Tanzania’s opposition Chadema party held its first public rally in six years this week, after the government lifted a ban on such gatherings. Despite the restored right to rally, critics doubt Tanzania’s Party of the Revolution, the second-longest ruling party in Africa, will stop squeezing opponents and say a change in law is needed. Charles Kombe reports from Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. VOA footage by Rajabu Hassan.
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Fresh Clashes as M23 Rebels Make Gains in East DR Congo
M23 rebels in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo clashed with soldiers and rival militias on Thursday, according to officials, who said the group’s fighters had also severed a vital road in the turbulent region.
The M23 has conquered swaths of territory in North Kivu province since last year and advanced toward its capital, Goma.
The group first leapt to prominence in 2012 when it captured the city of more than 1 million people before being driven out the following year.
Kivu Security Tracker, a respected violence monitor, said on Wednesday that the M23 was advancing in North Kivu’s Masisi territory.
The Tutsi-led group had cut off the road leading between the town of Kitchanga, which is in Masisi, and Goma, it said.
Police and local government officials in the area confirmed to Agence France-Presse on Thursday that the road had been cut off.
The artery is considered vital for supplying Goma, especially since the main highway leading north out of the city has been cut off since an earlier M23 advance.
A resident of the village of Kilolirwe, in Masisi, said that clashes with the rebels were also ongoing near Kitchanga.
An army official, who declined to be named, also said that clashes there were continuing.
Heritier Ndangendange, the spokesman for the APCLS militia, described the situation in Kitchanga as tense but said the APCLS and allied fighters remained in control there.
The fresh clashes come after the M23 was required to withdraw from territory it occupies, under the terms of regional mediation efforts.
Former Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, a mediator for the East African Community bloc, warned on Wednesday the situation was “sharply deteriorating.”
The fighting has triggered a humanitarian crisis and led to a row between DR Congo and neighboring Rwanda.
The government in Kinshasa accuses Rwanda of supporting the M23, something Kigali denies.
The M23 is among the scores of armed groups that roam the east of the mineral-rich Democratic Republic of Congo.
Many are a legacy of two wars at the end of the 20th century that claimed millions of lives and sucked in countries from around the region.
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With New Deep Sea Port, Nigeria’s Focus Turns to Better Road, Rail Connections
Nigerian authorities have hailed the launch of a deepwater seaport in Lagos they say will create 300,000 jobs and reduce shipping bottlenecks. While the new port is expected to reduce losses due to congestion, shipping industry experts say Nigeria’s poor roads and rail connections to ports also must be improved.
The launch by President Mohammadu Buhari during his two-day visit this week to Lagos signaled his government’s effort to grow Nigeria’s economy through infrastructural development.
The 1.5-billion-dollar, Chinese-built Lekki Deep Sea Port sits on 90 hectares of land in the Lagos Free Trade Zone — the biggest port by size in West Africa.
Authorities say ships docking at the port could be up to four times the size of vessels at the state’s Tin Can and Apapa ports. They expect it will ease delays and congestion at ports and increase earnings by up to $360 billion in coming years.
Efioita Ephraim is a manager at Ports and Terminal Nigeria, Ltd.
“The current ports we have in the country are located along rivers, tributaries and that’s why there are limitations. It’s a welcome development to have an infrastructure like this in our country. With this, larger vessels will be able to berth at our ports and we shall be in competition with neighboring countries such as Cotonou [Benin],” said Ephraim.
Most of Nigeria’s seaports were built many decades ago and are either closed or operating below capacity.
Nigeria loses an estimated $1 billion a year to delays and bottlenecks at ports. To address the problem, the Nigerian Ports Authority launched an automated process for clearing cargo at ports.
Abiodun Gbadamosi is the former general manager of Nigeria’s western ports. He said the new deep sea port at Lagos will add to Nigeria’s economic progress and create jobs.
The country’s bureau of statistics says Nigeria’s unemployment rate is 33 percent.
“What Nigeria needs now are jobs, jobs and more jobs, and that’s going to go a very long way. It’s going to improve the commerce around that area. It’s highly commendable and it’s going to actually propel the state. Then Nigeria can now push forward the idea of being hub for the region,” he said.
Ephraim said authorities must improve road and rail accessibility to the area.
