Traitor To Islam
"I might be the next victim. I have been threatened with death because I worked with German advisers who were training the Afghan Security Forces."
Zamir Ahmadi, Kabul, Afghanistan
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| KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN - MARCH 05: An Afghan interpreter with the U.S. Army's 4th squadron 2d Cavalry Regiment helps to question a villager during a joint patrol with soldiers from the Afghan National Army (ANA) March 5, 2014 near Kandahar, Afghanistan. President Obama recently ordered the Pentagon to begin contingency planning for a pullout from Afghanistan by the end of 2014 if Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai or his successor refuses to sign the Bilateral Security Agreement. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images) |
Those Afghans eager to find work and attracted by the opportunity to earn far more generous wages than they generally can otherwise, took ancillary positions with NATO forces in Afghanistan over the past dozen years. The countries' militaries that employed them would have been aware that these people would be targets with the withdrawal of the foreign military forces.
And most of the countries involved, in recognition of that fact have developed refugee programs designed for their former employees to find haven abroad.
Former interpreter, 22-year-old Zamir Ahmadi has experienced the usual harassment that accompanies those good wages and his language interpretation employment with foreign forces. He had acted as an interpreter for the German military in northeastern Afghanistan until May 2013, a two-year stint.
Since his job with the German military ceased, he is nervous about his future. All the more so, given the expressions of contempt going his way from militant Islamists. Hostile, threatening, anonymous telephone calls in the middle of the night; text messages to his mobile phone. Death threats.
He is one of many fearing the future when complete withdrawal of NATO troops take place.
Germany and the United states as well as a number of other NATO countries had planned to leave a skeleton force of military personnel as mentor-instructors to the Afghan national police and military, but unless the security agreement between Afghanistan and the United States is signed by the incoming president after the April election that will see the departure of Hamid Karzai, full withdrawal will ensue.
Ahmadi has been fearfully traumatized by having been informed that his name was shouted out by a Muslim cleric before the start of prayers in a local mosque which just happens to be a place of devotion popular with the Taliban. The cleric had shouted that he was a traitor to Islam. Naming him as a spy, calling on the faithful to kill him.
A neighbour who had attended the mosque relayed that scene to Ahmadi.
He had applied for a visa previously. Among Afghans who have been employed for Germany there were drivers, translators and others, about 1,500 in total. Figures released by the German Interior Ministry testify that to March of last year Germany had processed 596 cases where local Afghan staffers and their families wished to emigrate to Germany.
Of that number 265 received permission, and 59 local staffers with 115 family members having departed for Germany.
Before the turn of the year Germany simplified the immigration process, waiving the need for approval by the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees, enabling Afghans to emigrate holding simply a visa. "If they feel threatened, we take this very, very seriously, even if they are not working for us anymore. We take every single case into account", said Brig.Gen. Walter Ohm, director of military support for the German military in Afghanistan.
Almost 3,000 German troops remain yet in Afghanistan though last September Germany closed down its base in Kunduz ahead of the final withdrawal of foreign combat troops by year's end. Last November a former German interpreter, Jawad Wafa, was discovered in the trunk of a vehicle parked near Kunduz city, six kilometres from the former military base where he had worked. His body showed signs of torture.
Kunduz police spokesman Sayed Sarwar Hussaini said the police have received no complaints from former employees of the Germans about death threats.
Labels: Afghanistan, Afghans, Germany, Taliban, Threats, Violence
posted by Pieface @ Friday, March 07, 2014
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