are not enough.
We need to see action, ”she said.
"Aid organizations cannot do their job if the Taliban do not comply with these central obligations and humanitarian rules," said Thomas-Greenfield on a video link.
She announced nearly $ 64 million in new US aid funding.
The United Nations has appealed to donor countries to pledge more than $ 600 million at the conference.
The money is to save people in Afghanistan from hunger until the end of the year and prevent a collapse of public services.
mrc / dpa