Status: 08/14/2021 4:45 p.m.
Other countries announced days ago that they would use soldiers to get their citizens out of Afghanistan. Now the Bundeswehr is also preparing for such a mission. The final decision lies with the Bundestag.
According to information from ARD capital studios are used to secure the escape of German citizens from Afghanistan. This primarily concerns diplomats, employees of the German embassy in Kabul and employees of organizations.
Crisis conference by phone
The subject is so urgent that Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU), Vice Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), Foreign Minister Heiko Maas (SPD), Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer (CDU) and other cabinet members held a telephone crisis conference about it today. A government spokesman said that voting was currently taking place on how the retrieval could be guaranteed as quickly as possible.
Preparations for the evacuation of embassy and local staff from Afghanistan have started
Sarah Frühauf, ARD Berlin, daily news 5:00 p.m., August 14, 2021
Bundestag must agree to an operation
Such an evacuation mission by the Bundeswehr is only possible with the approval of the Bundestag. The mandate for this is currently being prepared. There is talk of using paratroopers from the Rapid Forces Division in the operation – a unit that is ready for precisely such crises and emergency tasks. Defense Minister Kramp-Karrenbauer announced that the first forces would be deployed as soon as possible. She could not provide any information on details.
First, the German press agency reported on the plans. Because the radical Islamic Taliban are only a few kilometers from the Afghan capital Kabul, Federal Foreign Minister Maas announced yesterday that German embassy staff and local Afghan staff would be flown out of Kabul on charter planes.
Seehofer: “Examination also possible in Germany”
Interior Minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) stated that the identification of Afghan employees and the issuing of visas could also be carried out in Germany if necessary. He told the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”: “We are open to any procedure. No entry of local staff will fail at the Federal Ministry of the Interior.”
Laschet sees a moral obligation
Union Chancellor candidate Armin Laschet spoke of a “moral obligation”. The army will “have to act again. These people have to be helped, they have to be taken out now,” said the CDU politician at the state parliament of the Young Union of Hesse in Giessen. Germany can no longer watch as the local workers are threatened by the Taliban.
Habeck for airlift
Green co-leader Robert Habeck called for more commitment from the federal government for people who have supported the Bundeswehr or German ministries in Afghanistan as local staff. “It now needs an airlift to bring these people out of mortal danger,” said Habeck of the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”. “It’s a question of loyalty. We mustn’t let them down, time is running out.”
Thomas Ruttig, Afghanistan Analysts Network, with background information on the situation in Afghanistan
tagesschau24 5:00 p.m., August 14, 2021
Green Chancellor candidate Annalena Baerbock urged in Deutschlandfunk, All 27 EU countries should prepare for the fact that many Afghans will leave their country. Germany must “unite with the European countries that want, and above all with the Americans and Canadians, so that we can jointly agree on clear quota rules”.
Left-wing defense politician Alexander Neu also called for the local staff to be evacuated. “All local employees of the international organizations active in Afghanistan and NATO, including their families, must be evacuated and brought to the NATO countries,” he told the news portal Watson.
“Federal government must provide protection”
FDP defense expert Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann said that ARD capital studiothat action must now be taken quickly. The federal government is just as responsible for local staff as it is for German embassy staff and must therefore ensure appropriate protection.
With information from Anja Günther, ARD capital city studio.