02/01/2019 Tungol Law Immigration, Politics, Research "Afghan Interpreters Who Aided US Troops Still Await Visas"
Naseri, formerly an interpreter for U.S. Marine Corps forces in Afghanistan, moved to the home of his wife’s father because his work with the Americans in the past was well known and frowned upon by residents from his village.
ANDREW QUILTY FOR THE WASHINGTON POST
Alex Horton of the Washington Post reports on a 32 year old man, who was an interpreter for U.S. troops in Afghanistan for seven years. Most of that time, he had his ear pressed to a radio to intercept Taliban chatter that officers said provided vital intelligence. In 2013, following two militant attempts to kill or capture him, he applied for a special visa for Afghans endangered because of their work for the United States. He spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear for his life.
His plans to settle in Texas have been set adrift amid the Trump administration’s heightened scrutiny for issuing visas. Last year, 1,649 such visas were approved for Afghans – a 60 percent drop from the previous year. This was, by far, the biggest decline in the program’s 10-year existence.
The challenge to secure such visas is not entirely new. The issuance of special visas dropped by 30 percent in 2015 – a result of changing security measures implemented by the Obama administration, interpreter advocates say.
However, there is a renewed sense of urgency to provide safe haven for Afghans who have been instrumental in helping U.S. forces, advocates say, now that the Taliban has been resurgent in the country amid uncertainty about a potential U.S. troop pullout.
Many interpreters are “expressing a profound fear and imminent threat,” said Kirt Lewis, the program director for No One Left Behind, an interpreter advocacy group.
Since the creation of the Afghan Allies Protection Act of 2009, nearly 16,000 principal Afghan applicants have been approved for visas, according to State Department data.
Congress has not allocated new visas for 2019, and advocates warn that continued delays will imperil the 19,000 applicants still waiting.
The delays are significant. Congress required the State Department to take no longer than nine months to complete visa claims in the 2014 defense spending bill, but the average wait time is 23 months, according to the most recent data released last summer.
It is difficult to pinpoint how many interpreters have been targeted and killed, advocates say. In 2014, the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP) estimated that one interpreter was killed every 36 hours, but cautioned that the number might be outdated; a new estimate could not be done.
“Every day of this slowdown in processing exposes more and more allies to reprisals from the Taliban and other hostile militant groups,” said Adam Bates, policy counsel at IRAP, a legal advocacy group.
The State Department could not provide comment because of the partial government shutdown, a spokesman said.
The interpreter has been frustrated that his efforts to protect U.S. service members have not been reciprocated.
For more on this story, please click here.
...
