Annie here with an update. We raised enough to pay the fee for Fereshta and Israr's Humanitarian Parole Applications, so those are sent off and now we wait. Our current hurdle is to keep them in Turkey and not have them deported back to Afghanistan because their application to Turkish Immigration for asylum was denied. I have found a Turkish attorney to take their case and appeal it in Turkish Administrative court. The attorney's fee is $2,200. Please reach out to me if you have any questions--I check the comments here daily. Thank you so much to everyone who has donated!
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Hi. My name is Annie. Donating here is a way to help one specific Afghan family.

 

I volunteer at a small non-profit that connects women attorneys in the US with women in Afghanistan who are seeking to further their legal careers abroad. I met Fereshta and became her mentor in May of 2020. At that time, she was living with her family, taking care of her elderly father, helping to plan her brother's wedding, job searching, and making plans to apply to LLM programs outside of Afghanistan. Fereshta and I became fast friends, and we soon became a part of each other's lives and families. 

As her mentor, I worked with Fereshta for a year and a half helping her develop her legal English. Prior to pursuing a career in the law, Fereshta worked as a midwife in Helmand Province, and she worked as a translator for Doctors Without Borders in a hospital. Last November (2020), Fereshta was kidnapped by the Taliban. They held her for ten days and told her that they were going to kill her. She escaped with the help of Israr*, who is now her husband. The Taliban delivered two written death warrants to her family’s front door after her escape. These letters explained that the Taliban had sentenced her to death for working with foreigners. Here is a translation of one of the letters:

 

“Dr. Mohammad [Last name*], and his daughter Fereshta [Last name*]:

We have been informed that your daughter, contrary to Islamic principles and contrary to the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, has become an agent [lit. slave] of the United States, which is a country of infidels who behave contrary to Islamic norms. Thus she worked with foreigners and received a salary that is haram, contrary to the principles of Islam, at the time of her [or her father's] work in the hospital that followed the laws of the Islamic Emirate. Accordingly, we took your daughter prisoner and tortured her for ten days until she escaped. Later, by the will of God, we will punish her with death.”

 

Fereshta and Israr* fled to Turkey before the Taliban took over Afghanistan in August 2021. They applied for refugee status in Turkey, but the Turkish government just rejected their refugee applications. They are now attempting to appeal that decision. Fereshta is pregnant with a baby girl. She and Israr* want to make it to a country where they can raise their daughter in safety and where all three of them can go to school and pursue the careers they want. Fereshta would like to be an attorney, and Israr* would like to become an engineer. They would like their daughter to grow up and become whatever she chooses.

 

I am raising money to pay for their Humanitarian Parole applications to the United States, and to pay for the first two years of their (estimated) living expenses. This includes application fee for 2 people ($1,150), travel to the United States ($3,000), rent ($1,200/month), food ($800/month), medical expenses (if the baby is born here in the U.S = $4,500), and other costs associated with resettlement and for a newborn baby starting this winter. I am going to be the sponsor for Fereshta and her family, and I will assume the financial burden of their resettlement if the United States accepts their application. Donating here is a way to help one specific Afghan family. If their application to the US is denied, I will either return any donated funds (at donor's request) or I will leave the money in an account to send to them in monthly installments wherever they are able to re-settle.

 

Fereshta is an Afghan woman with a Taliban death warrant over her head. She is a wife, an expectant mother, and she is a woman seeking to improve the lives of all women born in Afghanistan. In coming to know and love Fereshta over the past year and a half, her story has become my story.  I was there to try and support her after her kidnapping and escape from the Taliban late last year, and I was there to try and support her after her harrowing escape to Turkey. Please take this chance to support her now. Thank you so much.

 

*We have changed Fereshta's husband's name and redacted her last name here in order to protect their identities from the Taliban.