Afghanistan

The U.S. Is Closing Every Door on Afghan Allies

Afghan prosecutors, interpreters, and other U.S. partners are being evicted, abandoned, or forced back into Taliban hands.

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A tan background with a map of the United States with different flags across it and soldiers standing in front | Illustration: Eddie Marshall | Midjourney | ChatGPT
(Illustration: Eddie Marshall | Midjourney | ChatGPT)

As the U.S. wraps up the congressionally mandated Coordinator for Afghan Relocation Efforts (CARE) program, uncertainty for allies overseas is on the rise. Some allies who relied on CARE housing for safety while waiting on a yearslong processing queue now face an uncertain future, while multiple endangered U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) applicants have reportedly been deported from Pakistan, where they once sought refuge during case processing.

Closing Every Path to Safety

According to Shawn VanDiver, president of #AfghanEvac, the CARE-funded housing where Special Immigration Visa (SIV) holders and USRAP applicants were sometimes kept safe during processing in Islamabad and Kabul "has been kicking people out…for months." 

VanDiver also confirmed that the State Department is beginning to present options for dismantling Camp As Sayliyah, the main facility for SIV and USRAP case processing in Doha, Qatar. Around 1,500 Afghans remain on the base, VanDiver said, about 1,200 of whom are waiting on USRAP processing, while another 300 are SIV recipients awaiting privately funded movement to the U.S. 

There are four possible plans being considered for the future of Camp As Sayliyah's residents. First, relocating to a third country. This is at present a "hypothetical," according to VanDiver, because the State Department "has been trying for four years to identify countries willing to take Afghans who can't pass vetting, and they've been unsuccessful."

The second option, and the one VanDiver said is "looking like the only option," is to leave Afghan residents' futures to the whims of Qatari officials. "Kicking the can to Qatar while refusing to take responsibility ourselves isn't strategy," VanDiver said. "It's cowardice dressed up as diplomacy."

The third possibility, forcing those Afghans to return to their homeland, would be "a legal and ethical failure," said VanDiver. The final option is resettlement in the U.S. for eligible USRAP applicants; however, this is not a viable possibility, given that the USRAP remains suspended.

VanDiver said these individuals, who often "sold all of their belongings and entrusted the U.S. government to keep them safe, are being abandoned and will likely be killed."

Deported Afghan Prosecutors

In mid-June, three unrelated Afghan prosecutors with USRAP cases were deported from Pakistan to Afghanistan, according to Mark Dumaine of the Association of Prosecuting Attorneys (APA). One of the deported prosecutors, a female, had previously been beaten by the Taliban on account of her work. Another, a male from the Hazara minority, has an open Taliban warrant for his arrest and detention. Dumaine has not made contact with either deported ally for weeks.

The third deported prosecutor worked with the Afghan attorney general to prosecute criminal drug cases. The prosecutor has been in touch and told Dumaine that he has relocated to a remote region in Afghanistan with no access to services. He said he feels "exposure might lead to violence or death."

According to Dumaine and the APA, at least 53 former prosecutors have been murdered by the Taliban since the U.S. withdrawal in August 2021.

Each of the 750 Afghan prosecutors Dumaine has referred to the USRAP program supplied individual testimony and evidence of the threats they personally faced due to their work. Dumaine says male prosecutors "were targeted simply because they chose, in hindsight, the wrong side." Women prosecutors, however, "were actively recruited, trained, and placed in face-to-face roles with the Taliban at U.S. request," Dumaine explained, because the U.S. would only fund the creation of the Attorney General's office in Afghanistan if it employed "20 percent female prosecutors."

Prior to January 20, the State Department routinely interceded in the cases of USRAP applicants arrested by Pakistani authorities, Dumaine said. Now, he reported that those intercessions are no longer taking place.

"It's disheartening and dishonorable," Dumaine said.

The final deadline for Afghans—including USRAP applicants—to self-deport was June 30, and Dumaine sees tragedies ahead, including likely suicides for hopeless Afghans in U.S. processing pipelines who fear for their lives under the Taliban.

I reached out to the press counselor of the Pakistani Embassy in Washington, D.C., and the Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs to ask whether they were aware of the deportation of Afghan allies and if they intended to continue deporting endangered Afghans back to the Taliban. I received no response.

Expanding the Travel Ban

The International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP) continues to be embroiled in a legal case, Pacito v. Trump, to force the government to resume USRAP processing. Although a judge previously ordered the government to process 160 refugees who had travel booked within two weeks of the USRAP suspension, IRAP media relations manager Spencer Tilger said in a press release last week that the federal government informed IRAP that it planned to include refugees in its travel ban. This, Tilger wrote, effectively banned travel for two-thirds of those 160 cases ordered to be processed and admitted.

Amid the uncertainty, VanDiver said that "unless they get serious about restarting USRAP, it's insulting to even discuss it and give false hope. You don't offer a parachute with no ripcord."

The State Department did not respond to questions about Afghans being displaced from CARE housing or about considerations underway for the future of inhabitants of Camp As Sayliyah.