The Diplomat
The Spanish government has resumed, through Pakistan, the evacuation from Afghanistan of Afghans who collaborated with our country, after the operation that was set in motion immediately on the arrival of the Taliban in Kabul had to be interrupted at the end of August.
According to Radio Nacional de España, 132 Afghans arrived yesterday in Pakistan by land to travel to Spain in the next few hours, on Monday at the latest. They are a group of people who collaborated with the Spanish Armed Forces deployed in Afghanistan, but who could not be evacuated in August.
The first destination of this group, as was the case with the 2,206 Afghans evacuated in the first emergency corridor, will be the Torrejón de Ardoz air base in Madrid, from where they will be transferred to other locations. The Ministries of Defence, Interior and Foreign Affairs are participating in the operation, and for security reasons they are not providing too much information about the operation.
The Pakistani exit route from Afghanistan for the Afghans who collaborated with Spain was negotiated a month ago by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, who travelled to Islamabad so that the Pakistani authorities would facilitate a land corridor through which these people could be taken out. Albares, who met with his counterpart, Shah Mahmud Qureshi, and was received by Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan, insisted at the time that Spain would not leave anyone behind.
