YET ANOTHER DAY OF KABUL CHAOS
These twin girls make it to Britain... ... this brother and sister are left behind...
Strapped in: Asna and Sana on the plane
POSING for the camera in their party dresses, five-year-old twins Asna and Sana yesterday epitomised the successes of British rescue missions from Kabul as they prepared to begin a new life in England.
The young sisters may not yet understand just how fortunate they are to escape Afghanistan amid fears that up to 1,000 face being left behind.
But for their translator father, the RAF evacuation flight to Britain from Kabul was a lifeline, as he admitted the Taliban would have killed him because of his vital support for the Army.
The ecstasy of the family – interpreter Nooragha Hashimi, his wife, the twins and their brother – was in stark contrast to the desperate scenes unfolding outside a temporary British processing unit at Kabul’s airport, illustrating the lottery faced by those trying to reach the UK.
Under a volley of warning gunfire from troops and Taliban militia, British passport holders found themselves stranded behind a locked door blocked by soldiers wielding rifles.
Distressingly, an ITN news team even filmed two crying children reportedly left behind in the chaotic scramble outside the airport when their parents were admitted entrance.
Mr Hashimi and his family were among the lucky ones.
Speaking to Sky News, the former translator who served alongside the Royal Engineers in the former Taliban stronghold of Helmand
‘They closed the door on us and they’re shooting’
Province said that without intervention he almost certainly would have been killed.
As uniformed British troops fussed over Asna and Sana while scanning them with metal detectors, he said: ‘Everyone knows about me – “He’s an interpreter” – so that’s why this was dangerous for me.’
Reflecting on the Taliban’s pledge of an ‘amnesty’ for those who served alongside Western forces, he added: ‘Everybody was scared about what they’re going to do, and the first time they’re saying “we’re gonna do nothing [to] anybody”, but nobody knows if it will be the same as 1996.’
Under the Taliban’s previous iron-fisted rule of Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, women were banned from work and education and those deemed criminals and traitors were stoned, executed or tortured to death.
The Hashimi family were placed on an RAF aircraft and evacuated alongside around 130 others yesterday.
Such was the clamour to process as many desperate Afghans as possible that some were placed on the floor with cargo ropes used as makeshift seatbelts.
Mr Hashimi said the family planned to settle in southern England, where he hopes the weather is warmer than in the North.
However, at the makeshift processing unit at Hamid Karzai International Airport, which has been besieged by thousands of Afghans hoping to be evacuated, hundreds with links to Britain faced another day of desperation yesterday.
Speaking to ITV News, one man, with a Yorkshire accent and waving a British passport, said he was ‘stuck’ in Afghanistan alongside his chil
dren. He spoke shortly after warning gun shots forced the crowds to cower. ‘I’m a British citizen, my kids are British, and they’re stuck here,’ he said, in visible distress.
‘They closed the door on us and they’re shooting back at us. My message for the Prime Minister is just to get us out of here.
‘Otherwise our kids are struggling and we’re all in a big mess here. The British Army is right behind this fence, they’ve closed the gate and they’re not letting no one in.’
One man pointed to a boy of around five and a girl of around three and said they had been left behind by their parents in the rush to board evacuation flights to Britain. He told the channel’s John Irvine: ‘Mr Biden, you did this. You planned this. You made the deal with the Taliban. This is the consequence of it. This is the repercussions of it. Go to hell, Biden!’
Another British interpreter from Helmand who worked with troops said he had been waiting all night with his wife and children. ‘I need help from the UK,’ he said.
It came as journalists reported feeling threatened by the Taliban for covering such scenes.
Sami Patman, who is working with Sema News, a local media outlet in Kabul, said: ‘I reached the airport of Kabul to cover the rush on the gate. I asked the Taliban fighter at the scene to get permission and to shoot some pictures and footage.
‘His behaviour was aggressive, he threatened me and said, “Leave the area, otherwise I’ll break your camera and kill you.”’
Abdul Razzaq, a Kabul resident hoping for an evacuation flight, said: ‘The situation at times gets worse and Taliban militants open fire every single moment when there is some mismanagement in the crowd. These are scary scenes for all, particularly children who are crying and terrified.’