TIRANA, Abania: Albania on Friday housed its first group of Afghan evacuees who made it out of their country despite days of chaos near the Kabul airport, including an attack claimed by the Daesh group.
A government statement said an Egyptian Almasria Universal Airlines plane landed at the Tirana international airport at 3:20 a.m. (01:20 GMT) carrying 121 people, including 11 children. It was not clear whether this was the first flight after the two suicide bombings in Kabul that killed at least 60 Afghans and 13 American troops, or if the plane that landed in Albania’s capital had come directly from Afghanistan.
“It was the fear from such attacks which pushed us our utmost that these citizens come soonest to Albania, where they are away from danger and fear for their lives,” Albanian Foreign Minister Olta Xhacka said. She and US Ambassador Yuri Kim were at the airport to greet the evacuees.
A government source said the flight from Kabul was organized by a US non-governmental association and there was a stopover in Tbilisi, Georgia before landing in Tirana.
After the plane landed in Tirana, the passengers were supplied with facemasks and had their information processed in a military tent before they were taken on buses to hotels in the nearby western port city of Durres. The Albanian government will supply them with food, transportation, security and other necessities, according to the foreign minister.
The government plans to allow the evacuees to stay in Albania for at least a year before they move to the United States for final settlement.
Albania may temporarily house up to 4,000 Afghans, people who would be at risk in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. Xhacka said they include “pedagogues, artists, intellectuals, activists of the civil society, human rights organizations or those of women.”
Kim praised the Albanian government for agreeing to host evacuees.
Such a move has been highly evaluated and praised from Washington.
“As they have always done, the people of Albania are once again providing hospitality & protection to those in greatest need,” the US ambassador tweeted. “We are proud to call you a friend & ally. Thank you.”
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Albania gets 1st Afghan evacuees after deadly Kabul blasts
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Albania gets 1st Afghan evacuees after deadly Kabul blasts
- An Egyptian Almasria Universal Airlines plane landed at Tirana International Airport carrying 121 people, including 11 children
- Albania plans to allow the evacuees to stay for at least a year before they move to the United States for final settlement
US heading to ‘authoritarianism’, warns Human Rights Watch
- HRW: US President Donald Trump has shown ‘blatant disregard for human rights and egregious violations’
WASHINGTON: Human Rights Watch warned Wednesday that President Donald Trump was turning the United States into an authoritarian state as democracy declines globally to its lowest ebb in four decades.
Trump’s return to the White House has intensified a “downward spiral” on human rights that was already under pressure from Russia and China, the New York-based advocacy and research group said in its annual report.
“The rules-based international order is being crushed,” HRW said.
In the United States, the group said, Trump has shown “blatant disregard for human rights and egregious violations.”
In descriptions that would have been unthinkable in the US section of its previous annual reports, the group pointed to the deployment of masked, armed agents — the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency — which has carried out “hundreds of unnecessarily violent and abusive raids.”
“The administration’s racial and ethnic scapegoating, domestic deployment of National Guard forces in pretextual power grabs, repeated acts of retaliation against perceived political enemies and former officials now critical of him, as well as attempts to expand the coercive powers of the executive and neuter democratic checks and balances, underpin a decided shift toward authoritarianism in the US,” the report said.
Human Rights Watch repeated its finding that the United States engaged in enforced disappearances — a crime under international law — by sending 252 Venezuelan migrants to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador.
Trump’s return to the White House has intensified a “downward spiral” on human rights that was already under pressure from Russia and China, the New York-based advocacy and research group said in its annual report.
“The rules-based international order is being crushed,” HRW said.
In the United States, the group said, Trump has shown “blatant disregard for human rights and egregious violations.”
In descriptions that would have been unthinkable in the US section of its previous annual reports, the group pointed to the deployment of masked, armed agents — the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency — which has carried out “hundreds of unnecessarily violent and abusive raids.”
“The administration’s racial and ethnic scapegoating, domestic deployment of National Guard forces in pretextual power grabs, repeated acts of retaliation against perceived political enemies and former officials now critical of him, as well as attempts to expand the coercive powers of the executive and neuter democratic checks and balances, underpin a decided shift toward authoritarianism in the US,” the report said.
Human Rights Watch repeated its finding that the United States engaged in enforced disappearances — a crime under international law — by sending 252 Venezuelan migrants to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador.
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