Thousands of people stranded in Kabul as reports of massacres arrive from inside

Thousands of Afghans and foreigners are desperately stranded in Kabul because Taliban controls do not allow them to reach the airport or the document processing center.

Although 18,000 people have been evacuated and 1,000 in the last hours, at this rate it will be difficult for August 31 to be the date set by President Joe Biden to leave Afghanistan as the situation is tense and becomes chaotic by day. in days. The deadline could be extended.

Speeding up the evacuation is essential, when the tension is mounting minute by minute and the Taliban can decide to interrupt it whenever they wish. Them they are in charge of security of those who must pass to emigrate. There are citizens with European and American passports who cannot cross this logistical nightmare.

Desperate families follow hand over their children foreigners to get out of the country. They keep throwing their babies through the wall at the airport to the soldiers, who hand them over to those who can leave because they can’t get there and they want to save them.

When the Taliban launched a “public relations battle” for their new restraint in Kabul in front of the world, their historic brutality was felt by the Afghans, who remained in the country and by the Shiite minorities, as the Sunni militiamen. they don’t respect and don’t kill.

Massacres

Amnesty International denounced the brutal massacre of nine Hazaras men, the country’s Shiite minority, in the advance of the military offensive towards Kabul in July.

He reported that “in Ghazni, Taliban fighters recently tortured and massacred nine members of the Hazara minority, Shiite Muslims, during their offensive.” It was July in Ghazni and you can only know it now.

According to witnesses who spoke to Amnesty, Taliban activists they waited and they will ambush a group of Hazara men. “They took them home, strangled them and they cut their arms and legs. Six of the men were executed and the other three were tortured to death by the Taliban, ”according to Amnesty.

The Hazaras are an Afghan Shiite minority, the most persecuted in both Afghanistan and Pakistan, who consider themselves islamic republics. This new massacre evokes the massive execution of the Hazaras for four days in the province of Bamyan, where they killed 170, when they were in power.

Resistance

This minority try to flee afghanistan where his men join the rebel forces of the son of Commander Ahmad Shah Massoud (one of the main leaders of the anti-Soviet resistance in Afghanistan in the 1980s) in the Panjshir valley, where 10,000 men are already preparing to attack the Taliban.

Between them there are parts of the afghan army, which evaporated, along with its weapons, tanks and supplies.

A Taliban diplomatic face in Kabul so as not to lose international aid and be vaccinated against the Covid pandemic and other behaviors on the ground. The Taliban make it difficult to evacuate Kabul and those who want to advance towards the capital from the interior. They go house to house with a “blacklist” of Afghans looking for them, threatening to join the ranks of the Taliban.

Germany evacuates from within

The relative of a journalist who works for Germany’s most famous news agency was killed by the Taliban because the one they were looking for had already fled the country.

“The activists killed the relative of a Deutsche Welle journalist and seriously injured another,” the German public broadcaster said. Deutsche Welle (DW) said that “the Taliban carried out door-to-door searches to find the journalist”, who now works in Germany. “Other relatives were able to flee and they’re hidden“, According to the station.

“The murder of a close relative of one of our publishers by the Taliban is inconceivably tragic. It testifies the grave danger where all of our employees and their families are in Afghanistan, ”said Peter Limbourg, CEO of DW.

“It is clear that the Taliban are already conducting an organized search for journalists, both in Kabul and in the provinces. We are run out of time !“said the CEO of DW.

Germany will send two helicopters to Kabul for an evacuation mission. “Germans threatened in remote areas of Afghanistan will be rescued by helicopter,” a defense ministry spokesperson said.

Special forces often use light helicopters to evacuate citizens in crisis situations.

A German was shot on the way to Kabul airport. “A German civilian was shot and wounded on his way to Kabul airport,” he added. “He is receiving medical treatment. But his life is not in danger and he will soon be airlifted,” said the German spokeswoman.

Afghan journalists have reported that their homes have been raided and raided since the Taliban seized power in Kabul on Sunday.

The role of British paratroopers

In the past 24 hours, 963 people were evacuated from Kabul by the British Royal Air Force and a total of 18,000 people left Afghanistan, when the chaos at the airport continues. They do not let them pass to those who are waiting to fill out their papers.

British Paras troops, who fought in Helmand against the Taliban, are dealing with “hundreds” of people at the airport, who are expected to be at the US base and claim that “There is no one there” to take care of them.

The most difficult mission is to extract future passengers from the crowd, knowing that many of them will never be able to board and that their lives are in danger.

Consulate staff can identify people to be evacuated. But the mob rages when they take them and leave the others, spawning violent situations “Sometimes we are 50 meters from them and they cannot get out,” said a consul.

Former British Minister and former Prime Minister Rory Stewart, who visited Afghanistan on foot in 2000, called the British and US military withdrawal from Afghanistan “completely unnecessary”. He said this had led to a “shameful humanitarian catastrophe” and given a “significant victory” to the militant groups.

Desperate families

Desperate families continue to crowd Kabul airport in the hope of boarding a flight.

Pakistan’s national airline has resumed evacuation flights from Kabul, in a bid to relocate Pakistanis and other foreigners, who remain stranded abroad.

Minister Fawad Chaudhry said Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) would send two planes to the Afghan capital on Friday to evacuate 350 passengers.

It comes days after the PIA halted all flights to Kabul to protect passengers, crew and planes, after consulting with Afghan civil aviation authorities.

Government after evacuation

The Taliban are in tribal talks on the new government.

Negotiator Anas Haqqani, the current chieftain after his father’s death, said the formation of an “inclusive government” will not take place before August 31, the day marked for Western forces to leave the country. He made an agreement with the United States to “do nothing” until the final withdrawal, which could be postponed.

The Taliban will have to replace its security and defense forces. In two cities of the country, in Jalalabad and Gahzni the protests started against the presence with the help of the old red, black and green Afghan flag, which the Taliban want to replace with theirs.

The Taliban entered the closed Indian consulate in Kabul to remove documents from its interior and parked cars. They also entered the consulate in Kandahar and Herat. India is the declared enemy the Taliban and Pakistan.

The United Nations Food Program announced that “A humanitarian crisis incredible proportions are opening up before our eyes in Afghanistan.

Mary Ellen McGroarty, program manager, called on the international community to “stand up for the Afghan people at this time”. Its staff are to remain in Afghanistan to help “the 14 million people at risk of malnutrition and 40 percent of their crops lost due to drought.”

Paris, correspondent

ap