Latest news with #AfghanAllies
Times of Oman
23-07-2025
- Politics
- Times of Oman
UAE halts deportation of Afghan allies as US begins visa processing
Abu Dhabi: The Trump administration has reached an agreement with the United Arab Emirates to halt the deportation of Afghan allies who worked alongside U.S. forces, ensuring they can remain in the UAE while their U.S. visa applications are processed, Khaama Press reported. According to Khaama Press, visa processing has now officially begun in the UAE for Afghan interpreters and soldiers, marking a significant step toward securing their safe relocation to the United States. The agreement follows reports that the UAE was preparing to forcibly return some Afghans to Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, triggering international concern. The decision was made in coordination with senior U.S. officials, including the Vice President, the Secretary of State, and the White House Chief of Staff, Khaama Press stated. Emirati authorities were also involved in finalizing the deal. A senior White House official told Khaama Press that President Donald Trump has "ordered a full effort to begin the safe and permanent resettlement of these Afghan allies." The U.S. State Department is now actively reviewing individual visa cases. The development has renewed hope for thousands of vulnerable Afghans who supported American military and diplomatic efforts over the past two decades. Many of them have faced prolonged delays and uncertainty regarding safe passage, Khaama Press reported. The agreement is seen as a meaningful step toward honoring the United States' commitments to its wartime allies and also helps ease recent diplomatic tensions caused by earlier deportation threats, according to Khaama Press. If fully implemented, Khaama Press noted that this agreement could become a model for how the U.S. responds to future crises involving allied personnel, offering a structured path to safe resettlement. But even as the U.S. begins processing visas for Afghan allies in the UAE, Khaama Press reported that a U.S. federal court has rejected a request to delay the termination of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Afghan nationals -- a move that now puts thousands at risk of deportation and the loss of work authorization. According to Khaama Press, U.S. District Judge Theodore Chuang in Maryland ruled on July 10 that Afghan TPS holders will not be allowed to retain their legal status while a broader legal challenge proceeds in court. As a result, the protections currently extended to thousands of Afghans in the U.S. will end on July 14, 2025. "This ruling affects approximately 11,700 Afghan migrants who were granted TPS after the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan in 2021, rendering return to the country unsafe," Khaama Press reported. Immigrant rights organisations have contested the Biden administration's decision to end TPS for Afghan nationals, claiming it is "unfair and politically motivated," according to Khaama Press. Advocates argue the administration is disregarding the grave human rights concerns in Afghanistan, particularly the persecution of vulnerable communities. Human rights defenders have raised alarm over the ruling, warning that forced returns could have dangerous consequences. "Sending Afghans especially women and girls back to Taliban-controlled Afghanistan is dangerous," one rights group noted. Human Rights Watch and the United Nations have both documented extreme gender-based repression under the Taliban regime. Khaama Press highlighted these reports, noting that the Taliban's treatment of women amounts to "gender apartheid." The situation remains volatile, with widespread restrictions on freedom, education, and employment for women. Legal experts and human rights activists are urging swift action from the U.S. government and Congress. They recommend passing legislative solutions such as the Afghan Adjustment Act or expanding humanitarian programs to safeguard Afghan TPS holders. Without intervention, thousands of Afghans could face forced deportation to a country where they may be subjected to violence, repression, and loss of basic rights, Khaama Press added.
Yahoo
14-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Afghan man who worked as interpreter for US Army detained by ICE in San Diego
SAN DIEGO (FOX 5/KUSI) — An Afghan man who once helped the U.S. military abroad is being held in ICE detention after his arrest Thursday. It's part of a recent wave of federal courthouse arrests in San Diego and across the country. Cellphone video obtained by FOX 5/KUSI shows federal agents as they approached the asylum-seeker moments after his first hearing and repeatedly asked him for his name. The man, who was accompanied by his attorney, refused to answer and agents proceeded to handcuff the man in the hallway of the federal courthouse in downtown San Diego before producing a warrant. The man stated that he worked with the U.S. military in his home country and has documents to prove it. His attorney, Brian McGoldrick, confirmed his client was an interpreter for the U.S. Army for three years before the 2021 Taliban takeover. 'He and his brothers had a logistics company in Afghanistan, and they provided a lot of material,' McGoldrick said. Word of the arrest sent shockwaves through AfghanEvac, a local nonprofit organization dedicated to helping Afghan allies. 'Every message they're sending to Afghans is we don't want you here, get out, which is wild and especially considering how many Veterans care about this. Because if they get sent back, they're dead,' said Shawn VanDiver, President and Founder of AfghanEvac. VanDiver said the man's wife was previously threatened by the Taliban at a wedding where one of his brother's was murdered. 'So, he fled to Iran. Got to Brazil on a humanitarian visa and walked here from Brazil,' VanDiver added. 'The whole world is watching what's happening with these folks. How is anybody going to stand by us again?' VanDiver said. Meanwhile, McGoldrick is keeping his client's name confidential for safety reasons, but said he has a pending Special Immigrant visa, no criminal record and was legally paroled into the U.S. 'He finally got an appointment with CBP One and he presented himself at the San Ysidro Port of Entry, I think July 6 of 2024,' said Brian McGoldrick, immigration attorney for the Afghan asylum-seeker. He said a judge denied the government's motion to dismiss the case. 'The government simply used a statue that allows them to say that his Notice to Appear was improvidently issued,' McGoldrick said. 'That means that the Notice to Appear would've been mistakenly issued,' explained immigration attorney Saman Nasseri. He explained the approach is becoming more and more common in immigration court. 'The way that they've been justifying arresting people at these hearings is they're dismissing terminating the notices to appear, putting people in expedited removal proceedings,' Nasseri said. However, McGoldrick said when he asked for more information regarding the Notice to Appear and reasoning behind the request for case dismissal, the government's attorney refused to elaborate. McGoldrick said he hadn't been able to speak with his client while he's detained in Otay Mesa. He explained that he could remain in custody for months until his asylum hearing in September. 'It's really ICE's discretion to hold him or not,' he added. 'We don't have a relationship with Afghanistan that allows us to return immigrants. It's kind of scary to think that if he were put in expedited removal where would he go?' FOX 5/KUSI reached out to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for comment but have not heard back. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Independent
