It is far too early to predict the final outcome of the Ukraine invasion, but it is clear that no peace settlement or ceasefire will be reached soon. Nearly four months after Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine, millions of Ukrainians have been forced to flee to European and even non-European countries such as the United States and Canada. The war in Ukraine not only threw the country’s and the world’s economies into disarray, but it also cost Afghanistan economically and The fate of the Afghans who have been displaced by the arrival remains unknown.
According to reports, the US and the international community have chosen to treat Afghans like stepmothers, providing Ukrainians with residency documents and visas in their countries in just seven days. However, large numbers of Afghan asylum seekers’ documents have faded away, and some countries (Germany, for example) have reportedly revoked documents issued to some Afghan asylum seekers. According to specialists in international affairs, the international community’s double standards are in direct violation of human rights and international law.
“They left Afghanistan like a hot potato, burnt our (women’s) hands, and dumped us, we are dropped,” Mahbooba Siraj, an Afghan women’s rights campaigner, told Vice, an English-language YouTube channel. “This is the reality, and I will shout it from the highest peaks of the earth,” she concluded. “I am depending on women, and I am counting on mankind.”
After defeating his military opponent Soviet Union (USSR) in Afghanistan via Afghans, the international community, particularly the United States, simply ignored Afghanistan for the first time in the 1990s.
As a result of this huge historical blunder, Afghanistan has been engulfed in a civil war that is still unfolding. After years of deadlock, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev signed a peace treaty with Afghanistan in April 1988. The last Soviet soldier left Afghanistan in February 1989, and the civil conflict raged until the Taliban took power in the late 1990s. According to an interview with former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, the US helped develop another group, the Taliban, with the support of Pakistan’s military intelligence (ISI). The Taliban took control of Afghanistan in 1996. Following the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the US Trade Center, the United States invaded Afghanistan on October 7, 2001, overthrowing the Taliban’s five-year-old radical government and establishing a US-backed new democratic government in Afghanistan with the support of forty-eight other NATO allies. The United States took the lead by establishing a 20-year military presence in Afghanistan. “And finally, 16 days after the Taliban took control on August 15th, On August 31st, US President Joe Biden stated that the United States has finished its 20-year war in Afghanistan, the longest in American history.
The US government has a lot of lessons to learn from Afghanistan.
Despite the fact that US and NATO countries have evacuated over a hundred thousand Afghans in evacuation operations, some have arrived in the United States and are still languishing in various camps day and night.
Hundreds of thousands of Afghans have remained in Afghanistan after working with foreign nations, particularly American forces and projects, and have presented their documents, with the US state promising to evacuate them. Despite this, they have been locked up at home for over ten months and have been counting down the days until their asylum cases are resolved and they may travel to their destination countries. They had no idea, however, that the Ukraine war would freeze their markets to the point that no one would purchase them for a dime.
Poverty, hunger, and new evidence that biometric data systems are endangering Afghans
According to the World Food Program (WFP), 22.8 million people are experiencing acute food insecurity, while 8.7 million are experiencing emergency food insecurity. Drought has increased displacement, putting a strain on humanitarian services. The country’s economy, as well as its health and education systems, are on the verge of collapse.
According to current and former military sources, the present administration has seized US military biometrics equipment that might aid in the identification of Afghans who supported coalition forces.
Human Rights Watch stated today that the Taliban possess systems containing sensitive biometric data that Western donor states left behind in Afghanistan in August 2021, putting thousands of Afghans in danger.
Journalists, activists, and human rights advocates’ residences have been raided by the Taliban.
freezing Afghanistan’s assets and putting international funds on hold
According to international agencies, Afghanistan’s reliance on international help has come to a halt, causing the country’s economy to collapse.
On the other hand, the US has frozen ten billion dollars of Afghanistan, one-third of which is the money of ordinary Afghans and businesspeople, and its fate is uncertain.
the present Afghan administration is not recognized
Another key difficulty that has exacerbated Afghanistan’s present dilemma and severed Afghanistan’s diplomatic and government-to-government links with the rest of the world is the current government’s non-recognition, which has lasted over a year. Although the international community accuses the Islamic Emirate of not granting women’s rights, not allowing girls to attend school, and failing to form an inclusive government, the Acting Foreign Minister refutes the accusations, claiming that the world has yet to propose a government formation model, and that the above-mentioned issues, which the international community views as a barrier to their government’s recognition, are merely an excuse.
conclusion and Solutions
Given Afghanistan’s current unwarranted humanitarian, economic, and security situation, if the international community continues to see Afghanistan as a problem and focuses solely on the on-the-ground benefits, competition, and interests in Ukraine, Afghanistan will once again be at the mercy of armed with nuclear weapon neighbors stimulated arm groups, who will fight hard enough to get rid of it, If the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan spirals out of control, the nation will become a shelter for terrorist and destructive groups, posing a serious danger to global security and stability.
According to international affairs specialists, this is the technological and knowledge era, and the international community’s breakdown of their pledges to Afghans, as well as their insensibility in this crisis, will not be forgotten. And the international community’s indifference to the current catastrophe in Afghanistan, which has been the legacy of their acts, deeds, and commitments for the last 20 years, has gravely harmed their prestige, political position, and reputation across the world. Furthermore, they will find it more difficult to fight them in Afghanistan who are now finding a foothold in here.
And the US, NATO, and the rest of the world should exert direct pressure on the present Afghan administration to tackle these challenges.
The international community’s and the US’s approach to closing and closing borders is not the answer. It continues to mistreat the Afghan people and inflames anti-international sentiment.
- https://www.wfp.org/countries/afghanistan
- https://theintercept.com/2021/08/17/afghanistan-taliban-military-biometrics/
- https://www.csis.org/analysis/ukraine-war-preparing-longer-term-outcome
- https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/03/30/new-evidence-biometric-data-systems-imperil-afghans
- https://www.hrw.org/asia/afghanistan
