US to relocate Afghan pilots who fled to Tajikistan
WASHINGTON: The United States hopes to soon relocate around 150 Us-trained Afghan Air Force pilots and other personnel detained in Tajikistan for more than two months after they flew there at the end of the Afghan war, a US official said.
The State Department official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, declined to offer a timeline for the transfer but said the United States wanted to move all of those held at the same time. The details of the US plan have not been previously reported.
Reuters exclusively reported first-person accounts from 143 Us-trained Afghan personnel being held at a sanatorium in a mountainous, rural area outside of the Tajik capital, Dushanbe, waiting for a US flight out to a third country and eventual US resettlement. Speaking on smuggled cell phones kept hidden from guards, they say they have had their phones and identity documents confiscated.
There are also 13 Afghan personnel in Dushanbe, enjoying much more relaxed conditions, who told Reuters they are also awaiting a US transfer. They flew into the country separately.
The Afghan personnel in Tajikistan represent the last major group of Us-trained pilots still believed to be in limbo after dozens of advanced military aircraft were flown across the Afghan border to Tajikistan and to Uzbekistan in
August during the final moments of the war with the Taliban.
In September, a Us-brokered deal allowed a larger group of Afghan pilots and other military personnel to be flown out of Uzbekistan to the United Arab Emirates. Two detained Afghan pilots in Tajikistan said their hopes were lifted in recent days after visits by officials from the US Embassy in Dushanbe.
Although they said they had not yet been given a date for their departure, the pilots said US officials obtained the biometric data needed to complete the process of identifying the Afghans. That was the last step before departure for the Afghan pilots in Uzbekistan. US lawmakers and military veterans who have advocated for the pilots have expressed deep frustration over the time it has taken for Biden’s administration to evacuate Afghan personnel.