Special Trump administration cancels flights for nearly 1,660 Afghan refugees, US official says
Written by Jonathan Landay
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – About 1,660 Afghans authorized by the U.S. government to resettle in the U.S., including family members of active-duty U.S. military personnel, have had their flights canceled under President Donald Trump’s order suspending U.S. refugee programs, U.S. official and and the best leader. A refugee resettlement lawyer said Monday.
The group includes unaccompanied minors waiting to be reunited with their families in the US and Afghans who are at risk of Taliban retaliation for fighting against the US-backed Afghan government, said Shawn VanDiver, head of the #AfghanEvac coalition of US veterans and activist groups. rights. and a US official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
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The U.S. decision also leaves thousands of other Afghans who have been approved for resettlement as refugees in the U.S. but who have not yet been cleared for flights from Afghanistan or from neighboring Pakistan, they said.
Trump has made immigration enforcement a major promise of his 2024 election campaign, leaving the fate of America’s refugee programs up in the air.
The White House and the State Department, which oversees the US refugee program, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
“The Afghan people and the lawyers are terrified,” VanDiver said. “I had to recharge my phone four times today because there were so many calls.
“We warned them this was going to happen, but they did it anyway. We hope they will consider it,” he said of communications with Trump’s transition team.
The VanDiver organization is the main coalition working with the US government to remove and resettle Afghans in the US since the Taliban seized Kabul as the last US troops left Afghanistan in August 2021 after two decades of war.
About 200,000 Afghans have been brought to the US by former President Joe Biden’s administration since the US military’s crackdown on Kabul.
Among the many laws Trump was expected to sign after being sworn in for a second term on Monday was to suspend the US refugee program for at least four months, said a Trump administration official, who asked not to be identified.
“We know this means unaccompanied minors, (Afghan) soldiers who have trained, fought and died or been injured alongside our soldiers, and the families of US service members who will continue to participate,” VanDiver said.
VanDiver and the US official said that Afghans who have been approved for resettlement as refugees in the US are being removed from the planes that were supposed to take them to Kabul between now and April.
They include about 200 family members of Afghan-American workers working in the US who were born in the US or Afghans who came to the US, joined the military and became natural-born citizens, they said.
Those removed from the planes included an unknown number of Afghans fighting against the U.S.-backed government in Kabul and about 200 children of Afghan refugees or Afghan parents whose children were brought alone to the United States during the U.S. withdrawal, VanDiver said. once. an American official.
An unknown number of Afghans who qualify as refugees because they work for US contractors or US-linked organizations are also in this group, they said.
(Reporting by Jonathan Landay; Editing by Don Durfee and David Gregorio)
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