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Afghan evacuees who fail initial screening will head for Kosovo
Kosovo has agreed to take in Afghanistan evacuees who fail to clear initial rounds of screening and host them for up to a year, a U.S. official said on condition of anonymity Saturday.
The U.S. Embassy in Kosovo said later in a statement that the arrangement did not mean Kosovo was taking evacuees who had been deemed ineligible for admission to the United States.
“Some applicants are still in the process of obtaining needed documents and providing all the information required to qualify under U.S law for immediate entry,” the embassy statement said.
Several other countries for a time balked at temporarily hosting the United States’ Afghan evacuees, for fear of getting stuck with the Americans’ security problems, AP reported.
Within days of the Taliban takeover, the U.S. mobilized thousands of American troops, diplomats, law enforcement agents, border and transportation workers, volunteers and others for screening, processing and caring for evacuees at more than a half-dozen U.S. naval stations, airfields and army bases in Europe and Asia.
The aim of the mobilization was to get deserving evacuees through to the United States as quickly as possible, and stop possible security risks among evacuees, and other evacuees who failed to qualify for relocation to the United States, before they touched foot on U.S. soil.
The hastiness of the airlifts led to a minority of people among the evacuees getting thousands of miles from the Kabul airport before Americans detected problems, including some evacuees with security issues.
Some who managed to get through crushing crowds and U.S. and Taliban controls at the airport got put on planes and made it to transit sites, without any apparent eligibility for U.S. relocation as an at-risk Afghan, the official said.
Most Afghan evacuees are clearing processing in a matter of days at large transit sites that U.S. government employees set up quickly at military bases in Qatar, Germany and Italy, along with smaller sites elsewhere. Those evacuees then fly through Philadelphia or Washington Dulles airports for resettling in the United States.
Eligible Afghans include those who worked for the U.S. government, or women’s advocates, journalists or others vulnerable because of their role in Afghan civil society.
The U.S. official who disclosed the Kosovo plan said the transit centers “provide a safe place for diverse groups … to complete their paperwork while we conduct security screenings before they continue to their final destination in the United States or in another country.”
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Khalilzad warns Pakistan-Afghanistan tensions likely to worsen after fresh airstrikes
Former U.S. special representative for Afghanistan reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad has warned that the latest Pakistani airstrikes in Afghanistan and recent violence inside Pakistan are part of a wider crisis, saying he sees no indication that the situation is about to change.
In a post on X on Thursday, Khalilzad described the Pakistani airstrikes that have killed Afghan civilians and the increasing use of force against civilians in Pakistan as “interconnected tragedies,” implying both effected by Pakistan’s establishment.
“Unfortunately, I do not see any signs of change,” Khalilzad said, adding that current indicators suggested the use of force against Pakistanis would “likely get worse” in the coming days.
His comments came after Pakistan carried out a new wave of airstrikes inside Afghanistan overnight Thursday, saying it had targeted 10 locations used to launch and store drones.
Pakistani Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said the strikes were conducted in response to drones launched from Afghan territory a day earlier and described them as “deliberate, precise, calibrated and proportionate.”
Afghan officials said the strikes killed four civilians. The attacks reportedly hit locations including Kandahar, Khost and Paktia provinces. Afghanistan’s Islamic Emirate authorities have denied launching the drones cited by Pakistan and have condemned the strikes.
The latest attacks follow Pakistani airstrikes earlier this week in Kunar and Paktika. Pakistan said those operations killed 28 militants, while the United Nations confirmed that three Afghan civilians — a man, a woman and a girl — were killed, with four others injured.
The renewed airstrikes come amid a sharp deterioration in relations between Kabul and Islamabad. Pakistan has accused Afghanistan of allowing militant groups, including the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), to operate from its territory and launch attacks inside Pakistan.
Afghan authorities reject the allegations and say militancy inside Pakistan is an internal issue.
Khalilzad has previously called for a change in Pakistan’s strategy toward both its internal security problems and Afghanistan.
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Afghanistan summons Pakistani chargé d’affaires over latest airstrikes
Afghanistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned Pakistan’s chargé d’affaires to Kabul and lodged a strong protest against the violation of Afghan airspace and Pakistani military airstrikes on several Afghan provinces.
The ministry handed the Pakistani diplomat a formal protest note following the attacks on Kandahar, Paktia and Khost provinces on Wednesday night, which reportedly caused civilian casualties.
The Islamic Emirate strongly condemned the strikes, calling them a violation of Afghanistan’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and contrary to Islamic, international, humanitarian and good-neighborly principles.
The ministry also rejected what it called baseless claims that Afghan territory was being used as a source of Pakistan’s recent security incidents.
It said using such claims to justify military action was an attempt to distort facts, mislead public opinion and conceal Pakistan’s internal failures.
The Islamic Emirate further accused Pakistan’s military leadership of avoiding commitments made to regional countries and warned that such actions could further escalate tensions in the region.
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Museum dedicated to preserving ‘Jihadi’ artefacts opens in Kandahar
The museum’s collection includes more than 100 items gathered from different locations.
A museum dedicated to preserving what Afghan authorities describe as “Jihadi artefacts” has officially opened in Kandahar, with officials saying more than 100 items have so far been collected for display.
Mufti Mohammad Tahir Ahmad, Director General for the Preservation of Jihadi Artefacts at the Ministry of Information and Culture, attended the inauguration ceremony alongside Qari Ahmadullah Saeed Khosti, Director of Registration for Jihadi Artefacts and Documents.
Mufti Inamullah Samangani, head of the Kandahar Information and Culture Department, and officials from several government departments also attended the ceremony.
According to the official responsible for preserving the artefacts in Kandahar, the museum’s collection includes more than 100 items gathered from different locations.
The collection includes weapons that officials say were captured from British, Soviet and US forces, as well as personal belongings and other items associated with people killed during Afghanistan’s conflicts over the past two decades.
Officials said efforts to collect additional artefacts would continue in order to expand the museum’s collection.
The museum is now open to visitors, according to the officials.
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