“If the items are to be conveyed out of the port and into the port by road, then I would expect the multimodal mode of transportation be encouraged to and from the Lekki deep sea port, rail water and road transportation.”
China is one of Nigeria’s biggest lenders and has been funding rail, road and power projects.
The first commercial vessel is expected to arrive in the port this Sunday.
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World Bank: Afghan Revenue Collection, Exports Remain Strong
The World Bank has delivered a surprisingly upbeat assessment of the Afghan economy in the first nine months of the fiscal year 2022, citing high exports, a stable exchange rate and strong revenue collection under Taliban rule.
The report stands in stark contrast to regular reports from U.N. agencies and NGOs of near-universal poverty and widespread hunger in the country since the Taliban takeover in August 2022 led to a cutoff of most international aid.
That and the strict enforcement of international sanctions on Taliban leaders and isolation of the Afghan banking sector had pushed the war-ravaged economy to the brink, but effective anti-corruption efforts and other measures seem to have enabled the Islamist rulers to contain the downward slide.
The World Bank assessment released this week noted that inflationary pressure has eased since July of last year, decelerating by half to 9.1 % in November, while most basic food and non-food items remain widely available. The report attributed the decline in inflation to lower global oil and food prices, along with a stable exchange rate.
In what may be a peace dividend from the end of fighting in the country, Afghanistan exported $1.7 billion worth of goods, an increase of approximately 90% compared to the full year 2021, the bank reported. Pakistan, with 65%, and India, with 20%, remain the two main export destinations for Afghan vegetable products, mineral products, and textiles.
The report noted that up-to-date import data was unavailable, but the January-June 2022 data shows the country imported $2.9 billion of goods. Neighboring Pakistan, China, and Iran are identified as the main import origins.
The World Bank assessment said revenue collection had remained strong, reaching $1.54 billion between March and December 2022, in line with 2020 results.
A major chunk of the revenues came from taxes collected at borders and non-tax sources. A rise in coal mining royalties and fees likely drives the increase in Afghan ministries’ revenue, the report found.
In other findings, the World Bank report said nominal and real wages rose slightly in December. It noted that most Afghan civil servants have received salaries regularly, with women reporting they are being paid more regularly than men over the last two months. The civil servants say in the survey the key challenges when trying to withdraw their salaries are the banks are crowded and short of cash, which makes it difficult for them to deal with on a regular basis.
The bank did not address recent reporting from the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, which said that 97% of Afghans live in poverty, two-thirds of the population need aid to survive, and 20 million people face acute hunger.
But Afghan analyst Torek Farhadi, a former adviser for the World Bank and the IMF, said the economy “is limping along” because of the injection in cash of humanitarian aid by the United Nations.
“It maintains the value of the Afghani [local currency] as U.S. dollars are converted into the Afghani currency in the Kabul exchange market,” he told VOA in written comments. “The U.N. aid has been able to maintain the status quo.”
Farhadi noted the country continues to face difficulty in attracting foreign investment, at least in part because the Afghan private sector has been suffering from a lack of transparency about Taliban economic policies.
“Private investment requires a climate free of pressure,” he emphasized. “Nobody dares to make long-term investment plans as Taliban trade and investment legal framework is non-published and unpredictable.” A thriving private sector is crucial to provide jobs to the educated Afghan youth to discourage them from leaving the country, Farhadi noted.
The Taliban have imposed their harsh interpretation of Islamic law to govern the country.
“Families with daughters also want to leave for countries where there is education if they can afford it. Afghanistan’s economy is depressed, and Taliban have difficulty creating confidence,” Farhadi said.
The Islamist rulers have excluded women from most areas of the workforce and banned them from using parks, gyms, and public bathhouses. They have barred girls from attending secondary schools beyond grade six.
Last month, the Taliban closed universities to female students until further notice, and they forbade women from working for national and international nongovernmental organizations.
The international community has refused to grant legitimacy to the de facto rulers over human rights concerns, mainly stemming from bans on women’s work and education.
The refusal by the Taliban to reverse the restrictions has prompted donor nations to withhold financial assistance and retain the economic sanctions, with exceptions for humanitarian aid.
Afghanistan’s population was estimated to pass 43 million in 2022, and a staggering 28.3 million people will need urgent humanitarian assistance this year in order to survive prolonged drought-like conditions, according to latest U.N. assessments.
