EXCLUSIVE: ‘We Lost Everything’: Afghan Migrants Stuck in Guatemala Have a Message for Biden
Guatemala City, Guatemala — President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw U.S. troops was wrong and he should give Afghans refuge in America, six Afghan migrants told the Daily Caller News Foundation in an exclusive interview.
During the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, Biden left them scrambling and they desperately tried to escape via Kabul airport, where the situation was bloody, chaotic and tense, the group told the DCNF. Their trip led them to Guatemala, where they were detained with 10 other Afghan migrants and other foreigners.
“My message for the government of USA, please open your doors for us and help us,” one emotional Afghan refugee told the DCNF in Guatemala. “We don’t have a country now. I don’t feel we have a country. When I am from Afghanistan, I feel like this too. I don’t have a country. We are the humans of this world. And we need the help of this world.”
“I had a good life, I never want to leave my country,” he said.
Since then, they’ve been trying to find their way to the U.S., a trek that started with a flight to Brazil after crossing into Iran.
“We also have a lot of messages for him,” one Afghan refugee told the DCNF. “First of all, Afghanistan was a country that moving to a good side. It was changing, moving for us from last 20 year, we were also in the war.”
“Our future was bright,” he said. “Our education system was at good side, everything was going well, but suddenly they made a decision, but everything finished. Our future, our education system, everything.”
The Biden administration evacuated U.S. forces from Afghanistan on Aug. 30, 2021, which quickly led to the Taliban takeover of the country. Between July 2021 and January 2022, the U.S. accepted over 79,000 Afghan evacuees.
“There is nothing more,” another Afghan refugee told the DCNF. “We lost everything. We don’t have any hope for a future in Afghanistan. That’s why we left everything and came here.”
“What we can say to Biden because we are a small country people, poor country people, but I just want to tell that it was not a good decision that he took. And I hope that they took a good decision for in future for our country, for our children, for our mother and sisters,” he said.
Some of the Afghan men were engineers and doctors, and one worked in the Afghan government before the U.S. withdrawal. They said they hope they can find any job in the U.S. to support their families in Afghanistan, which they hope will eventually join them in the U.S.
“As you supported before us in this 20 years … please do not leave them alone in this moment. Please support them as you can because they need everything,” the second Afghan refugee said.
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