138 local workers flown out so far: a daring promise of protection

138 local workers were flown out of Afghanistan – according to the first results of the Bundeswehr Airlift. About 50,000 people are still waiting for help. Foreign Minister Maas promises rescue, but there are still many imponderables.

Eleven days of the Bundeswehr airlift. Over 35 flights from Kabul. The goal of flying out as many German citizens and local staff as possible. German soldiers finally flew 5,347 people. Five days later, however, the official number of local workers who have made it is sobering.

“As of today, 138 and 496 family members have arrived in Germany. A total of 634 people,” said Interior Minister Horst Seehofer’s spokesman, Steve Alter. 138 local employees made it into a German plane. Alter should explain why there are only 138 local employees and who the other Afghans were who were flown out of Germany. Apparently, however, there is still no precise overview: “At the moment we don’t know whether there is a specific German workforce.”

They may also include Afghans with valid residence permits in Germany, Afghan citizens who are married to Germans, or local staff from other nations.

You can imagine how it went there. Nobody stood in front of a German plane and said that we will only take those who come to Germany with us and that we will leave those who have to go to Italy here. In this respect, people may also have come to Germany who had a local workforce related to other nations. This can be explained by the process landscape.

However, the process landscape must also explain why so far only 138 of the more than ten thousand local workers seeking help have been rescued. Foreign Minister Heiko Maas named the figures: “There are still tens of thousands of local workers, including their families, and there is still a group of those whom we have identified as particularly in need of protection. Also around ten thousand people.”

More than 50,000 vulnerable people

Local staff and relatives. In addition, people and their families identified as particularly vulnerable. Also a number of together a maximum of ten thousand people. Christofer Burger, the spokesman for Foreign Minister Maas, says the extent of the so-called phase II of the evacuation for the local staff alone: ​​”A number of over 40,000 local staff and their relatives. Plus the group of people in particular need of protection.”

How to leave Afghanistan

Together over 50,000 people. All with a promise to come to Germany. Maas made a daring promise of protection in Uzbekistan. Our work continues until everyone is safe, he said. The most likely variant now: the overland route out of Afghanistan. The Foreign Minister, however, did not want to talk about routes or plans: “I would not do that publicly in any way. At the moment, the prerequisites for securing these routes are not in place. For this there would also have to be agreements with the Taliban that are in place the form has not yet existed. But also with the countries to which those will then come. ”

The airlift is history. Now the federal government is relying on rescue by land or via a civil airport in Kabul that is to be rebuilt. “As soon as the airport in Kabul is ready for operation again, it will create flight routes as with the military evacuation, but using civilian means,” says Maas.

However, that would require Turkey to guarantee protection and operation. A lot of subjunctive currently in evacuation phase II, in which Germany is now spoken to over 50,000 people.