World
Efforts to evacuate LGBTQ Afghans to continue after US troop withdrawal
Taliban entered Kabul on Aug. 15
The last American troops have withdrawn from Afghanistan amid continued efforts to evacuate LGBTQ people from the country.
Marine Corps Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command told reporters on Monday the last American C-17 left Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, the Afghan capital, at 3:29 p.m. ET (11:59 p.m. in Afghanistan.)
“Tonight’s withdrawal signifies both the end of the military component of the evacuation but also the end of the nearly 20-year mission that began in Afghanistan shortly after September 11, 2001,” said McKenzie.
The previous White House in 2020 brokered a peace deal with the Taliban that set the stage for the withdrawal. President Biden last month announced American military operations in Afghanistan would end on Tuesday.
The Taliban entered Kabul on Aug. 15 and toppled then-President Ashraf Ghani’s government.
McKenzie and Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday noted the U.S. evacuated more than 123,000 people — including 6,000 American citizens — from Afghanistan since the Taliban regained control of the country.
“This has been a massive military, diplomatic and humanitarian undertaking — one of the most difficult in our nation’s history — and an extraordinary feat of logistics and coordination under some of the most challenging circumstances imaginable,” said Blinken in remarks he delivered from the State Department.
Blinken acknowledged “a small number of Americans — under 200 and likely closer to 100 — who remain in Afghanistan and want to leave.” Blinken in his remarks did not specifically mention LGBTQ Afghans who remain in the country, but he did refer to “at-risk Afghans” when he referenced the Taliban’s commitment “to let anyone with proper documents leave the country in a safe and orderly manner.”
“We are all committed to ensuring that our citizens, nationals and residents, employees, Afghans who have worked with us and those who are at risk can continue to travel freely to destinations outside Afghanistan,” reads a statement the U.S. and more than 100 other countries signed on Sunday. “We have received assurances from the Taliban that all foreign nationals and any Afghan citizen with travel authorization from our countries will be allowed to proceed in a safe and orderly manner to points of departure and travel outside the country.”
“We will continue issuing travel documentation to designated Afghans, and we have the clear expectation of and commitment from the Taliban that they can travel to our respective countries,” adds the statement. “We note the public statements of the Taliban confirming this understanding.”
Blinken in his remarks noted the U.N. Security Council on Monday “passed a resolution that enshrines that responsibility — laying the groundwork to hold the Taliban accountable if they renege.”
“The international chorus on this is strong, and it will stay strong,” said Blinken. “We will hold the Taliban to their commitment on freedom of movement for foreign nationals, visa holders, at-risk Afghans.”
“We will work to secure their safe passage,” added Blinken.
Taliban ‘will kill us one by one’
The Taliban instituted a strict version of Sharia law in Kabul and the large swaths of Afghanistan it controlled from 1996 to 2001.
Dr. Ahmad Qais Munhazim, an assistant professor of global studies at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia who is originally from Afghanistan, in an op-ed the Washington Blade published earlier this month wrote the Taliban hanged men in soccer fields who had been accused of having same-sex relationships.
A Taliban judge last month said the group would once again execute people if it were to return to power in Afghanistan. One LGBTQ Afghan who commented under a Facebook post said the Taliban “will kill us one by one, so I have no choice but to escape.”
More than 60 members of Congress last week urged the U.S. to evacuate LGBTQ Afghans from their country. Canada thus far is the only country that has specifically said it would offer refuge to LGBTQ Afghans.
“With the Taliban’s takeover of the country, LGBTQ+ Afghans face the prospect of violent death. Sharia law, cemented in Afghanistan’s constitution, prohibits all forms of same-sex activity, and makes same-sex activity punishable by death,” reads the letter the members of Congress sent to Blinken. “Just as it was for ISIS in Iraq, Sharia law is the Taliban’s guiding compass as it establishes its rule over Afghanistan’s government and society. During its campaign in Iraq and Syria, ISIS frequently executed LGBTQ+ individuals by stoning them to death, castrating and hanging them in public squares, and throwing them off buildings.”
“Under Taliban rule, LGBTQ+ Afghans will suffer a similar fate,” it adds.
Nick Herbert, a member of the British House of Lords who advises Prime Minister Boris Johnson on LGBTQ issues, urged the U.K. to offer sanctuary to LGBTQ Afghans.
“The safety of LGBT+ people in Afghanistan is now a huge concern and many have not been able to leave,” tweeted Herbert on Aug. 27. “Afghans most in need, including LGBT+ people, will rightly be prioritized and welcomed to the UK under the Resettlement Scheme. We must do everything we can to help them.”
The safety of LGBT+ people in Afghanistan is now a huge concern and many have not been able to leave. Afghans most in need, including LGBT+ people, will rightly be prioritised and welcomed to the UK under the Resettlement Scheme. We must do everything we can to help them.
— Nick Herbert (@nickherbertcbe) August 27, 2021
Rainbow Railroad, a Toronto-based organization that assists LGBTQ refugees around the world, on Monday said it remains in contact with LGBTQ Afghans who hope to leave their country. Stonewall, a British LGBTQ rights group, tweeted it “won’t stop working to get LGBTQ+ Afghans to safety.”
