Please pardon my brevity and haste. I thought that you all might want to be made aware of this situation. I'm not sure what action we can take to help Andeisha Farid and her family after this unfortunate action that apparently involved American personnel. Perhaps you will have some ideas...
This morning I received a very disturbing email from Andeisha, the founder of Afghan Child Education and Care Organization, an organization that runs 10 orphanages in Afghanistan and Pakistan with over 450 children of diverse ethnicities. Andeisha has been honored in the US for her work. She and her orphanages were also the topic of stories on the NBC Evening News. What apparently happened last night is as perplexing as it is infuriating.
More after the break.
Last night at 1 a.m at least 30 armed men in military uniform, including some foreigners that my mother and sister identified as American soldiers broke down the door to my mother and father's apartment in Kabul city. These were soldiers, the secret service of Karzai's government with perhaps their American trainers. Just downstairs from the apartment is where the chief of Kabul police lives. Why such a middle of the night, cloak and dagger assault on a little family (my 70 year old father, mother, my little sister, three small children and my younger brother) in a little apartment was necessary given the location and the target, we can only assume had more to do more with creating fear than obtaining some suspect or information which they could have done civilly at any other time of day. These soldiers, with drawn guns and rifles aimed proceeded to ransack the apartment as you see in the movies, pointing guns to my mother and sister not to move on pain of death. They handcuffed a 16 year old nephew of my brother and ordered him into a corner. There were spoils to be taken, beside laptop computers. They took money from a safe and items of value. Then they put black hoods over my father and brother and ordered my mother and sister not to move from their room for ten minutes after they left. We do not know where they took my father and brother, why, or for how long. All that remains is shock, an empty, destroyed apartment, and questions. This may be how a SWAT team approaches the task of saving hostages, but to investigate an old man living in a small apartment with women and children?
The situation is still unclear. What is and has been clear is that advocates for women’s rights and secular education are tolerated more than appreciated by the Kabul regime. Andeisha has been outspoken and highly visible, which has apparently made her and her family a target, not just for the Taliban but also for our "allies" in Kabul. Who were the Americans participating in this action? Military? "Contractors"? If this is the way Afghanis with the high international profile Andeisha enjoys are treated, what can the average citizen expect?
"Trapped between two fires..."
I tell you if I ever knew that my father had been involved with the Taliban in any way I would have cut him from my life long ago, but my father was once likewise terrorized by the Taliban, interrogated almost to death simply for having sent his girls to school in Pakistan. It is my father who taught me the principles of equality and democracy. He raised all of his children including my little brother in such a manner at the greatest risk to his own life. Today my mother is in shock. We are all in shock. How to perform my duties, how do I concentrate on the needs of the children in the orphanages?
This incident tears at my heart for many reasons in addition to my fear for the life of my father and brother. The victimization of my people continues in this manner all over Afghanistan. Oftentimes people are simply killed. I cringe because the manner in which the government and its allies conduct security, provide freedom, is the manner in which many people in my country feel trapped between two fires: on one side the Taliban and their brand of terror, and on the other side a government almost equally horrifying. I despise the Taliban. Every cell in my body, every action of my life exists to fight against such extremists. AFCECO is my war against the Taliban, and it will continue to be my battle plan for the rest of my life. Every day when I come to the orphanage and see the happy faces of the children who were victims of the Taliban, I have hope. But not everyone is so fortunate as I am to be so clear about what is best for their country, and incidents like what happened to my family only worsen their clarity.
Please pardon my brevity. I wish I could recommend some action that we could take beyond a message of support and/or contribution to AFCECO. I will continue to monitor the situation and will update as I obtain more information. We can only hope that Andeisha's father and brother will be returned safely to her family.
In closing, I will let Andeisha speak for herself.
I was going to write a different letter today. I was going to tell you the wonderful news about having been awarded a grant that will allow me to provide leadership training for our oldest girls, and to send them to America where they will receive mentorship from women who are leaders and business owners. Instead this is the letter I write. I write this letter not only for myself, but for you my friends, so you can have your eyes opened to another reality here in my country, a reality seldom reported in any news.
Update:
Email address for press office at our embassy in Kabul (KabulPress@state.gov).
Amnesty International contact page.
jethrock has provided some great video about Andeisha and AFCECO.