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Taliban Refill Afghan Jails
Less than two years after releasing all prisoners held by the previous Afghan government, including suspected terrorists, the Taliban are rapidly refilling prisons with new inmates.
Over the past 18 months, de facto Taliban authorities detained more than 29,000 individuals on various charges such as theft, kidnapping, murder and moral crimes according to country’s top prison official.
“We have released some 15,000 inmates,” Mohammad Yusuf Mistari, the Taliban’s director of prisons, told VOA in WhatsApp messages. “Currently, there are approximately 14,000 inmates in the Islamic Emirate’s jails.”
Among the prisoners, up to 1,100 are women.
Taliban officials claim they have no political prisoners and that all the prisoners are held on criminal charges — a claim not confirmed by independent organizations.
But groups like Human Rights watch say the Taliban have opted for killing criminals associated with armed opposition groups — Islamic State and other Afghan militias that have increasingly posed serious security threats to the fledging Islamist regime —instead of keeping them in jails.
Under the Islamic Emirate’s strict interpretation of Sharia, acts such as drinking alcohol or extramarital relationships are considered criminal and carry severe penalties, while homosexuality and sodomy are punishable by death.
Since November, the Taliban have restarted public displays of punishment. Thieves have had their hands chopped off, adulterers have been flogged, and those found guilty of murder have been shot and killed in front of hundreds of male spectators.
More than 100 men and women have been publicly whipped, and at least two men have been executed so far, according to the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), which monitors human rights in the country.
“Such barbaric punishments — often carried out against persons for activities that should not even be considered crimes, such as listening to music — constitute torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, and are prohibited under international law,” Patricia Gossman, associate Asia director at Human Rights Watch, told VOA.
Redoing torture
Various forms of torture have been widely practiced at formal and informal detention centers and jails in Afghanistan, according to UNAMA and various rights groups.
Hundreds of Taliban fighters reportedly died in extremely brutal detention conditions in late 2001 and early 2002 during U.S.-led military campaigns that toppled the Taliban with the help of local Afghan militias, according to reports by the New York Times and Physicians for Human Rights.
Torture of detainees was also prevalent under the former Afghan government, which incarcerated more than 30,000 individuals, a large number of whom were alleged Taliban insurgents, according to U.N. reports dating back to at least 2011.
Last year, the Taliban produced a film documenting the bitter experiences of some prisoners held at the Parwan Detention Facility beside Bagram Air Base, which the U.S. military operated until 2012 when it was transferred to the Afghan government.
“The Taliban seem to be repeating all the mistakes and abuses of the past, including those they complained that the Republic [former Afghan government] had been responsible for, like torture,” Gossman said.
Mistari, the Taliban’s top official for prisons, refuted the torture allegations.
“Our leaders have given us a 39-articles guidance in which it’s said that we should treat inmates nicely,” he said, adding that the guidance also states if a guard or a jail official is seen taunting prisoners, he should be transferred elsewhere.
“We have nothing to do with their crimes. We are only there to protect the prisoners, feed them and keep them,” Mistari added.
Food, cold
Maintaining the prisons and feeding the large inmate population has long been a challenge in Afghanistan.
The previous Afghan government received financial and technical support from international donors to manage its prisons and detention facilities.
Facing strict international sanctions, the Taliban appears to be unable to run the jails, feed and care for the large inmate population.
Even outside the Taliban jails, an overwhelming majority of Afghans face hunger.
Throughout 2022, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) provided three meals daily for some 12,000 inmates in Afghanistan.
“The ICRC continues to work with Afghan authorities to ensure humane and dignified conditions of detention across Afghanistan,” Lucien Christen, an ICRC spokesperson, told VOA.
Moreover, the humanitarian organization has donated blankets, shawls, jackets and socks to keep 20,000 prisoners warm during the frigid winter temperatures.
Cold weather has killed more than 120 Afghans over the past two weeks, Taliban authorities have confirmed.
Both UNAMA and ICRC have access to prisons in Afghanistan for monitoring purposes.
“De facto authorities do appear to be seeking to fulfil their obligations in relation to the treatment of detainees,” UNAMA reported in July 2022. “Progress is hindered by financial constraints, resulting at times in inadequate food, medical care and hygiene supplies for detainees, and the cessation of vocational education and training programs for prisoners that were previously funded by the international community.”
