Afghanistan: Faced with the advance of the Taliban, many Afghans want to flee abroad
Audio 02:26
The co-founder of the Taliban, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar (center), during inter-Afghan negotiations with the government of Kabul, in Doha on March 18, 2021. AP - Alexander Zemlianichenko
By: Sonia Ghezali Follow
6 mins
Faced with the advance of the Taliban, many Afghans are fleeing.
Many want to flee abroad.
In recent days, moreover, a long queue has formed at dawn in front of the passport service in Kabul.
Publicity
From our correspondent in Kabul,
Hundreds of people line up one behind the other in front of the passport service entrance. Police officers, armed with Kalashnikovs, stand guard, tense. A man, his eyes feverish, approaches.
“My father was 81, he caught the Covid here. This is the biggest risk I have taken in my life. My father died the day before yesterday. He was buried yesterday. But today I am here again. I am here with a very, very heavy heart. With immense pain. But what can I do? Do I have to stay at home? No I had to come here, I had to ask for our passports again, to get my family out of here, to go anywhere.
"
In the queue, a man scrolls through photos on his cell phone.
He prefers to remain anonymous.
“This
is my house in my village.
They destroyed everything.
They put a mine inside.
I even have a video.
Look.
The Taliban planted a landmine in my house.
I have lost all of my properties
.
"
"We cannot see the future in Afghanistan"
This man fled his village in the province of Uruzgan.
Captured by the Taliban twenty days earlier.
“
They came and burned our houses, they launched rockets.
The Taliban killed several women and children.
It was shooting everywhere.
He claims that around 60 people including women and children were killed.
Frightened, he wants to get a passport and flee to Iran.
Amina - her name has been changed for security reasons - wants to flee to Turkey with her husband and two young sons. This university teacher fled by bus her province of Badakhshan in the northeast of the country, which fell into the hands of the Taliban. “
We cannot see the future of Afghanistan. Everything is uncertain. The only thing we know is that the future is bleak for all the Afghan people.
Amina says she has no more hope, like many in the long queue.
With the departure of the international coalition, the Taliban claim to control 85% of Afghan territory.
The Afghan authorities deny it, but they recognize that the Afghan security forces are in a "delicate" situation.
The Taliban launched a major offensive in the north of the country, seizing the borders with Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and a major border post with Iran.
This Tuesday, July 13, they took control of two districts in the central province of Bamiyan.
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Afghanistan
Society
Immigration