[News] From Afghan interpreter to US homeless - the long road to the American dream

[Love Pulse]

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-58020494

 

 

Zia Ghafoori, his pregnant wife and their three small children landed in the United States from their home in Kabul in September 2014.

He held five US visas - a reward for 14 years of service as an interpreter with US Special Forces in Afghanistan.

But the benefits stopped there. Upon arrival, Zia found himself homeless - sent to a shelter by a well-meaning volunteer who told him it would be a place for him and his family to start a new life.

Seven years later, the memory still angers him.

Speaking to the BBC from North Carolina, where he now lives, he recalled struggling to look his children in the eye, apologising for bringing them to the US.

"I couldn't control my tears," he said. "After what I had done for both countries, I was asking myself 'is this what I deserve?'"

But among his peers Zia, now 37, counts himself lucky to have made it to the US at all.

Tens of thousands of Afghans have served as interpreters, fixers and local guides to US and allied soldiers since the start of Afghan War in 2001, when Western forces invaded to wrest control of the country from the Taliban.

Decades after the beginning of what would become America's longest-running conflict, President Joe Biden has vowed to withdraw US troops by 11 September - even as the Taliban appear poised to return to power.

A prolonged exodus
Mr Biden promised that a mass evacuation of interpreters would begin before August, and on Friday, 200 Afghans out of an initial group of 2,500 arrived in the US to complete their visa applications and begin new lives.

As many as 50,000 interpreters have worked with the US military. Since 2008, some 70,000 Afghans - interpreters and their families - have moved to the US under a special immigrant visa awarded for their service. But some 20,000 interpreters and their families are still seeking a way out.

They face a clogged and complex visa process and the threat of a swift Taliban advance as the US winds down its 20-year war.

The danger to interpreters - marked for their work for the Americans - is grave. An estimated 300 interpreters have died since 2009 while seeking a US visa - a process that can take years.

The delays have stung Zia.

"These people stood up and fought shoulder and shoulder to support both countries... and we're closing our eyes and leaving them there, leaving them to die," he said.

 

To hear Zia tell it, it was also the realisation of a promise made to his mother six years earlier, when the Taliban swept to power in Afghanistan.

Then a grade school student, Zia saw the sudden end of a carefree childhood, an easy rotation between school, soccer, and games with his seven siblings.

Zia recalled his lively neighborhood transformed under strict Islamic rule - indiscriminate beatings of men and women, a strange quiet as families hid indoors, his sisters barred from school.

His older brother, then in his twenties, was beaten and thrown in prison after he was overheard speaking the dialect of Panjshir valley, then the center of anti-Taliban resistance.

The beating left his feet and legs so swollen, he couldn't put on his boots, Zia said. The injuries were so bad he was unable to walk.

Within days, his parents decided they couldn't stay. The family fled from their home in Kabul, moving to Pashawar, Pakistan. "I told my mom, 'When I grow up, I will fight against these people,'" he said, referring to the Taliban.

In Pashawar, he learned English at school.

His family remained in Pakistan until 2001, when the US began its decades-long invasion.

"When I got back, I saw a stable government was starting," Zia said. "I said ok, now we have a hope."

He settled back into life in Afghanistan, got married and began teaching English at a local school. Within months of his return, a friend told him the Americans were in need of interpreters.

They went the very next day, he said, showing up at the base in Kabul asking about a job.

"They were just hiring people who could speak English. I didn't know military words, they told me 'no problem,'".

He loved the work, he said, despite the months-long tours away from home, and the acute threat of serving on the front lines.

He resisted pleas from his wife and family to retire, saying he was devoted to his "brothers" of the US armed forces, who gave him his nickname, "Booyah".

"We were the eye and the tongue of the military," Zia said.

For Zia, working with the Green Berets, this meant near-constant proximity to violence and death.

In April 2008, he accompanied US forces in the Battle of Shok Valley. Minutes into the six-hour firefight his best friend, another interpreter, was killed. The battle spawned the highest number of Silver Stars - the second-highest decoration for value - of any battle since Vietnam.