Some senior Taliban leaders, including current ministers and governors, have a history of incarceration inside and outside Afghanistan, including at the Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp, a U.S. military prison set up in 2002 where only one Afghan inmate remains.
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African Leaders Discuss Path to Food Security at Dakar Summit
African heads of state and development partners will discuss ways to increase Africa’s agricultural production at a summit in progress in Senegal. Climate change, soaring inflation, and the effects of Russia’s war on Ukraine have combined to make food security precarious throughout much of Africa.
The consensus throughout the three-day event has been that it’s time for Africa to end its dependence on food imports.
The continent has enough arable land to feed 9 billion people, yet it spends $75 billion each year to import more than 100 million metric tons of food, according to the African Development Bank, which organized the summit.
“Only a secure continent can develop with pride,” said Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank. “For there is no pride in begging for food. The timing is right. And the moment is now,” he says. “My heart and my determination is that Africa feeds itself.”
Around 282 million Africans suffer from hunger, according to U.N. figures, and persistent drought has pushed some areas such as the Horn of Africa and Madagascar to the brink of famine.
Recent disruptions in the global food supply chain have also aggravated the issue.
Africa typically imports 30 million metric tons of food from the now warring nations of Russia and Ukraine, and energy, fertilizer and food prices have increased by 40 to 300 percent, according to the African Development Bank.
In order to become self-sufficient, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari said, African nations must increase funding toward agricultural initiatives and rural infrastructure.
“To succeed, there is no doubt that we need to subsidize farmers,” he said. “We must reduce the rate of rural to urban migration through the development of rural areas,” he said, “We must invest heavily in irrigation to help address the increasing frequency of droughts.”
Due to high lending risks, less than 3 percent of total financing from African commercial banks goes towards funding agriculture, Buhari said, and central banks must pick up the slack.
At a CEO roundtable Thursday, Ahmed Abdellatif, president of Sudanese business conglomerate CTC Group, said risks can be minimized with agri-insurance.
“If you’re one of the unlucky half a percent where the rain does not come, it wipes you out totally, and you’re in very big trouble,” he said. “So agri-insurance would be a big enabler.”
Various speakers pointed to success stories on the continent. Ethiopia increased production of a heat resistant wheat variety from 5,000 to 800,000 hectares over a four-year period and is now on its way to becoming a wheat exporter.
The adoption of a drought-resistant maize variety in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda has more than doubled outputs.
In response to the conflict in Ukraine, Zimbabwe began producing its own fertilizer and wheat. Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa said the country expects to produce enough wheat to begin exports next year.
“A country must be ruled by the people of that country. A country must be developed by the people of that country,” he said. “And a country must eat what it sows – that is village wisdom.”
The conference will continue through Friday.
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US, Chinese, Russian Officials Scramble to Visit Africa
Top Chinese, Russian and American officials are visiting Africa, the world’s fastest-growing continent, this month. Several U.S. officials are in Africa, walking a fine line between their desire for Africa’s support against Russian aggression and Chinese ambitions, and their promise to do work that benefits the continent. VOA’s Anita Powell reports from Washington.
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US, Chinese, Russian Officials Scramble to Visit Africa
Top Chinese, Russian and American officials are scrambling this month to visit African nations and pledge their commitment to the world’s fastest-growing continent.
As President Joe Biden prepares for a visit later this year, several of his top officials have recently visited Africa. There, they must balance the desire to secure the continent’s support against Russian aggression and Chinese ambitions with their promise to work to benefit Africa.
Washington says this is not about countering Russian and Chinese ambitions — though the U.S. has expressed dismay over African nations’ reluctance to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — but about building meaningful relationships in areas such as business, health, peace and security.
“Our partnership in Africa is not about — about other nations,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in response to a question from VOA. “Our partnership there, it’s — as demonstrated by our commitments at the U.S.-Africa Leaders’ Summit — the United States sees African countries as genuine partners and wants to build relationships based on mutual respect.”
But the continent’s top diplomat says Africa, which was brutally colonized by European powers for centuries, is no one’s pawn. And, he pointedly added, China understands that.
“Africa refuses to be seen as an arena for influence struggles,” said African Union Commission chairperson Moussa Faki. “We are open to cooperation and partnerships with everyone, as long as they respect our principles, our priorities and our interests. The partnership we have with China is built on these principles.”
