‘What Happens Next?’: Escape From the Taliban

Dr Susan Carland: Welcome back to What Happens Next?, the podcast that examines some of the biggest challenges facing our world and ask the experts, what will happen if we don't change and what can we do to create a better future?

I'm Dr Susan Carland, keep listening to find out what happens next.

[Music]

Yalda Hakim: We start with breaking news now. Taliban fighters have reached the Afghan capital, Kabul. Some reports say they've begun entering the city, but a spokesman for the militants said that they've been told to wait…

Newsreader 1: As police officers and security officials abandon their positions, the Taliban urged people to stay calm…

Speaker 1: You want us to avoid bloodshed and to… destruction to our properties of the people...

Dr Susan Carland: This week, we are departing a bit from our usual format to tell an international story in full.

Parisa Sekandari: So I had to choose that I will stay in Afghanistan. I will stay in my homeland, but will not have any right, any future…

Professor Sharon Pickering: I remember I became so distressed when we got news that our first group of five were being beaten by the Taliban, and no one was going out to reach them.

Dr Susan Carland: In August 2021, after 20 years of occupation, the US military departed Afghanistan, leaving the country in the hands of the Taliban.

While many headlines at the time focused on the American military's failure, the real stories were human ones. Afghan citizens were gripped by devastation and fear for their country, their political freedoms and their human rights – especially the rights of women and girls.

The Taliban's original rule in the nineties was marked by a brutal approach. With their resumption of power, champions of women's rights and gender equality began to fear for their lives, and for their families.

Today on What Happens Next?, we'll discuss what the new regime means for women and girls. You'll also hear a harrowing story of the emergency evacuation that helped several young scholars and their families successfully flee Afghanistan for Australia.

[Music]

Professor Jacqui True: Hi, I'm Jacqui True and I'm a professor of International Relations at Monash University. I direct the Monash Gender, Peace and Security Centre, which aims to build globally recognised research on issues of gender, peace and security.

Dr Susan Carland: Jacqui, can you tell us a bit about the history, and also the current situation, of the Taliban in Afghanistan?

Professor Jacqui True: The Taliban was government in Afghanistan prior to 2001, and in 2001, after the attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Towers in New York and Washington, D.C., at the hands of the Al-Qaeda network, the US, along with other allies, mounted an intervention in Afghanistan because Afghanistan, under the Taliban rule, was harbouring the Al-Qaeda network on its territory.

George W. Bush: Good afternoon. On my orders, the United States military has begun strikes against Al-Qaeda terrorist training camps and military installations of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

Professor Jacqui True: So that led to a regime change and an international military operation. Ultimately in 2005, the restoration of a constitution and a transition to a democratic government.

Speaker 2: [Speaks in another language]

Professor Jacqui True: So the Taliban basically had to regroup and reestablish its network in hiding in Pakistan, and, of course, still receiving significant funding from other countries in the region. And obviously still present in the country itself.

They are now the government in Afghanistan, so to speak, if we can even speak about them being a government, given that they're not recognised by most countries in the world. But nonetheless, they've imposed a certain regime.

And I think many people have been surprised at how quickly they have been able to take power and government by force in the country since August 15, when they arrived in Kabul and having a presidential palace empty, having been evacuated by President Ghani.

Dr Susan Carland: Having worked closely with a number of Afghan scholars, activists and youth leaders over the years, Professor True knew their lives were now in danger, as long as they remained in the country.

She led a remarkable team that immediately leapt into action and helped evacuate a number of scholars, and their relatives, from what was quickly becoming a life-or-death situation. Tell us about the evacuation that you were part of to help bring people from Afghanistan that you'd been working with over to Australia.

Professor Jacqui True: So at Monash and Monash Gender, Peace and Security Centre over the last two years, we've had a debate series with Afghans for Progressive Thinking, who are a youth-led organisation. They have 236 debate clubs around Afghanistan in high schools and in universities.

