Afghan envoys marched abroad after the sudden return of the Taliban

September 16 (Reuters) – The sudden return to power of the Taliban has left hundreds of Afghan diplomats abroad: depleted of money to keep the missions operational, fearsome for families at home and desperate to take refuge in the foreign.

The Islamist militant movement, which quickly ousted the government with support from Afghanistan on August 15, said on Tuesday it had sent messages to all its embassies asking diplomats to continue their work.

But eight embassy officials who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity, in countries such as Canada, Germany and Japan, described the dysfunction and despair in their missions.

“My colleagues here and in many countries are calling on host nations to accept them,” said an Afghan diplomat in Berlin, who said he feared what might happen to his wife and four daughters who stay in Kabul if allowed to use her name. .

“I’m literally begging. Diplomats are willing to become refugees,” he said, adding that he should sell everything, including a large house in Kabul, and “start all over again.”

Afghanistan’s missions abroad face a period of “prolonged limbo” as countries decide whether to recognize the Taliban, said Afzal Ashraf, an international relations expert and a member of the British University of Nottingham. .

“What can these embassies do? They do not represent a government. They have no policy to implement,” he said, adding that embassy staff would be granted political asylum for security reasons if they returned to Afghanistan.

The Taliban, who applied a strict interpretation of Islamic law with punishments such as amputations and stonings during their previous government from 1996 to 2001, have tried to show a more conciliatory face since returning to power.

Spokesmen have assured Afghans that they do not want revenge and will respect the rights of people, including women.

But reports of house-to-house searches and retaliation against former officials and ethnic minorities have made people wary. The Taliban have vowed to investigate any abuse.

A group of deposed government envoys issued a first such joint statement, reported by Reuters on Wednesday ahead of its public release, calling on world leaders to deny formal recognition to the Taliban. Read more

“NO MONEY”

Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi told a news conference in Kabul on Tuesday that the Taliban had sent messages to all Afghan embassies telling them to continue working.

“Afghanistan invested a lot in you, you are Afghanistan’s assets,” he said.

A senior Afghan diplomat estimated that there were about 3,000 people working at or directly dependent on the country’s embassies.

The ousted administration of President Ashraf Ghani also wrote a letter to foreign missions on September 8 calling the new Taliban government “illegitimate” and urging embassies to “continue their normal functions and duties.”

But these calls for continuity do not reflect the chaos on the ground, embassy staff said.

“There is no money. It is not possible to operate in these circumstances. Now they do not pay me,” a source at the Afghan embassy in the Canadian capital, Ottawa, said.

Two Afghan embassy officials in New Delhi said they were also running out of money for a mission to serve thousands of Afghans trying to find a way home to reunite with families or in need of help. to apply for asylum in other countries.

Both members of the staff said they would not return to Afghanistan for fear of being targeted because of their connections to the previous government, but would also fight for asylum in India, where thousands of Afghans carry years seeking refugee status.

“I have to stay strong for now at the embassy facilities and wait to go out to any nation that is willing to accept me and my family,” one said.

GOVERNMENT IN EXILE

Some envoys from Afghanistan have openly criticized the Taliban.

Manizha Bakhtari, the country’s Austrian ambassador, regularly publishes allegations of human rights abuses by the Taliban Twitter, while Chinese envoy Javid Ahmad Qaem warned against not believing the Taliban’s promises to extremist groups.

Others, on the downside, hope that their host countries will not rush to recognize the group and put them at risk.

Several Afghan diplomats said they would be closely monitoring the annual meeting of world leaders at the United Nations in New York next week, where there is uncertainty about who will occupy the seat of Afghanistan.

UN credentials give weight to a government and no one has yet formally claimed the seat of Afghanistan. Any measure deemed legitimate by the Taliban could empower the group to replace embassy staff with its own, diplomats said.

In Tajikistan, some embassy officials managed to get their families across the border in recent weeks and are considering turning the embassy into residential premises to house them, a senior diplomat said there.

And, like comrades around the world, they have no plans to return home with the Taliban back in power.

“It is very clear that not a single Afghan diplomat sent abroad wants to go back,” a senior Afghan diplomat in Japan said. “We are all determined to stay where we are and maybe many countries will agree to be part of a government that is in exile.”

(This story is corrected to fix the typographical error in paragraph 13)

Rupam Jain Reports; Written by John Geddie; Edited by Mike Collett-White

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