When Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, descended into panic as the city fell to the Taliban, Prince Wafa placed a desperate call to a State Department number set up to help people trying to flee. Wafa, an American citizen who lives in San Diego, had arrived in Afghanistan just a month before to visit his wife in Kabul. After the sudden collapse of the U.S.-backed Afghan government, he is now attempting to get her and himself out of the country to safety.
A former U.S. Army translator, Wafa, who became a U.S. citizen in 2019, is among those most endangered by the fall of the Afghan government: people who cooperated with U.S. forces and are now likely to be treated as traitors by the Taliban, Afghanistan’s new rulers. The home of Wafa’s family in the city of Herat had already been visited by longtime neighbors who turned out to be covertly working for the Taliban; the neighbors were said to be searching for him.
The abrupt departure of American troops and closure of the Kabul airport left Wafa, who fears violent retribution for his work with the U.S., stuck hiding with his wife in Kabul and looking for a way out.
When Wafa called the State Department on August 29, the deadline for the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan was still expected to be two days away. An official picked up Wafa’s call and gave him instructions on what to do.
Wafa was reassured by the confident tone of the U.S. official. “They told me that they would not leave any citizen in the country, they would get everyone out,” Wafa said. “They told me to take shelter and not go to the airport and to wait for further directions on what to do.” The official took down his information and told Wafa to wait for another call that would provide directions on how to safely exit the country with his wife.
Wafa waited for a nerve-wracking 24 hours, but no call came.
read more here: https://theintercept.com/2021/08/31/us-citizen-afghanistan-evacuation-state-department/
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