Last-minute reprieve: 200 embassy guards good to go
Afghan guards who protected Aussie diplomats in Kabul are approved for asylum visas.
Nearly 200 Afghan security guards who protected Australian diplomats in Kabul have been approved for asylum visas in a last-minute reprieve after they were told as recently as Saturday to “contact a migration agent”.
Amid ongoing turmoil outside the city’s airport, where seven people were killed in the crush at the weekend, the federal government revealed the guards and their family members had been approved for humanitarian visas.
The move came after more than 100 received an email from the government at the weekend saying they had been rejected for locally-engaged employee (LEE) visas and encouraging them to apply for one of 3000 general humanitarian places earmarked for those fleeing the country.
“We encourage you to investigate your options fully, including under this humanitarian stream,” the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said. “You may wish to contact a migration agent to discuss these avenues.”
But late on Sunday, years after some first sought asylum, a DFAT spokesman said the guards had “been approved for visas in another humanitarian category”.
“Every applicant who does not meet the criteria of the category of at-risk employees now has their application forwarded automatically to the Department of Home Affairs to be automatically considered under another humanitarian stream,” the spokesman said.
“This process has already resulted in hundreds of other visas being granted to those who are ineligible for the special category.”
As Australian officials scrambled to process visa applications, some of which had been in train for years, more than 300 people escaped the besieged capital on RAAF flights. We will continue to run those flights, working together with our partners and our allies,” Scott Morrison told the ABC.
“As best as we can communicate in what is a very chaotic environment, with comms under constant pressure and a very chaotic scene outside the airport, then we continue to … get as many people through as we possibly can in the time we have available, as safely as we can,” the Prime Minister said.
However, the crush outside the airport gates and the persistent threat of violence was preventing many of those with visas from getting to safety.
Former Australian Defence Force interpreter Sanjar told The Australian he had been shot at by a Taliban fighter as he tried to approach foreign soldiers at the gate to show them his family’s Australian visa papers, which he received by email on Saturday.
“The Taliban shoot under my foot on the ground. I’m fine now but I am very afraid,” he said via WhatsApp.
Another former ADF interpreter, Mohammed, also received visa approvals for his family on Saturday, after days of uncertainty.
“I made it to the airport. Now I am looking for some Aussies to try and get in, to make it to the plane,” he said.
An Afghan man already in Australia, Easa, said he had been in contact with his family members – a group of nine at the airport gate – who were facing demands for bribes from the CIA-backed Khost Protection Force, which was patrolling the outside of the gate for the Americans.
“My cousins hold valid visas and are at the gate. KPF is under control,” he said. “They can’t get through because they want $US500-$US1000 in order to approach ADF. I don’t know what to say. I told them to wait and get through somehow.
“They have no hope of getting through unless they get their name called and get escorted because of the amount of people sitting down.”
Britain’s Sky News aired footage of bodies outside the airport covered in white shrouds and Western soldiers pulling children out of the crowds and treating injured and dehydrated Afghans.
Afghan security forces manning checkpoints between the Taliban outside the airport and Western forces within it said on Sunday the airport would be closed for 48 hours to allow Western forces to clear the crowds of evacuees inside the airport, some of whom had gone days without food, and for the international community prepares more refugee shelters.
Anti-Taliban militia forces captured three districts 160km north of Kabul in two days of fighting at the weekend, signalling the start of a fresh civil conflict in Afghanistan as the Western evacuation effort from the capital reached new heights of chaos.
The US government warned its citizens on Sunday to stay away from the airport unless specifically contacted to come, amid fears Islamic State fighters were seeking to capitalise on the mayhem to launch attacks.
The Biden administration said it hoped to complete its evacuation by August 31 – a deadline EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said at the weekend was “mathematically impossible”.
Britain’s Armed Forces Minister James Heappey has also warned that the air bridge out of Afghanistan for British evacuees could close within days and that not everyone would be evacuated.
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