KABUL (SW) – With the rise of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan, the process of evacuating foreign nationals and those Afghans under threat, including journalists, gained momentum.
On humanitarian grounds, a number of countries have announced their readiness to accept journalists from Afghanistan. Although the initial evacuation of journalists and vulnerable citizens has ended, there have been reports that a number of people have left Afghanistan by using forged journalistic documents.
A number of journalists told a news conference in Kabul on Monday that the evacuation of vulnerable citizens, especially journalists, was not transparent and that institutions had evacuated other people in exchange for money without reviewing their documents.
Nasir Akhtarzai, head of the Afghanistan Journalists’ Union, said that the documents of those who left Afghanistan as journalists should be carefully examined.
“It was not a transparent process. Members of civil society should also be asked about their identity and which institution they belongs to”, he said adding forged identities were used for evacuation.
Frozan Khalilyar, a local journalist, said that while the journalists are not safe and face many challenges, it was worrisome to see people exploit the situation for their benefits. “The latest incident of 160 people evacuated in disguise of journalists has concerned us all”, said Khalilyar.
This comes as donors from Silicon Valley including LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, as well as Facebook Inc., had agreed to fund an evacuation flight for 188 journalists, aid workers and others who were suddenly in danger after the Taliban’s quick capture of Kabul.
They hoped to get most of those evacuees to Mexico City, via Abu Dhabi, to start a new life.
Those plans largely succeeded. But amid the chaos in Afghanistan, they also took an unexpected turn.
Shortly before their flight left on Aug. 30, the airline — Kam Air — stuffed the half-empty plane with at least 155 additional passengers — its employees, their families and more, according to U.S. officials and organizers of the flight
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