The Associated Press (AP) has reported that two years after the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, tens of thousands of Afghan citizens are still waiting to receive US visas.
In a report on Friday, the AP stated that many of the applicants who fled Afghanistan are running through their savings, living in limbo in exile. They worry that the US, which had promised so much, has forgotten them.
According to the AP, there are about 150,000 applicants for Special Immigration Visas (SIVs), not including their family members. The processing of all these applications would take 31 years.
There are also 27,400 applicants who applied for P1 and P2 visa programs. Since the US military withdrawal from Afghanistan, the US State Department has only processed 6,862 applications.
In June, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that the US has relocated about 24,000 citizens of Afghanistan since September 2021. However, this number may include people who were evacuated from Afghanistan in the immediate aftermath of the Taliban takeover.
The AP report states that among the refugee program applicants are about 200 AP employees and their families, as well as staff of other American news organizations still struggling to relocate to the US.
In a recent report, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) faulted the various resettlement programs set up for citizens of Afghanistan.
“Bureaucratic dysfunction and understaffing have undermined the US promise that these individuals would be protected in a timely manner, putting many thousands of Afghan allies at risk,” the SIGAR report said.
The SIGAR report also criticized the lack of transparency surrounding the refugee programs, which it said has left citizens of Afghanistan considering whether to leave their country to await processing without the “critical information” they need for such a crucial decision.
