Vreemdelingenrecht.com - het weblog

Left to the mercy of the Taliban By Thomas Martienssen BBC News, Kabul Interpreters who worked with US forces in Afghanistan are being hunted down by the Taliban. Thousands have emigrated to the US but others have been blacklisted, refused a visa, and left in grave danger. In spring this year, two men rang Nader's doorbell so hard they pushed it half way through the wall of his mud-brick house. He came to the door, they coaxed him outside and then dragged him to the village graveyard. "When I realised they were taking me somewhere to be executed I started yelling and fighting," he says. "My brother came out to find me, but by the time he'd come they'd shot me, I just lay down and they left." If Nader had not struggled he would have been shot in the head. Instead, as the militants hurried to get away, they only managed to shoot him in the leg. Nader's v...

Number of Afghans resettled in Canada double original estimate Afghanistan interpreter Ghulam Wali Noori is shown at his home in Ottawa on Wednesday Jan. 5, 2011. (Sean Kilpatrick / The Canadian Press) The Canadian Press Published Sunday, Oct. 7, 2012 7:34AM EDT OTTAWA -- A special program to offer a new life in Canada to people who acted as interpreters for Canadian soldiers and diplomats in Afghanistan -- sometimes at the risk of their lives -- has brought in nearly double the numbers expected. Officials had planned for only 450 Afghans to eventually make the move when they began a special immigration program for interpreters and their families in 2009. With Canada's combat mission ended and a year after the program...