{"id":329019,"date":"2021-08-23T03:00:37","date_gmt":"2021-08-23T00:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/a-canadian-bottleneck-in-kabul-is-endangering-innocent-lives\/"},"modified":"2021-08-23T03:00:37","modified_gmt":"2021-08-23T00:00:37","slug":"a-canadian-bottleneck-in-kabul-is-endangering-innocent-lives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/a-canadian-bottleneck-in-kabul-is-endangering-innocent-lives\/","title":{"rendered":"#A Canadian bottleneck in Kabul is endangering innocent lives"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#A Canadian bottleneck in Kabul is endangering innocent lives<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n Paul Wells: People struggling to escape and those helping them are running up against procedural confusion layered on top of constant mortal danger\n <\/div>\n
\n A coalition of non-governmental organizations trying to get Afghans with a history of helping Canadians out of war-torn Kabul says immigration bottlenecks are putting those innocent lives at risk.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur immedia<\/a>te concern is, can IRCC simplify the process?\u201d David Fraser, a retired Canadian major-general<\/a> who is trying to get 1,650 people out of Afghanistan, said in a telephone interview, using the initials of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. <\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s becoming the unanimous request of groups that are working with Canadian officials, and with small groups of frightened Afghans on the ground around Kabul, to help people escape the chaos that has engulfed the Afghan capital.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Canadian government needs to provide \u201cclear guidance\u201d to those people trying to get out, Fraser said. \u201cW<\/span>hen do they want them to move? Where do they want them to go? And keep it simple. Because we\u2019ve got groups that have been sitting on the ground 12, 24, 36 hours, making the trip<\/a> [from safe places around Kabul to the fences and crowds surrounding Kabul\u2019s airport] two or three times. And the conditions\u2014I can\u2019t describe. They have to go through Taliban checkpoints, Afghan security checkpoints, a sea of humanity, panic, to get up to a gate to find somebody to connect with and identify with.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fraser said the most evident bottleneck is the work by immigration officials to process the app<\/a>lications of candidates for transport. Government officials on Saturday told reporters in Ottawa that IRCC is working to clear applicants as quickly as possible. And they\u2019ve been relaxing requirements as they go. Since mid-August, applicants seeking to leave Afghanistan no longer need passports. Visa\u00a0officers are working around the clock, the government officials said, and rather than using email or requesting additional documentation, where possible officers are calling applicants or their representatives to seek the information required.<\/p>\n

Fraser, who has been pushing the government for two months to get Canada-linked Afghans out of the country, said he doesn\u2019t doubt the good faith. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of criticism of Harj,\u201d he said, referring to Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan, who served under Fraser in Afghanistan 15 years ago. \u201cOn this one, I\u2019m giving Harj full marks. He\u2019s pushing on this one. I don\u2019t know what\u2019s happening underneath him, you know, in the department. And Marco [Mendicino, the immigration minister] has been pretty good on this one, too. But the bureaucrats are being bureaucratic.\u201d<\/p>\n

The result, advocates for the people trying to get out say, is procedural confusion layered on top of constant mortal danger. This is, it should be said, a story many Canadian journalists approach with particular urgency, because so many of the people trying to get out worked as interpreters, fixers and guides for Canadian journalists.<\/p>\n

At a news<\/a> briefing Sunday with ministers responsible for the evacuation effort, CTV News anchor Lisa LaFlamme asked about some of the people she\u2019s been in contact with. \u201cThe Afghan families that we are tracking received a text [Saturday] to proceed to the airport on their own. Then they were told not to go. There were several texts back and forth, complete confusion,\u201d\u00a0 she said. \u201cThere were no buses, no Canadian soldiers, no military escorts to get them there safely to the airport\u2014as France managed to do. I wonder why not. And is there a plan for Canadian Forces to go outside the wire to help these people successfully and safely get to the Kabul airport?\u201d<\/p>\n

Sajjan said Canadian special-forces soldiers at the airport are \u201cdoing everything in their power\u201d to help, but that operational security kept him from giving more detail. Canadian soldiers have, however, \u201cdone some very creative and interesting work to be able to connect with people and guide them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mendicino added that his department is \u201cremaining in constant contact with everybody that has applied under our programs, giving them as much direction with regards to where and when and how to stay safe as possible.\u201d Officials \u201cwill exhaust every effort to continue to process those applications as quickly as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

Advocates for the people trying to flee Afghanistan are reluctant to directly criticize a government they\u2019re working with closely and which has succeeded in getting some people out. But they see a vast disconnect between what they\u2019re hearing from cabinet ministers and what they\u2019re hearing from the people who are in danger.<\/p>\n

Kevin Newman, the former Global and CTV news anchor who is working with the NGO group, points out that so far, Canadian transport flights have been taking off with other countries\u2019 nationals on board\u2014an indication that other countries have been more successful than Canada at finding and processing people who need help. In an article for the newsletter The Line<\/a>, Newman decried \u201cthe government\u2019s obsession with paperwork. Even [on Sunday] Canadian officials on the safe side of the airport controlling who might get through were reported by eyewitnesses to be taking an \u2018extremely strict\u2019 approach to paperwork verification. Only those granted full Canadian citizenship under the government\u2019s Special Immigration Measure are being told they qualify to leave. That requires a lot more work to process and is perhaps less than a tenth of all the Afghans who are known to have applied and are in various stages of completing multiple forms.\u201d<\/p>\n

The people Fraser, Newman and others are trying to help are disproportionately from Kandahar, where most of the Canadian military effort was concentrated between 2005 and 2011. They\u2019ve had no government help getting from Kandahar to Kabul, a 500-km drive on the notorious Highway 1 with its banditry and Taliban checkpoints. And now they\u2019re caught in administrative limbo, unsure when it\u2019s safe to approach the airport or whether their efforts will succeed if they do. Their numbers grow daily. \u201cIt\u2019s been hard,\u201d Fraser said. \u201cJust excruciating.\u201d
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