Trailblazer Zahra offered US flight ..but faces chaos at Kabul airport
AFGHAN women’s advocate Zahra Nazari was offered a glimmer of hope yesterday after US authorities granted her a place on a military flight out of Kabul.
Businesswoman Zahra, 20, her 18-year-old sister and 39-year-old mother had been holed up in the Afghan capital after fleeing their home city last week.
She told the Mirror how the extremists had vowed to find and kill her for running her own business and campaigning for women’s rights, and made a direct plea to US President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Boris Johnson for help.
Following our report, Zahra – who had worked with Unicef and the US Embassy – received an email with her American airport visa and instructions to make her way to Kabul’s international airport.
However, it is not clear if the evacuation offer includes her mother and sister, who Zahra says she won’t leave behind.
After making it past Taliban checkpoints to the airport the three women joined scenes of chaos with thousands of other Afghans desperate to leave.
Speaking yesterday, Zahra said: “The airport gates are closed and there are 3000 people waiting outside. It is so crowded and the Taliban are firing a lot.
“We don’t know how long we will be here or what is going to happen.
“I am worried about my mother and sister. I won’t leave the country without them.”
Zahra, one of the Hazara people who are persecuted by the Taliban, won businesswoman of the Year in 2017, aged 17, after opening a handicraft business in Bamiyan, central Afghanistan.
Her mother was the first woman in the city to open a shop, and her sister is the country’s first female skier.
Claiming the family only had money for a few more days’ food and lodging, she begged for help to escape the country, saying: “We are very scared and don’t know what to do.
“Please take us away from here before the Taliban comes and kills us.”