Afghanistan: Qatar, Taliban reach agreement to continue evacuations

Evacuations from Afghanistan hit a pause in the past few months, with many Afghans looking to flee the country remaining. Qatar has recently come to an agreement with the insurgent group in restarting evacuations from the country.

Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani said Monday that Qatar has reached an agreement with the Taliban in operating two chartered Qatar Airways flights per week. This would allow thousands of Afghans and foreign nationals looking to flee the country in months since the US withdrawal back in August, with the Taliban rapidly taking control of Afghanistan afterward.

This follows a previous report last week that the US plans to restart evacuations and resettlement efforts again. Qatar has already been sporadically operating chartered flights from Kabul back in September. The flights stopped in December following a dispute with the insurgent group over which passengers are allowed on the flights.

The first evacuation flight took place on January 26 from Kabul bound for Doha, according to Reuters.

This also comes as Qatar’s emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani visited Washington to meet with US President Joe Biden at the White House. Qatar’s role as an intermediary between Washington and the Taliban has been praised by US officials. The US announced back in November that Qatar would become its representative in Afghanistan.

The US and other western nations have been facing pressure to ramp up evacuations from Afghanistan, especially of Afghans who have worked for the foreign military forces and are at risk of reprisals from the insurgent group. Advocates said that thousands of Afghans who worked with the US military still remain in the country.

At the same time, the US announced that international banks may now transfer money to Afghanistan for humanitarian purposes, while aid groups are now allowed to pay teachers and healthcare workers at government-backed institutions without fear of breaching sanctions imposed on the insurgent group. The US Treasury Department provided guidance on sanctions exemptions that were issued back in September and in December for humanitarian work in Afghanistan.

The UN previously warned that more than half of the country’s population are facing extreme hunger, with the economy, education, and social services systems on the brink of collapse.