President Joe Biden says conditions at the Kabul airport are getting better, but a local group says the people they are trying to help don’t see any improvement.
The pictures from Kabul show crowds outside the airport, some now almost blasé about the gunfire.
“I’ve slept about three hours in three days because I’m so nervous that if I don’t pick up the phone, you know, somebody is going to miss a crucial bit of information that allows them to stay alive,” said Brianna Auffray, legal and policy manager at the Washington chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
She says she is working with 50 people in Afghanistan who are desperate to get out.
“One of the individuals that I’m helping on the ground was shot at. He’s OK, fortunately, but it’s, it’s becoming really, really difficult to get to the airport.”
But Biden says things are now getting better for people trying to get to the airport.
“We have no indication that they haven’t been able to get in Kabul through the airport,” said the president.
“That’s incredibly frustrating to hear,” said Auffray. “Because that is not at all what we’re hearing from our sources on the ground, from the people that we’re helping, trying to get through.”
World Relief in Kent is preparing for the Afghans who make it through to America, knowing their experience has been deeply traumatic. “Not only for having the little kids witness the chaos going on in Afghanistan, but also having to leave some of their family members back and not knowing what their future holds,” said resettlement program director Medard Ngueita.
World Relief is taking gift cards and cash donations to provide housing and household goods to help rebuild their lives.
“They don’t have a chance to put things together, to gather their belongings before leaving. They just have to run out of their house and try to find a safe place to go to.”
But first, they have to get out of Afghanistan.
“You know, they, they should really be getting direct assistance from the government, and that’s just not happening. And I don’t have any sort of guidance to give them. It’s incredibly frustrating that we are not getting anything from top-down,” said Auffray.
World Relief will eventually get federal money to help refugees, but Executive Director Chitra Hanstad says that money hasn’t arrived yet, so they are asking for community help now.
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