Afghanistan: Desperate women throw their children on barbed wire in a compound and ask British soldiers to pick them up | world News

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You can hear noises as you approach the high iron gates which are the only way to enter the compound which is the hub of British air traffic out of Afghanistan.

On either side of a narrow road, within the walls of an apartment complex in Kabul, exhausted British soldiers lie in the shade, waiting for their turn to return outside in the scorching sun and chaos once more.

The noise is a screaming sound, the noise of despair.

Thousands of people flock to this innocuous place that for some will be the gateway to freedom – and for many others, the end of the dream of escaping from the Taliban.

Photo: The compound in Kabul is surrounded by barbed wire

Two decades later, this is what I came up with. Hasty withdrawal, civilian evacuation … with the Taliban pursuing.

With each passing day, this relief operation grows more urgent and desperate, as the British Army attempts to expel thousands of people from Afghanistan in just days.

It’s a humanitarian mission in what looks like a war zone.

The temporary barrier is all that separates two armies that have been fighting for 20 years.

The Taliban are only a meter away from the British soldiers – an image I never imagined I would see.

We watched thousands gather at this base threatening to overwhelm the entire evacuation.

The Taliban helped with that. On the way they control the crowds of people trying to get to the British position.

Photo: Evacuees await airlift from Afghanistan

Sometimes they shoot in the air, making people stop.

They are a dangerous presence.

Day and night the families – who often had young children – risked their lives, avoiding shootings past at the gates of the civilian side of the airport; Pass the aggressive Taliban fighters, who occasionally beat and harass them.

At night, paratroopers blocked the road with cars and barbed wire.

A senior officer told me they had no choice because the situation was out of control, but he said the Siege would live with some of his soldiers for the rest of their lives.

“It was horrible,” he told me, “the women were throwing their children on the barbed wire, telling the soldiers to take them, and some of them got stuck in the wire.”

“I worry about my men, I advise some, everyone cried last night.”

Photo: British soldiers at a compound in Kabul

It sounds like a mess but there is a way, soldiers call translators as soon as different nationalities arrive at the checkpoint, including Afghans who have valid refugee status.

Then passports and papers are checked.

If they pass the pool, they will be directed to the entry gate to be processed. Some make it and some don’t.

Soldiers hate this, but without the proper paperwork they have to turn people away.

Terrified families – men, women and large numbers of children carried back through the barbed wire.

We watched a little girl, her parents and siblings brought back.

Back to Afghanistan, back towards the Taliban.

It was heartbreaking.

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The UK has “days” to evacuate the British

Fatima, not her real name, crossed the barrier holding her daughter’s hand. She thinks she might have an issue but she doesn’t know who to talk to.

She is terrified and crying. Her husband joined the Taliban and beat her.

She and her four-year-old child have nothing but a letter from the United Nations identifying them as victims.

She explained to me, “Afghanistan is the Taliban. The Taliban is a terrorist. My husband is a terrorist student.”

She began to list the countries: “America, Canada, France, just me and my daughter …”

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Gunshots erupted at Kabul airport

I asked if they were going anywhere. She said, “Anywhere! Any country.”

We mentioned her story to the officer in charge overseas.

Soldiers have a reasonable degree of freedom in their decisions, and Major Steve White decided to bring them into the system.

“I can put it in the system,” he told me, “but I don’t know if the system would spit it out, but I could at least do it.”

He walked over to Fatima and, through another journalist who could translate, explained to her what he would do. She looked confused, but we asked her to follow him.

And take her to the waiting list.

It was simply an act of human kindness in all this chaos.

Fatima has managed to get inside. Major White may have saved their lives, and he certainly gave them a better chance.

But there are many sad stories, too.

Photo: Stuart Ramsey interviewing a doctor who told him she and her family are scared

We met a doctor from Herat with her sister and mother, and they seemed to have absolutely no right to go through the gates.

They fled the Taliban and are now stuck.

They have hope but it seems hopeless.

She said to me, “We don’t have a brother, we don’t have a father, you know that living here is very difficult for us.”

She explained that they were living in Herat but fled to Kabul. Her uncle was part of the Taliban.

She said, “They want to force us into forced marriage. I am a doctor and my sister works in the field of women’s rights, I studied, my mother is a teacher, and my mother was a teacher …”

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I asked if they were escaping from a certain danger.

“Yes, yes, we are afraid, we are afraid,” she said, crying.

I have written about the Afghan war since its inception. I’ve been to countless inclusions with British and American soldiers, met with the Taliban, and seen the pain and grief in Afghanistan two decades ago.

The Taliban won.

As I watch the soldiers carry the children toward the gates of the compound, I can’t help but think how wasteful this is.

Once again, a small group of soldiers deals with the chaos.

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