Abandoning the Liberal Government of Canada's Promise to Afghan Civilians
Abandoning the Liberal Government of Canada's Promise to Afghan Civilians
"In our conversation today you suggested we shouldn't be so involved and should step back and 'let the professionals in the Ministries handle it' or something to that effect.""I hate to tell you, but everyone on the ground considers our government's management of this amounts, so far, to be a total disaster.""It is, however, a little galling to suggest our office is an impediment and the Ministries are doing a great job.""These men [Afghan civilians who worked for Canadian diplomats and Canadian forces] have not only provided their own countrymen with selfless service at their own risk, but are in part the reason why many soon-to-be Canadian citizens are alive and able to apply to these special immigration measures.""Retired General Thompson, who used to command the special forces, called me this A.M. and said he was 'livid' when he saw the video [depicting Canadian soldiers ignoring GAC-approved evacuees at Kabul airport].""The fact we continue to place getting the paperwork right above saving lives, outrageous as it is, seems to me classical Canadian government bureaucracy and therefore not totally surprising.""Separating families, like parents from their children, is however, something that I would think is totally un-Canadian.""I know that our government can't, for security reasons, reveal its plans and that we need to 'have faith' that we are doing everything we can to help the Afghans we claim to be trying to help. I am however, sorry to say, starting to lose faith."Marcus Powlowski, Liberal Member of Parliament, Thunder Bay-Rainy River, mid-August, 2021"I am astounded that a member of the embassy biometrics team, or members of the embassy staff in general, would even have access to the names and nicknames of those who are working with using this capacity [referring to an Afghan interpreter by his underground nickname identifying him as an Aman Lara operator].""I'm appalled that this information would be shared in this casual manner, and with no apparent understanding of the impact communicating this knowledge in such a manner could have."Drummond Fraser, Aman Lara co-founder, retired lieutenant-colonel
During
that brief period when the Taliban was speedily taking over districts
and provinces, villages, towns and cities in Afghanistan on its way to
reaching its final destination, the capital Kabul, to oust the legally
constituted government supported by Western powers, allies Germany, the
United States and the United Kingdom undertook dangerous and determined
missions to rescue their personnel and remove them from the path of the
incoming Taliban, and with them the Afghans and their families who had
worked for them as office workers and interpreters.
Canada
spoke quite a bit about its moral and ethical duty to rescue the Afghan
civilians who had worked with Canadian diplomats and military, Prime
Minister Justin Trudeau assured everyone that he had the matter well in
hand and would never abandon the Afghans whose lives were in danger from
the Taliban who would make every effort to root them out, imprison,
torture and kill them. No fewer than 23 Members of Parliament
collectively approached the Liberal government to make haste.
On
the day Kabul fell to the Taliban, and the days that followed to the
end of August when all foreign troops were to leave the country, a
prodigious effort was underway to rescue thousands of Afghans to ferry
them out of harm's way and ultimately bring them to the countries which
they had assisted during the NATO presence in war-torn Afghanistan. But
in Canada, the prime minister saw an opportunity to call a snap election
and turned his attention to persuading Canadians to give him a majority
government.
It
had been known for months that the Taliban agreement with the U.S. for
troop withdrawal meant that a narrow window existed to extract the
vulnerable Afghan civilians who had brushed away risks to work with
foreign countries, and that moral indebtedness dictated they be taken
out of harm's way. A Canadian veterans' group had taken steps the
government had not, establishing a group they called Aman Lara, to
rescue Afghan civilians whom Canada owed a debt of gratitude to, and
their families.
Photo by Canadian Armed Forces/Handout via REUTERS |
This
group of veterans had attempted repeatedly to infuse the government
with a sense of mission and timing, and failed. Member of Parliament
Powlowski was brought into the rescue fold when Drummond Fraser, a
co-founder of Aman Lara, a retired lieutenant-colonel, apprised him of a
threatening phone call one of their safe-house coordinators in Kabul
had received: "Who
works for infidels and taking people out from our country and sending
them to the infidel country...Don't worry, we will be soon your guests."
Which
alarmed and motivated the Member of Parliament to initiate his own
efforts to infuse the government with a sense of urgency. Concerns were
raised of Taliban spies infiltrating safe houses, used by the Aman Lara
group to house vulnerable Afghans and their families until they could be
air-lifted out of the country to safety. Evacuation for most, however,
never took place. Although recommendations for the immediate transport
of Afghans with established links to Canada should take place
expeditiously to a safe third country while their safe have in Canada
was being processed, hundreds had little option but to go into hiding.
Immigration,
Refugees and Citizenship Canada had its bureaucratic routines and
paperwork, and Foreign Affairs Canada had its preoccupations and the
Canadian military lacked orders to act with alacrity, and so nothing was
done to evacuate desperate Afghans though they themselves flooded local
internet cafes to complete their applications as instructed and in the
process were inadvertently exposed to Taliban collaborators.
In
one instance a Canadian embassy staffer openly referred to an Afghan by
his underground nickname during a biometrics appointment, identifying
him as an Aman Lara operator. The Prime Minister's Office lectured MP
Powlowski to extract himself from involvement in the matter, that
matters would proceed at their pace and all would be well. Even as panic
and confusion in the capital of Kabul grew with Afghans terrified of
their future prospects hunted by the Taliban.
Nothing
stopped MP Powlowski from reiterating his concerns, made all the more
urgent by new revelations that very few interpreters were being allowed
aboard Canadian relief flights. All the more shocking with the
appearance of a video showing approved evacuees being turned away by
Canadian forces at the Kabul airport. Afghan nationals were forced to
stand in an open sewer waving their passports, visas and
government-issued letters guaranteeing safe passage on relief flights.
Few made it out.
And
that timing coincided with the Taliban conducting door-to-door searches
of homes looking for so-called 'collaborators and traitors'. That
category also matched the position of Afghan civilians who had worked
for the former Afghan government, and members of the Afghan military as
well. All considered to be puppets of the West, enablers and unfaithful
to the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan represented by the Taliban.
Labels: Afghan Worker Rescues, Afghanistan, Canadian Failure, Evacuation, NATO Countries, Taliban
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