In their words, interpreters Hameed Khan and Ghulam Faizi discuss the harrowing battle to bring their families to safety following the fall of Kabul
Adnan R. Khan: Every political engagement and dollar spent in Afghanistan brings an internationally-sanctioned terrorist organization one step closer to unofficial recognition
Educated in a Canadian-funded school, they became Afghanistan’s best and brightest young women. Today they live in fear, abandoned to the Taliban.
Shannon Gormley describes how the baby made it over the wall at the Kabul airport and journeyed to Canada. It is also a tale of how Western democracies revealed the nature of their fight in Afghanistan through their abandonment of it.
Paul Wells: How did the West get things so terribly wrong?
When the Taliban fell after 9/11, Afghanistan entered a period of hope. For Essazada, it feels as if the Taliban have won again.
They had close ties to Canada and were being hunted by the Taliban. Trapped in a dangerous, desperate crowd, the odds were against them.
Election Image of the Day: The desperate effort to get people out of Afghanistan is front of mind in Ottawa. You wouldn’t know it from watching the campaign.
Paul Wells: People struggling to escape and those helping them are running up against procedural confusion layered on top of constant mortal danger
Justin Ling: I asked the three main parties: Have we learned anything from Afghanistan? One clear theme emerges in all their answers (or lack thereof).
Adnan R. Khan: While other countries hurriedly work to get people out, Canada’s Prime Minister appears to not have a clue. And this country’s silence is deafening.
Stephen Maher: There are ways Canada can help around the world. But we should recognize that we do not make good occupying soldiers and stop trying to do it.