At least 24 students from Sacramento, California, have been stranded in Afghanistan as Joe Biden’s administration failed to rescue them even as the US withdrew its troops completely from the war-torn country on Tuesday. While the students remain missing in Afghanistan, the Biden administration has no clue about their whereabouts, as the US govt has no information on them.
According to the reports, 24 students of the San Juan Unified School District in California have not yet returned to campus since the semester began. The 24 students are confirmed to be stuck in Afghanistan after the Joe Biden administration completed the evacuation of Americans from the country.
Initially, it was estimated that nearly 150 students from Sacramento in California were stuck in Afghanistan. However, according to the latest estimate, 24 students have not returned and they are confirmed to be trapped inside Afghanistan.
It is not certain yet whether residents of Sacramento will ever return to the USA from Afghanistan, where bombings have killed at least 170 people in the last few weeks due to terror attacks. Meanwhile, Sacramento Congressman Ami Bera’s office has said they are working with the district to bring students back safely.
“Our office has been in close contact with the San Juan Unified School District and have urgently flagged the students’ information with the State Department and Department of Defense. We have not received an update from the State Department or the DOD,” the statement from Bera’s office said.
It is worth mentioning that several refugees from Afghanistan were earlier settled in Sacramento. Sacramento is home to more than ten per cent of Afghan natives living in the United States.
The Sacramento region has accepted a large number of refugees, special visa holders in the last few decades. It is estimated that one out of every nine Afghan natives living in the US resides in the Sacramento region. About 9,700 Afghan people live in Sacramento County, more than any other county in the US. Another 2,000 live in Yolo, Sutter, Placer or El Dorado counties, according to census data.
United States leaves behind contract working dogs in Kabul
On August 30, 2021, the last of the American troops left Kabul, ending the 20-years-long Afghanistan war leaving behind a devastated nation back in the hands of the radical Islamist group. Amid the stories of disappointments and bereavement, another sad picture emerged when it was reported that US troops left 51 contract working dogs behind while leaving the country.
Amidst their hurried withdrawal, the US troop have left contract working dogs that they had deployed during their war against the Taliban. Several veterans and NGOs are now trying to rescue the dogs from Afghanistan. An organization named Kabul Small Animal Rescue (KSAR) has launched a last-minute rescue operation codenamed Operation Hercules to save the stranded dogs on Kabul that included the contract working dogs.
Tommy Amenta, veteran and author, issued a video statement on August 30 describing the situation. He said that the last few hours in the rescue operation were chaos, and he was not sure if the chartered plane they had arranged for the dogs would be able to land or not. In addition, American Humane, a 150-years old national humanitarian organization, has condemned the US government for leaving 51 contract working dogs behind in Afghanistan.
In a statement, Dr Robin R. Ganzert, president and CEO of American Humane, stated that he was devastated to learn that the American government left behind US military contract working dogs “to be tortured and killed at the hand of our enemies.”
