The group is targeting at least initially the United Arab Emirates, the pilot said.
Washington:
One of the Afghan pilots and other staff members trained in the United States in an Uzbek camp for about a month began leaving the country on Sunday, one of the pilots told Reuters, under an agreement with the United States that reached despite the Taliban’s demand for the return of the Afghans and their planes.
The first group, at least, is initially targeting the UAE, the pilot said, on condition of anonymity. The move was expected to take place in several waves, starting on Sunday and ending the next day approximately.
Reuters was the first to report that pilots have begun leaving Uzbekistan. The U.S. State Department and Uzbekistan mission to the United Nations in New York did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Reuters had previously revealed tension in the Uzbek camp, and pilots feared being returned to Afghanistan and killed by the Taliban. The Taliban have said they will not retaliate after taking control of the country in August.
It was not immediately known what would happen to the 46 aircraft, including A-29 light attack aircraft and UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters, whose pilots flew into neighboring Uzbekistan as ground forces collapsed and the Taliban move to power.
Current and former US officials have told Reuters that the Taliban pressured Uzbekistan to hand over the plane and personnel.
John Herbst, a former U.S. ambassador to Uzbekistan, applauded the U.S. evacuation effort, saying the United States was telling Afghan pilots.
“I hope we have plans in place to make sure the plane they took off is back in the United States and certainly not back in the Taliban,” he said.
The Taliban did not respond to a request for comment on the Uzbek situation. The group seized planes, including helicopters and drones, as Afghan forces merged last month and called for the return of the plane that left the country before its fighters took power in Kabul. .
Afghanistan’s new rulers have said they will invite ex-servicemen to join the country’s renewed security forces and will not suffer any harm.
This offer sounds like Afghan pilots who spoke to Reuters. Even before the Taliban’s acquisition, the English-speaking pilots trained by the United States had become its main targets. Taliban fighters located them and killed some pilots.
In the Uzbek camp, near the city of Termez, the pilots had described feeling like prisoners, with very restricted movements and insufficient food and medicine.
Hopes began to rise about a week ago, when U.S. officials arrived to do a biometric examination of the Afghans, many of whom fled with only their clothes on their backs.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)