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AFGHANISTAN Trump also suspends reception programs: 1,600 Afghan refugees blocked

They are people who had worked with the United States in Afghanistan and had already received approval for resettlement. The program, which grants a Special Immigrant Visa, was established in 2009 and also includes family members of the selected people. On the eve of Trump’s inauguration, 200 Afghans managed to leave the Philippines, where they had been transferred to complete bureaucratic procedures.

Washington DC () – The flights of some 1,660 Afghans who had already received approval to move to the United States were canceled between yesterday and today, following President Donald Trump’s decision to suspend the reception programs for at least four months. refugees. Among them are unaccompanied minors awaiting family reunification and Afghan citizens who fear retaliation from the Taliban for cooperating with the US military, said Shawn VanDiver.founder of a veterans cooperative that works with the government in the evacuation of Afghans.

The news was confirmed by a US official who, on condition of anonymity, explained that the names of people already authorized for resettlement had been removed from the passenger lists of a series of flights scheduled through April. The list also included 200 people who had obtained US citizenship after enlisting in the US Army.

On the new White House website, on the page dedicated to “President Trump’s priorities for putting America back first,” the Republican president is said to be “suspending refugee resettlement, due to that American communities have been forced to receive large and unsustainable populations of migrants, severely straining security and resources.” Trump’s decision leaves thousands of other refugees who had been approved for resettlement in limbo. who had not been assigned flights. Many are stranded in Afghanistan or Pakistan, where they risk being forcibly repatriated due to expulsion policies adopted by Islamabad.

On January 19, a day before Trump’s inauguration, nearly 200 Afghans who had received regular visas from the US Embassy in the Philippines They managed to reach the United Statesas part of a agreement signed in August last year between Washington and Manila to obtain the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV). This is a program created in 2009 “to resettle Afghans who have worked for the United States” for at least one year starting in 2001 and to which the relatives of the selected people can also access. According to Kanishka Gangopadhyay, spokesperson for the US Embassy in the Philippines, 60 percent of the Afghans who left Manila in recent days were minors.

Since the withdrawal of US troops from Kabul in 2021, the Biden administration has received a total of almost 200,000 Afghans. But thousands of refugees remain stranded in countries in the region, including Pakistan. In July 2024, Islamabad extended residence permits issued by the UNHCR for 1.45 million registered Afghans for one year, although human rights groups estimate the total number of refugees in the country is more than 2 million. In addition, in October 2023 Pakistan launched a repatriation program for undocumented Afghans in which regular refugees were also involved. According to the International Organization for Migration, at least 813,000 Afghans have returned from Pakistan despite the risks related to the Taliban regime.

Thousands of Afghans have found refuge in Iran, where they nevertheless face discrimination and legal difficulties. two days ago Norwegian Refugee Council reported the forced repatriation of 3,000 Afghans in a single day. In 2024 they expelled a total of 750,000 Afghansbut the Tehran government has announced that it wants to increase the number to 2 million by March 2025. According to humanitarian organizations, Afghans are also 95% of the prisoners detained in Iran. Taliban authorities recently announced an agreement with Tehran for the return of 1,500 detaineesbut they did not give more details.

The international agencies estimate that almost 23 million people in Afghanistan – approximately half the population – are in need of humanitarian assistance, including 15 million who are severely food insecure.



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