Arizona
Afghanistan: Refugee talks about her new life in Arizona
Folks board a U.S. Air Power C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai Worldwide Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. (U.S. Air Power photograph by Grasp Sgt. Donald R. Allen)
PHOENIX – August marks the one-year anniversary of American withdrawal from Afghanistan, and since then, the nation has spiraled, as many feared, and it’s now in a deep humanitarian disaster.
On account of the turmoil, hundreds of Afghans have fled from the nation, and lots of of them re-settled in Arizona.
One of many refugees who re-settled in Arizona is Fahima Sultani.
“I believed the entire world collapsed on my head, after I obtained to know that the Taliban took management in Afghanistan,” mentioned Sultani, who’s now a pupil at Arizona State College.
Sultani was born in 2001. Rising up in Afghanistan, she by no means lived below the Taliban regime, however all the time feared the tales her dad and mom advised her. These fears turned to actuality because the Taliban took management, and phrase unfold that American and NATO troops had been leaving the nation.
Sultani mentioned she knew she needed to get out, and quick.
“I used to be pondering in the event that they kill me, allow them to do that as a result of if I keep in Afghanistan, I can be type of a lifeless physique as a result of I can not communicate,” mentioned Sultani. “Hundreds of thousands of ladies proper now, they don’t have the appropriate to talk. They don’t have the appropriate to stay freely, to make selections for themselves. So I believed that I’ll make it, or in any other case in the event that they kill me, allow them to do that.”
Sultani left her household behind to start out the harmful journey to America. Like lots of of others, she spent days making an attempt to get into Kabul’s airport.
“The third day that we had been making an attempt to get into the airport, an explosion occurred,” Sultani recounted. “A whole lot of preventing’s occurred. Gunfighting and gunshots occurred, and lots of people obtained killed from our group. We had been seven buses, and several other women simply gave up. They had been so frightened and afraid.”
Finally, Sultani made it onto a airplane to Washington D.C.. From there, she went on to a navy base in Wisconsin, the place she stayed for 3 months. That was when ASU discovered her. They welcomed Sultani, together with 63 different college students from Afghanistan.
“It is like heaven for me,” mentioned Sultani. “I’ve plenty of alternatives as a pupil, as a woman, as a human. I’ve plenty of alternatives. I will be myself, I can gown the best way I wish to, I can go wherever I would like, anytime, and not using a man or a male surrounding me.”
At present in Afghanistan, almost 20 million individuals are going through super hazard and hunger because the nation falls right into a dire financial disaster. In the meantime, the Taliban continues to hold out focused assaults, and place harsh restrictions on ladies and minorities.
“We had been following the information, as was everybody else, and realizing that we had been going to should mobilize shortly for those who had been actually popping out of hurt’s approach immediately,” mentioned Aaron Rippenkroeger, Govt Director of the Worldwide Rescue Committee in Arizona.
The Worldwide Rescue Committee responds in occasions of disaster by serving to resettle refugees into the US. Over six months, they welcomed 775 Afghan refugees to the Phoenix space.
“Lots of the people that got here had been actually extremely expert,”mentioned Rippenkroeger. “Medical doctors, engineers, pilots, you identify it. Folks now into their long-term conditions, in order that they’re in a house. They’re paying their lease. Yhey are employed for essentially the most half. Their youngsters are at school, and like I mentioned, a lot of them had been fluent in English earlier than they obtained right here.”
Now, Sultani is learning enterprise administration and entrepreneurship. She additionally helps worldwide college students on campus, however her largest dream is to create her personal non-profit, serving to ladies and kids again in Afghanistan.
“I can work, I can do my research, I may even dream larger than earlier than,” mentioned Sultani. “I can work on my potential to be stronger than ever.”
ASU for Refugees
https://asuforrefugees.asu.edu/
Worldwide Rescue Committee
https://www.rescue.org/who-we-are
(Associated Video) 60 refugee ladies from Afghanistan taking lessons at ASU
Hundreds of refugees fled Afghanistan late final yr when the U.S. formally ended its navy mission within the nation, and now, a few of them are in Arizona and enrolled at Arizona State College. FOX 10’s Danielle Miller studies.