Government in slumber leaves Nepalis in the lurch in Afghanistan
In mid-April, 2021, US President Joe Biden made a historic announcement. Biden announced that the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan will begin on May 1 and end on September 11, 2021, exactly 20 years after the September 9-11, 2001 Twin Tower attacks that prompted the US to launch a global war on terrorism.
The 9/11 attacks, as they are now known, became a turning point not only for the US, but the whole world. The stated objectives of the US-led war on terrorism were to protect the US by dismantling terrorist cells in the US and disrupting the activities of the Al-Qaeda-headed international network of terrorist organisations.
Afghanistan became a major theatre of this war as then US President George W Bush warned the Taliban regime in power in Afghanistan to hand over Al-Qaeda leaders hiding in that country or share in their fate.
But that war is coming to a close after taking a huge toll on humanity, leaving behind more than 3,500 US and allied military deaths, the deaths of more than 47,000 Afghan civilians, the killing of at least 66,000 Afghan troops, and over 2.7 million Afghans fleeing the country.
The fall of Afghanistan despite huge US involvement in man and machine will go down in war history as a major shocker.
Now, let's think a little bit about Nepali citizens stranded in Afghanistan and how indifferent the Nepali state appears to be when it comes to rescuing them.
Even a cursory study of events unfolding in Afghanistan of late would make it clear that the Taliban were poised to take over the country, given their steady advances towards the Afghan capital after the fall of provincial capitals in quick succession.
In May, for example, the Taliban captured Nerkh district just outside Kabul as violence flared up throughout the country. While the month of June saw the Taliban taking more than 50 of 370 districts, with Afghan soldiers suffering heavy fatalities.
While in early July, American troops pulled out of their main military base Bagram Air Base, an hour's drive from Kabul, signalling the end of US involvement in the war. After the Bagram pullout, the emboldened Taliban went on to control about a half of the country's districts by the end of July.
Well, was that in the distant past for our state in deep slumber?
But the Nepali state was fully awake in August, what with efforts to cobble together a grand coalition of like-minded allies under the not-so-august leadership of the Nepali Congress, right? Besides, our man in Islamabad must have kept the state abreast with the state of affairs in Afghanistan, where, as per the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, around 1,500 Nepalis are in Afghanistan while unofficial estimates put the number of Nepalis in Afghanistan, including those who went there illegally, at around 17,000. As of late evening, August 17, 2021, 120 Nepalis working as security guards in that country have returned. Media reports, quoting some of the returnees, point that the employer company and not the Nepal government had played a key role in their return home.
Or he too was in deep slumber?
On August 13, four provincial capitals, including Kandahar, the country's second largest city located in the south, fell to the Taliban along with the fall of the key city of Herat in the west. The major northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif fell on August 14, the eastern city of Jalalabad, just besides Kabul fell a day later and then came Kabul, on August 15.
Only after the entry of the Taliban into Kabul did the Nepali state awake.
A couple of lawmakers from both the ruling establishment and the opposition joined in, demanding that the government start airlifting the stranded Nepalis without delay. Soon enough, the Parliament on the verge of prorogation heard the shrill rhetoric at its echo-chamber, demanding immediate airlifting of the stranded Nepalis.
That was another instance of our good-for-nothings playing to the gallery.
History should judge this 11th-hour response to an emergency situation on the part of our elected representatives and the government with all harshness it deserves.
The 9/11 attacks, as they are now known, became a turning point not only for the US, but the whole world. The stated objectives of the US-led war on terrorism were to protect the US by dismantling terrorist cells in the US and disrupting the activities of the Al-Qaeda-headed international network of terrorist organisations.
Afghanistan became a major theatre of this war as then US President George W Bush warned the Taliban regime in power in Afghanistan to hand over Al-Qaeda leaders hiding in that country or share in their fate.
But that war is coming to a close after taking a huge toll on humanity, leaving behind more than 3,500 US and allied military deaths, the deaths of more than 47,000 Afghan civilians, the killing of at least 66,000 Afghan troops, and over 2.7 million Afghans fleeing the country.
The fall of Afghanistan despite huge US involvement in man and machine will go down in war history as a major shocker.
Now, let's think a little bit about Nepali citizens stranded in Afghanistan and how indifferent the Nepali state appears to be when it comes to rescuing them.
Even a cursory study of events unfolding in Afghanistan of late would make it clear that the Taliban were poised to take over the country, given their steady advances towards the Afghan capital after the fall of provincial capitals in quick succession.
In May, for example, the Taliban captured Nerkh district just outside Kabul as violence flared up throughout the country. While the month of June saw the Taliban taking more than 50 of 370 districts, with Afghan soldiers suffering heavy fatalities.
While in early July, American troops pulled out of their main military base Bagram Air Base, an hour's drive from Kabul, signalling the end of US involvement in the war. After the Bagram pullout, the emboldened Taliban went on to control about a half of the country's districts by the end of July.
Well, was that in the distant past for our state in deep slumber?
But the Nepali state was fully awake in August, what with efforts to cobble together a grand coalition of like-minded allies under the not-so-august leadership of the Nepali Congress, right? Besides, our man in Islamabad must have kept the state abreast with the state of affairs in Afghanistan, where, as per the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, around 1,500 Nepalis are in Afghanistan while unofficial estimates put the number of Nepalis in Afghanistan, including those who went there illegally, at around 17,000. As of late evening, August 17, 2021, 120 Nepalis working as security guards in that country have returned. Media reports, quoting some of the returnees, point that the employer company and not the Nepal government had played a key role in their return home.
Or he too was in deep slumber?
On August 13, four provincial capitals, including Kandahar, the country's second largest city located in the south, fell to the Taliban along with the fall of the key city of Herat in the west. The major northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif fell on August 14, the eastern city of Jalalabad, just besides Kabul fell a day later and then came Kabul, on August 15.
Only after the entry of the Taliban into Kabul did the Nepali state awake.
A couple of lawmakers from both the ruling establishment and the opposition joined in, demanding that the government start airlifting the stranded Nepalis without delay. Soon enough, the Parliament on the verge of prorogation heard the shrill rhetoric at its echo-chamber, demanding immediate airlifting of the stranded Nepalis.
That was another instance of our good-for-nothings playing to the gallery.
History should judge this 11th-hour response to an emergency situation on the part of our elected representatives and the government with all harshness it deserves.
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