Three months later, an Afghan couple who gave their baby to an American soldier during the chaos at Kabul airport on August 19 does not know where the child is now. The child is believed to have been evacuated to the US, but it is unclear where. That’s what the man and the woman say to the news agency Reuters. They have now also been evacuated to America.
Mirza Ali Ahmadi (35) and his wife Suraya (32) had gone to the airport after the Taliban took power in hopes of fleeing the country. Outside the gates, tens of thousands of other desperate Afghans gathered.
Because of the chaos that ensued, the father handed over the then two-month-old Sohail to an American soldier so that the child would not be crushed. Images of this went around the world.
Taliban
Mirza Ali was under the impression that he would get his child back when he entered the airport. But once he and his family got inside, baby Sohail was nowhere to be seen. Mirza Ali asked everyone he met where his baby was. He was told that children were being taken to a secluded area within the airport. But when they got there, that place was empty.
To the USA
In the end, the father was told by soldiers that the child had probably been evacuated. The family itself ended up on an evacuation flight to the United States via Qatar and Germany. The family is now at Fort Bliss, Texas, waiting with other Afghan refugees to be placed somewhere in the United States.
In the interview with Reuters, Mirza Ali says that he has been living in a haze for months. The child’s mother says she just cries. “Everyone promises they will do their best to find Sohail, but they are only promises.”
The US State Department says the government is working with the international community “to investigate every possibility of locating the child”.
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