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AFGHANISTAN

Spain starts evacuating Afghan employees via Pakistan

Spain was on Monday evacuating via Pakistan Afghan helpers left behind when western forces quit Kabul, a government source confirmed on condition of anonymity.

A group of Afghan nationals stand on the tarmac after disembarking from the last Spanish evacuation flight at the Torrejon de Ardoz air base near Madrid in August. Photo: PIERRE-PHILIPPE MARCOU / AFP)
A group of Afghan nationals stand on the tarmac after disembarking from the last Spanish evacuation flight at the Torrejon de Ardoz air base near Madrid in August. Photo: PIERRE-PHILIPPE MARCOU / AFP)

The government source declined to give any details of the move, citing security concerns.

But Spanish media, including daily El País and National Radio, reported that Madrid would bring close to 250 Afghan citizens, who had already crossed into Pakistan and would be flown out on military transport planes.

The first flight was expected to arrive on Monday evening.

Spain’s evacuations have been weeks in the making, with Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares visiting Pakistan and Qatar in early September to lay the groundwork.

Madrid evacuated over 2,000 people, most of them Afghans who had worked for Spain and their families, during the western withdrawal as the Taliban seized power in Kabul in August.

But the flights had to stop once the final American troops that had been protecting the Afghan capital’s airport left.

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said in August that Spain would not “lose interest in the Afghans who had remained” in their country but wanted to leave.

The European Union’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, on Friday urged the bloc’s member states to host a “minimum” of between 10,000 and 20,000 more Afghan refugees.

“To welcome them, we have to evacuate them, and we’re getting down to it, but it’s not easy,” he said in Madrid.

The EU has said a demand by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees to take in 42,500 Afghan refugees over five years can be achieved — although any decision lies with member states.

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AFGHANISTAN

The Danish resident saving Afghanistan’s women footballers one player at a time

The former captain of Afghanistan's women's football team has been working tirelessly from her home in Denmark to evacuate the team's players, who are under threat from the Taliban. And she isn't giving up.

The Danish resident saving Afghanistan's women footballers one player at a time
Khalida Popal photographed in the stands of FC Nordsjaelland in Farum. Photo: Tariq Mikkel Khan / Ritzau Scanpix / AFP

Khalida Popal is more determined than ever to continue her fight for the emancipation of girls and women in her native country, where the Taliban do not allow women to play sports.

As she battles to bring football players out of the country, she hasn’t slept for days.

“We have managed to get 75 people out of Afghanistan, which includes players and their families” who have flown to Australia, Popal tells AFP, sitting in the stands of FC Nordsjaelland, the Danish first division team for which she works as commercial coordinator. “We are trying to get more players out of Afghanistan. We’ll do everything possible to get our players out.”

Popal, 34, came to Denmark from Afghanistan 10 years ago as a refugee. She has not slept since Afghanistan fell into the hands of the Taliban, her hands clasped tightly around her phone as she helps organise the evacuation of the players, together with professional players’ union FIFPro among others.

On her voicemail, she listens to desperate pleas for help. As manager of Afghanistan’s now-splintered national squad, she is the point-person for the players, who are in a state of shock. Some of them have been threatened by hardline Islamists, others beaten by the Taliban.

“I had to take the lead, together with my team, to help them to get out of Afghanistan. The players were crying, seeking protection, hopeless,” she says.

Tool for emancipation

She helped them “to regroup, to keep up hope and not give up. That was the toughest,” she said, describing herself as a “survivor”. For their safety, she won’t disclose any details about the players still in Afghanistan that they’re trying to get out. She looks exhausted, but her determination is visible.

For her, football is her passion. But more importantly, she sees it as a tool for the emancipation of Afghan women. Everything she learned on the pitch — team spirit, determination, perseverance — has come in useful these past few days. She recalls her own childhood in Afghanistan, one she says was stolen by the Taliban.

“I was not able to go to school, I was not able to participate in any social activities,” she explains. “We wanted to kind of take revenge and say ‘football is the way that we want to take revenge from the Taliban and the Taliban is our enemy’. That was our strong statement.”

Since the first women’s teams started emerging about 15 years ago, football has grown rapidly in Afghanistan. But it all disappeared overnight when Kabul fell to the Taliban.

“We had around 3,000 to 4,000 women and girls who were registered in the football federation at different levels: grassroots, elite level, and semi-elite level. We had referees, coaches, female coaches,” Popal says.

‘Our pride has been taken from us’

“After the fall of Kabul, that was all gone. That’s sad,” she says, her voice cracking.

The players’ future is unknown at this point. They “might play football, but they will not play as players of Afghanistan, because they will not have a country nor a national team.”

The Taliban “have changed the flag of Afghanistan, the flag we felt proud to see and play for. Our pride has been taken from us,” she said.

With US troops set to leave on August 31, Popal, whose parents also live in Denmark, fears her native country will be abandoned and forgotten.

“Once again, people will live in a dark time. And whatever humanitarian crisis and crime happens in Afghanistan, nobody will be able to report about it.”

Especially, she says, since the Taliban have become better at speaking to the international media.

But she will continue to use her own voice.

“As human beings, stand together with me and fight, and be the voice for every woman of Afghanistan,” she pleaded. “For every woman who is left in the country, every woman who feels betrayed and abandoned.”

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