CLAYTON, Ga. — After fighting the Taliban alongside US Troops, an Afghan woman fights for the rest of her unit to get legal status in the U.S
Clarkston, GA- Zahra Ahmadi isn’t done fighting.
The Afghan woman fought alongside American troops against the Taliban. Now she is fighting for the right of her fellow refugees to stay in America legally.
“It’s the worst feeling when you will soon have your documents expire, and soon, you won’t be able to work outside or pay your bills,” Ahmadi said through a translator.
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Ahmadi had no choice but to flee to America.
She was part of a 39-all-woman unit that received special training from the US military. They fought alongside Americans against the Taliban and were able to get information from locals that U.S. Troops couldn’t.
Ahmadi remembers deciding to join the military to show she could support herself.
“I should do something to prove to my family and everyone around me that women can do anything that they want,” Ahmadi said.
Over the course of the war, the 39-woman unit never lost a single member in combat. Still, she remembers pushback from other Afghans.
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“They used to abuse us, they used to curse us, they’d say you are an Afghan lady, and you should not do this occupation,” Ahmadi said.
Two years ago, the United States started to pull out of Afghanistan. When the Afghan government collapsed she remembers being pregnant trying to get on one of the transports out of the country.
“The six days she was in Afghanistan after the government collapsed-- those were the worst days, full of fear, full of worries and sorrows, Ahmadi’s translator, Mina, said.
She would be resettled in an apartment complex in Clarkston.
Ahmadi says the women in her unit cannot safely return to Afghanistan with the Taliban in control. So the members are working to get long-term legal status in the country she fought alongside.
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The process that allowed them to be resettled gave the refugees two years of legal status. Soon refugees either need to get a visa or seek asylum.
Ahmadi was lucky. Her family got the needed paperwork to gain her legal status two weeks ago. However, she says she is now one of “five or six” unit members to get the needed paperwork.
The rest are running out of time to obtain legal status. If they don’t, these women will become illegal immigrants in a country that they fought alongside.
In an email, a Department of State spokesperson said “The Biden-Harris Administration continues to demonstrate its commitment to the brave Afghans who stood side-by-side with the United States over the past two decades.”
They pointed those refugees with issues to the Department of State’s Afghanistan Inquiries page explains the pathways available to Afghans outside the United States.
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