And we had had a debate series specifically focused on inclusive peace processes and how youth and women could participate in the peace process in civil society, but how they could influence the terms of those peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban, mostly taking place outside of the country. And also the focus of the debates was very much on how youth leaders could be advocates for human rights and women's rights in the country to really sustain peaceful relations after war.

[Music]

[Keyboard typing noises]

Professor Jacqui True: On the weekend, I think it was August 13th, I received a message from the director of the Afghans for Progressive Thinking, Muhammad Ajmal.

[Message alert sound effect]

Professor Jacqui True: And he said, “We've been really coping with the humanitarian crisis in Kabul. We're really worried. I don't think we can have our debate in a week's time.” And it was quite dire. He's a very mild mannered guy, very tolerant, peaceful person, as anyone would be leading such an organisation.

And I just thought… It was a Saturday morning. I just thought, this is it. This is it.

Parisa Sekandari: At that moment on that day, actually I was living in Herat, one of the provinces of Afghanistan.

Dr Susan Carland: Parisa Sekandari is one of the Afghan scholars who managed to escape the country. She recalls those crucial hours prior to fleeing.

Parisa Sekandari: On that day, I was planning for a tournament. It was for the national competition for the university students. We were planning on that program with some of international colleagues, and we were talking about the security issues that we may face in national competition, national program.

I never thought that after finishing the meeting, I will receive a call that Herat is under the control of Taliban, and you will not have any competition, national competition, nothing.

So at that time, I really froze on that. I didn't think of… that it would happen this quick.

Professor Jacqui True: I think I made a few phone calls, and particularly to Sharon Pickering, who was the Deputy Vice-Chancellor. And I said, “I think we need to get humanitarian visas and get these young people out, these young scholars out of Afghanistan. Do you think it's a crazy idea?”

Professor Sharon Pickering: Jacqui sent me a text and I've still got it. And it basically said, “I think we have a responsibility to get them out.”

Dr Susan Carland: Professor Sharon Pickering is Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Education, and Senior Vice-President at Monash University. She's a leading international researcher in criminology, with global expertise on border crossings, migration and trafficking.

Professor Sharon Pickering: And she said, “You can talk me out of it if you want.” And I rang her, and we talked, and I didn't talk her out of it. And I said, “No, this is what we need to do.”

And so she then mobilised the student group and I went to the Vice-Chancellor and said, “I believe we've got a responsibility.”

And the Vice-Chancellor, to her credit, immediately said, “Of course”.

[Music]

[Gunfire and shouting]

Professor Jacqui True: So I had a good think that weekend. I spent a lot of time talking to different people.

Monday morning in the Gender, Peace and Security Centre, we started a petition to the Australian government to respond to that situation in Afghanistan. I think by 24 hours we had 6,000 signatures. We just said, “Submit it”.

Our main role was then to get those visas and to provide ongoing moral support to encourage our colleagues to endure a really horrendous queue outside the airport, with three Taliban checkpoints, which were really violently patrolled by soldiers, Taliban soldiers.

[Gunfire and shouting]

Professor Sharon Pickering: Do remember that the fall of Kabul happened much quicker than anyone anticipated.

Joe Biden: The likelihood there's going to be the Taliban overrunning everything, and owning the whole country, is highly unlikely.

Professor Sharon Pickering: Our colleagues in Kabul say they went into work, they went into university, they went into their daily lives in the morning. And by the afternoon they'd had to make a decision to flee.

Dr Susan Carland: Mm.

Professor Sharon Pickering: So that notion of how quickly it moved, and something close to split-second decisions had to be made, and then that window for them to get to a border, or to the airport, and those scenes from the airport… They were decisions made in minutes and hours. They were not decisions made even in days and weeks. And so those calculations were instinctive.

Parisa Sekandari: So everything was so quick and I didn't have the time to think about it.