Rainbow Railroad continues to liaise with #LGBTQI people on the ground in #Afghanistan. @KimahliPowell updated @CBCToronto and @chrisgloverCBC on our efforts to find safety for people caught in this conflict. https://t.co/ewP818TZYD
— Rainbow Railroad (@RainbowRailroad) August 30, 2021
Iran
Grenell: ‘Real hope’ for gay rights in Iran as result of nationwide protests
Former ambassador to Germany claimed he has sneaked ‘gays and lesbians out of’ country
Richard Grenell, the presidential envoy for special missions of the United States, said on X on Tuesday that he has helped “sneak gays and lesbians out of Iran” and is seeing a change in attitudes in the country.
The post, which now has more than 25,000 likes since its uploading, claims that attitudes toward gays and lesbians are shifting amid massive economic protests across the country.
“For the first time EVER, someone has said ‘I want to wait just a bit,” the former U.S. ambassador to Germany wrote. “There is real hope coming from the inside. I don’t think you can stop this now.”
Grenell has been a longtime supporter of the president.
“Richard Grenell is a fabulous person, A STAR,” Trump posted on Truth Social days before his official appointment to the ambassador role. “He will be someplace, high up! DJT”
Iran, which is experiencing demonstrations across all 31 provinces of the country — including in Tehran, the capital — started as a result of a financial crisis causing the collapse of its national currency. Time magazine credits this uprising after the U.N. re-imposed sanctions in September over the country’s pursuit of nuclear weapons.
As basic necessities like bread, rice, meat, and medical supplies become increasingly unaffordable to the majority of the more than 90 million people living there, citizens took to the streets to push back against Iran’s theocratic regime.
Grenell, who was made president and executive director of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts last year by Trump, believes that people in the majority Shiite Muslim country are also beginning to protest human rights abuses.
Iran is among only a handful of countries in which consensual same-sex sexual relations remain punishable by death, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
Venezuela
AHF client in Venezuela welcomes Maduro’s ouster
‘This is truly something we’ve been waiting for’ for decades
An AIDS Healthcare Foundation client who lives in Venezuela told the Washington Blade he welcomes the ouster of his country’s former president.
The client, who asked the Blade to remain anonymous, on Thursday said he felt “joy” when he heard the news that American forces seized Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, at their home in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital, during an overnight operation on Jan. 3.
“This is truly something we’ve been waiting for for 26 or 27 years,” the AHF client told the Blade.
Hugo Chávez became Venezuela’s president in 1999. Maduro succeeded him in 2013 after he died.
“I’ve always been in opposition,” said the AHF client, who stressed he was speaking to the Blade in his personal capacity and not as an AHF representative. “I’ve never agreed with the government. When I heard the news, well, you can imagine.”
He added he has “high hopes that this country will truly change, which is what it needed.”
“This means getting rid of this regime, so that American and foreign companies can invest here and Venezuela can become what it used to be, the Venezuela of the past,” he said.
The AHF client lives near the Colombia-Venezuela border. He is among the hundreds of Venezuelans who receive care at AHF’s clinic in Cúcuta, a Colombian city near the Táchira River that marks the border between the two countries.
The Simón Bolívar Bridge on the Colombia-Venezuela border on May 14, 2019. (Washington Blade video by Michael K. Lavers)
The AHF client praised U.S. President Donald Trump and reiterated his support for the Jan. 3 operation.
“It was the only way that they could go,” he said.
The Venezuelan National Assembly on Jan. 4 swore in Delcy Rodríguez, who was Maduro’s vice president, as the country’s acting president. The AHF client with whom the Blade spoke said he is “very optimistic” about Venezuela’s future, even though the regime remains in power.
“With Maduro leaving, the regime has a certain air about it,” he said. “I think this will be a huge improvement for everyone.”
“We’re watching,” he added. “The actions that the United States government is going to implement regarding Venezuela give us hope that things will change.”
Colombia
Colombians protest against Trump after he threatened country’s president
Tens of thousands protested the US president in Bogotá
BOGOTÁ, Colombia — Tens of thousands of people on Wednesday gathered in the Colombian capital to protest against President Donald Trump after he threatened Colombian President Gustavo Petro.
The protesters who gathered in Plaza Bolívar in Bogotá held signs that read, among other things, “Yankees go home” and “Petro is not alone.” Petro is among those who spoke.
The Bogotá protest took place four days after American forces seized now former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, at their home in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital, during an overnight operation.
The Venezuelan National Assembly on Sunday swore in Delcy Rodríguez, who was Maduro’s vice president, as the country’s acting president. Maduro and Flores on Monday pleaded not guilty to federal drug charges in New York.
Trump on Sunday suggested the U.S. will target Petro, a former Bogotá mayor and senator who was once a member of the M-19 guerrilla movement that disbanded in the 1990s. Claudia López, a former senator who would become the country’s first female and first lesbian president if she wins Colombia’s presidential election that will take place later this year, is among those who criticized Trump’s comments.
The Bogotá protest is among hundreds against Trump that took place across Colombia on Wednesday.
Petro on Wednesday night said he and Trump spoke on the phone. Trump in a Truth Social post confirmed he and his Colombian counterpart had spoken.
“It was a great honor to speak with the president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, who called to explain the situation of drugs and other disagreements that we have had,” wrote Trump. “I appreciated his call and tone, and look forward to meeting him in the near future. Arrangements are being made between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the foreign minister of Colombia. The meeting will take place in the White House in Washington, D.C.”
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