But as the most senior visiting U.S. official said recently, these great-power rivals are keenly aware of each other’s activities, especially as China and Russia flex their muscles globally.
“Many African countries are now plagued by high and unsustainable debt, and that’s undeniably a problem, and much of it is related [to] Chinese investment in Africa,” said U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, the latest U.S. official to visit. “So, I think that’s simply a factual statement. But this is not for us. This is not a competition with China. We want to deepen our engagement with Africa.”
Analysts say these two goals — real partnership, but also great power competition — are not mutually exclusive.
“We want to check the ambitions of an expanding Russia and an expanding China, but we also want to see African countries collectively develop more of a political voice for themselves in international fora and create prosperity for their citizens at home,” said Cameron Hudson, who researches Africa at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
“So, all of these things can be true at the same time. However, we’re not acknowledging that truth. We are acknowledging only one truth, which is that we want to see Africa develop. And I think it’s just more complicated than that.”
Analysts estimate that China has spent more than $1 trillion on its global Belt and Road Initiative, which builds infrastructure in the developing world. China maintains a strict stance of noninterference in other countries’ internal affairs.
During his first trip on the job, China’s new foreign minister rejected the notion of the continent as an ideological battleground, as it often was during the Cold War.
“No country, no people, have the right to force African countries and its people to take sides,” said Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang. “Africa should be a platform for international cooperation, not an arena for competition between major countries.”
The next top American official to visit in coming days will be Biden’s ambassador to the United Nations, who previously oversaw the continent at the State Department.
And then, presumably, Biden himself. The White House said this week in response to a question from VOA that there are no concrete plans to announce yet.
Biden has framed the 11-month conflict in Ukraine as a fundamental struggle between democracies and autocracies. With Africa showing clear signs of democratic backsliding, Hudson wonders if Biden will keep those ideals in the forefront when he’s on African soil.
“Is he going to stick to those kinds of fundamental principles, which he says he holds, and have a very frank and honest and open dialogue with African states, criticizing them when it’s required, keeping the distance when it’s required?” Hudson asked.
“Or will he kind of ignore that or put that on a back burner so that he can build relationships that might advantage Washington at the U.N. or down the road politically?”
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UN Official: Use Taliban’s Desire for International Recognition as Leverage
U.N. Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed said Wednesday that the international community’s best leverage to persuade the Taliban to reverse restrictions on Afghan women’s rights is the group’s desire for international recognition.
“I went into Afghanistan thinking perhaps the most conservative of them [Taliban leaders] didn’t care about recognition — they do,” Mohammed told reporters of her mission there. “Recognition is one leverage that we have and should hold on to.”
The deputy secretary-general returned Tuesday from a two-week mission that took her and her delegation, including the head of U.N. Women and the deputy political and peacebuilding chief, to several Muslim countries, as well as to the Afghan cities of Kabul, Kandahar and Herat. She also met in the region with former Afghan President Hamid Karzai and former Chief Executive Officer Abdullah Abdullah.
She said it is clear the Taliban want recognition, laying out to her what they view as their achievements – claiming to have eradicated corruption and stopped poppy production while extending a general amnesty. However, a U.N. report released in November found that the area under poppy cultivation has increased under Taliban rule.
“All of this, we said, was not sufficient in terms of its implementation,” Mohammed said she told them.
Mohammed, who is Muslim, said one of the biggest challenges in dealing with the group, which “is loyal to the emir and the emirate,” is how to bring them “from the 13th century to the 21st.”
Decrees
She noted that as the Taliban have taken away rights, they have said they would later revisit the issue. Mohammed pressed officials for a specific timeline and said she was told only “soon.”
“And for them, what they want to do is create an environment that protects women,” she said. “Their definition of protection would be, I would say, ours of oppression.”
She said those “protections” include rules on education, school curriculum, work and dress codes that she sees as “red flags.”
The deputy U.N. chief said the Taliban are eager to keep international humanitarian assistance flowing, despite their widely condemned December 24 ban on Afghan women working with domestic and international aid groups. Some international NGOs suspended their work after the decree.
The World Food Program estimates nearly 20 million Afghans are acutely food-insecure, including more than 6 million people on the brink of faminelike conditions.
A few days before the work edict, the Taliban forbade females from attending school beyond the sixth grade.
