This is the seventh installment in a Washington Examiner series detailing the struggles of Afghan activists and allies affected by the August 2021 U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Afghan applicants to the State Department’s special immigrant visa program often experience difficulty locating employment records and finding former supervisors to provide letters of recommendation.
Over two weeks, I reached out to seven different U.S. companies, persons, or military entities on behalf of six Afghan SIV applicants and hopefuls who were missing supervisor recommendations or employment records. My inquires provided no resolutions, but they did illuminate the scope of complexities facing stranded Afghan allies. Because of the applicants’ continuing struggles to evade the Taliban, I have changed their names.
Reviled by the Taliban as a Hazara and former U.S. employee, Fawad fled his home in August after the Taliban threatened to behead him in front of his wife and two young children and killed his dog. For months, Fawad has been living in a tent with his family while attempting to apply for an SIV. Many of his papers were left behind, and he has been unable to acquire employment records or supervisor letters from former employers TFI International or Tundra Security Afghanistan, now Acuity International.
Former colleagues, former company presidents, and company employees were unable or unwilling to assist Fawad, who has accepted his inevitable death. In August, the Taliban killed Fawad’s best friend several days after he refused to give them Fawad’s location. Last week, they sent a warning letter to Fawad’s home mosque, promising to shoot him on site when they find him.
As Afghan Air Force sergeant Wahdat, also Hazara, gathered papers to file his SIV, he lacked employment paperwork and a supervisor letter. Raytheon, a company he once worked with, located personnel files within hours of my inquiry and found Wahdat had only taken courses through the company. Unable to support an SIV application with this information, Raytheon hopes to provide some documentation that might assist Wahdat.
Hiding in a Kabul office, Ali fears for his life because of his work with the Afghan National Police, U.S. and British military, and a U.S. nonprofit group. After the British government seemed to abandon his resettlement procedures, Ali asked Mission Essential Personnel for his employment records to support an SIV application. In response to my inquiry, Mission Essential Personnel searched their files and coordinated with Ali to release his records. The records, however, indicate Ali cannot use this employment to support an SIV application. More unfortunate still, the two years Ali spent working with the U.S. nonprofit group, as well as his glowing letter of recommendation from the organization, do not qualify him for the SIV program.
Hilaluddin was employed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers between 2012 and 2014, but he only applied for his SIV last month. Unable to reach his military supervisor, he used a letter of recommendation from a U.S. politician in his SIV application.
Rahmatullah’s SIV application has stagnated for seven years because he cannot locate his military supervisor, for whom he worked during three years employed as an Afghan subcontractor of a U.S. construction company.
Despite exhaustive Google searches, social media requests, and an email to Hilaluddin’s supervisor’s last-known address, I could not contact Hilaluddin’s or Rahmatullah’s supervisors. The Army Corps of Engineers, however, explained that a Department of Defense initiative called Project Rabbit could provide a cover letter for Hilaluddin in the absence of a supervisor letter.
Project Rabbit coordinates with the State Department to provide missing employment data for SIV applicants who worked with over 60 Department of Defense contractor partners. As of mid-January, a Defense Department spokesperson told me that Project Rabbit supplied employment records for 4,800 SIV applicants. Around 3,100, or 64.6%, of these applicants received chief of mission approval, compared with the 40% approval rate for most SIV applicants.
Project Rabbit has limits, however.
Tarik, who once held multiple prestigious positions in the Afghan government and worked with Vekti-DynCorp and the American Councils and the U.S. Embassy, changes locations weekly for his safety. Tarik has a pending humanitarian parole visa and a Priority-2 referral to the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, but he has waited eight months to receive his SIV case number. My inquiry to Vekti-DynCorp, now Amentum, generated an auto-reply saying the company is a Project Rabbit participant. However, Project Rabbit is only engaged after applicants receive a National Visa Center SIV number, according to a Department of Defense spokesperson. Without his SIV case number, Project Rabbit cannot procure Tarik’s employment data.
Hilaluddin and Tarik may find that Project Rabbit moves their SIV cases forward. Raytheon could uncover a way to assist Wahdat. Ali, Rahmatullah, and Fawad can apply for humanitarian parole visas, though they are costly, are often rejected, and have a backlog of more than five years. For now, each applicant remains stuck in Afghanistan with no immediate prospects of evacuation.
Beth Bailey (@BWBailey85) is a freelance writer from the Detroit area.