24-05-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
UK urged to bring hundreds of Afghan heroes to safety after major blunder saw them wrongly rejected
The British government has been urged to hasten the relocation of hundreds of Afghan heroes to the UK after Ministry of Defence (MoD) failures saw them left at the mercy of the Taliban. Thousands of applications for sanctuary from Afghans who worked with British troops were rejected despite them having credible links to the UK special forces (UKSF). The High Court heard this week that one UK special forces officer oversaw the blanket rejection of 1,585 cases during the summer of 2023. Ministers had initially denied that Afghan commandos, known as the Triples, had been paid by the UK government, but were forced to backtrack and announce a review into 2,000 applications. Around 600 Afghan allies, whose applications were among the initial 2,000 re-examined, have been granted approval to come to the UK. Now government lawyers have said that a further estimated 2,500 applications have been identified for review after the MoD realised the significance of rediscovered payroll data, paving the way for hundreds more to be brought to sanctuary. Former veterans minister Johnny Mercer has said that he is "shocked and appalled" by the failings in the MoD's initial handling of the applications. Campaigners and former military chiefs called on the government to speed up the relocation of these brave soldiers to the UK. Colonel Simon Diggins, former defence attache in Afghanistan, said that poor records had been kept by the UKSF, impacting the lives of the Triples soldiers. He said: 'We know that these individuals' lives are in danger. There is a real imperative to do something about it and to do it quickly. The accusation of poor data keeping is fair but now we have some records there is also an imperative to come up with a quicker way of dealing with this [Triples' evacuation].' Sarah Fenby-Dixon, Afghanistan consultant at the Refugee Aid Network, said: 'It is vital that the review process for all cases is speeded up, as even after being granted eligibility some people are waiting many months or even years before being transferred to safety.' A former senior member of the Triples, who is now in the UK, has brought the legal challenge against the government's processing of applications, with the case reaching the High Court this week. Thomas de la Mare KC, for the claimant, argued that guidance on how resettlement decisions were made should be made public and likened the failings to 'a crime scene'. In a witness statement to court, a senior civil servant said a new 'phase two' of the Triples review would re-examine 'at least several hundred although this may be as many as c2,500 applications'. The MoD said this would likely bring in soldiers who had served in the later years of the conflict in Afghanistan. Around 130 cases from the initial review will be moved into phase two, lawyers told the court. The High Court heard how the initial review was prompted after senior civil servants became concerned about how resettlement applications were being decided. It has since emerged that there was an effective 'blanket practice of automatic refusal', which left these highly trained Afghan soldiers at the mercy of the Taliban. A particular UK special forces officer was overseeing hundreds of rejections during a 'sprint' in the summer of 2023 to rush through decisions, the court heard. The MoD said that the officer's approach to decision-making was 'lax and unprofessional' and reached 'decisions far too quickly'. MoD caseworkers were also 'overly reliant' on UKSF personnel, and were 'not consistently exercising their own independent judgement', the government found. MPs have previously raised concerns about the potential bias of UKSF personnel having power over resettlement of Afghan allies amid an ongoing inquiry into alleged crimes by the UKSF in Afghanistan between 2010 and 2013. Some of the Afghan commandos who applied for UK sanctuary could be witnesses to the events being examined by the independent inquiry. Mr Mercer, who raised concerns about decision-making with senior civil servants in early 2024, said: 'When I raised what was happening with the most senior officers and civil servants in the UK government, one in particular from UKSF claimed he was offended that I had and it was offensive to the UKSF. He was either lying to my face as a cabinet minister which is serious enough, or is so deeply incompetent he didn't know.' The MoD estimates that around 5,000 people were members of the Triples, working alongside the UKSF, during the Afghan war. General Sir John McColl, the UK's former special envoy to Afghanistan, said he believed the MoD had 'worked really hard to do the right thing for the Triples'. He said it was good that the MoD is re-examining up to 2,500 more cases and pressed for resources to be given to the team in charge of dealing with Afghan cases. He added that the delay in help was 'a combination of the record-keeping not being particularly good and that the withdrawal was as chaotic and fractured as we all recall'. 'We are now nearly four years on since the withdrawal and in that time these people have been in great danger, some of them will have been in harms way as a consequence of the delay, which is very unfortunate', he said. Col Diggins added: 'If there are potentially 2,000 more people, who with their family members could equal up to 10,000 people, that's a big number. We have an obligation to them for their service but we need to think differently about how we do the evacuations. 'We also need to ensure that if we are going to bring people from Afghanistan to this country, there are supported by a proper programme of integration when they get here.'