Mohammed said she was relieved that a third decree they feared might come down this month, or even during their mission, barring foreign women from working with international organizations, had so far not happened.
“I don’t say that it won’t, but clearly the pressure that we are putting on has stopped that rollback as quickly. … We will continue to put that pressure on and engage,” she said.
International conference
Mohammed said discussions are underway for an international conference to be co-hosted by the U.N. and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in March in the region on women in the Muslim world.
“This would bring in the issues of Afghanistan, but also the region,” the deputy secretary-general said. “I often say this, when Malala [Yousafzai] was shot, she was shot in Pakistan. So there is a region[al] problem. There is a region that also needs to come to the front with pushing for the rights of women in Islam.”
As for Afghan women, Mohammed insisted the international community will not abandon them.
“It’s not when it gets hard that we drop off,” she said. “It’s when it gets hard that they see more of us, and we are there in solidarity with them.”
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Afghan Soldier Seeking US Asylum Freed From Federal Custody
An Afghan soldier seeking U.S. asylum who was detained for months after being arrested while trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border has been freed from immigration detention and reunited with his brother, his attorney said Wednesday.
Abdul Wasi Safi’s release from custody in Eden, Texas, came after a judge dropped an immigration charge against him at the request of federal prosecutors.
Wasi Safi fled Afghanistan following the withdrawal of U.S. forces in August 2021, fearing reprisals from the Taliban because he had provided U.S. forces with information on terrorists while working as an intelligence officer for the Afghan National Security Forces. In the summer of 2022, he began a treacherous journey from Brazil to the U.S.-Mexico border, where he was arrested in September near Eagle Pass, Texas. He had hoped to eventually be reunited with his brother, who lives in Houston.
On Monday, a federal judge in Del Rio, Texas, dismissed the federal immigration charge after prosecutors had filed a motion asking her to do so “in the interest of justice.”
Zachary Fertitta, one of his criminal defense attorneys, said Wednesday that Wasi Safi was receiving medical care at an undisclosed location but that he planned to speak at a news conference on Friday in Houston.
Fertitta said Wasi Safi and his brother “are overjoyed to be reunited.”
‘Not a danger’
Jennifer Cervantes, another of Wasi Safi’s immigration attorneys, said earlier Wednesday that she expected him to be transferred from U.S. Customs and Border Protection custody to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She said ICE would likely interview him but had no reason to keep him in custody.
“He’s certainly not a danger to the United States. He’s done a lot of good service for the United States,” Cervantes said.
U.S. Representative Sheila Jackson Lee, a Houston Democrat, belongs to a bipartisan group of lawmakers that had been working to free Wasi Safi. She said in a statement Tuesday night that she expected him to arrive in her hometown by Friday.
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees Customs and Border Protection and ICE, has not responded to an email seeking comment Wednesday.
Sami-ullah Safi, Wasi Safi’s brother, was employed by the U.S. military for several years as a translator. Sami Safi said he was pleased the criminal case had been dropped but that he remained frustrated about how his sibling was treated in light of his family’s support for the U.S in Afghanistan.
“If we categorize my brother’s service, how many lives he has saved because of his service, and how many lives I have saved because of my service being a combat translator?” Sami Safi said.
Wasi Safi’s case was first reported by The Texas Tribune.
‘Serious’ health problems
On his journey from Brazil to the U.S., Wasi Safi suffered serious injuries from beatings, including damaged front teeth and hearing loss in his right ear.
“We are now working on his health condition, which has turned serious after months of neglect,” Zachary Fertitta, one of his criminal defense attorneys, said in an email Wednesday.
The lawyers, lawmakers and military organizations that have been working to free Wasi Safi said his case highlights how America’s chaotic military withdrawal continues to harm Afghan citizens who helped the U.S. but were left behind.
Nearly 76,000 Afghans who worked with American soldiers since 2001 as translators, interpreters and partners arrived in the U.S. on military planes after the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. But their immigration status remains unclear after Congress failed to pass a proposed law, the Afghan Adjustment Act, that would have solidified their legal residency status.
Cervantes said Wasi Safi’s case is not unique and that other Afghans seeking asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border have also faced difficulty getting their cases properly reviewed. She said she hoped her work “sheds some light on that and [helps] these guys get what I think is the right thing to do, what I think is fair for them.”
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