It was very hard for me as there were no flight at that time, because Herat Airport was under the control of the Taliban, and I had to travel by bus to Kabul. And it was not an easy decision because of the security problems. And also I couldn't travel alone to Kabul because of the restrictions for females. When I talked with my family and tried to convince them, finally I had the decision of going to Kabul and it was 22 hours’ travel by bus to Kabul with the more than 10 checkpoints of the Taliban.

And it was really hard to get to Kabul, but I did because I had to make that decision at that time.

Professor Sharon Pickering: What became apparent is two things: We had to get them emergency evacuation visas, emergency humanitarian visas, and we had to get them to the airport.

So Jacqui and the students worked on getting them to the airport, and myself and the team here, including Government Relations and my chief of staff said, “Right, we'll work on the visas”.

So of course, when you think about visas, you think, “Alright, we better go to the lawyers. We'll go talk to lawyers”. The lawyers came back and said, “Yeah, we'll definitely be able to do them within a week or two”.

[Laughter]

And we were like, “No, I don't think so”.

Dr Susan Carland: Maybe an hour, you've got an hour.

Professor Sharon Pickering: So my, so my chief of staff is saying, “Right, I can't get any lawyers to do it.”

Fortunately, between the two of us, we're reasonably well-travelled. And I turned to him and I said, “You're going to do them.”

And I'd only just recently taken up this job. So one of the first major projects my chief of staff and I worked on was, he basically became one of Australia's greatest migration agents.

[Laughter]

[Music]

Professor Sharon Pickering: And then our students swung into action.

And so basically we connected with the ADF, who gave us advice on how to get people to the airport. And of course the frustration was, some countries were helping get their people to the airport and Australia was not in a position to do that. And so what they basically did is they said, “Right, here's the details. This is where they need to get to, you need to talk them through it.”

And basically it meant that there were WhatsApp groups running to try and keep up morale, because for most people who went to that airport, they spent usually three or four days, and three nights, in what could only be described as the most inhumane conditions. And some of the group turned back because it was too hard. And that really deflated the team here because they wanted to keep going.

I don't think any of us slept for the time that our scholars were trying to get to Abbey Gate. I think that there was a sleep schedule of when people were wake or not.

Our students were incredible. These are young people that we were evacuating. These are people in their early twenties, and our students were there for them and they did not rest as they guided them out.

Dr Susan Carland: Did you ever have a moment where you thought this could go really wrong?

Professor Sharon Pickering: Absolutely. Absolutely. The whole time.

I remember I became so distressed when we got news that our first group of five were being beaten by the Taliban and no one was going out to reach them. And so they were within sight of defence force officials from a number of countries, and they were four men and one woman in this first group that we were trying to get through. And to have the messages coming through on WhatsApp saying, “We are being beaten,” and knowing that and being in those roles… it was a lot.

It was just crushing. It was crushing, because people were dying in those lines and we were desperate to get them through.

Professor Jacqui True: We developed a kind of division of labour. We had a schedule, we had different people on the WhatsApp channels. We had about three different groups of Afghan scholars at that stage, and we always had two people on each of the channels. We had channels to the ADF, to the captains. We had channels to various other people.

And so we actually had to act incredibly quickly. We had to do, in a way, I think it was the crazy thing, but the crazy thing is the normal thing to do in such a situation.

And we were lucky because our last group really just was evacuated and on a flight, on an Australian flight to Dubai, within hours of the ISIS attack on the Kabul airport. So there really wasn't time. And then a couple of hours later, the entire airport closed.

Newsreader 2: Islamic State affiliate ISIS-K claiming that it is behind the suicide blast, which killed more than 13 US service members and dozens of Afghans.

Dr Susan Carland: What is your hope now that you have these amazing scholars from Afghanistan here in Australia? What's your hope that they'll be able to do to help rebuild Afghanistan from here?

Professor Jacqui True: We can provide a safe space, and we can provide a platform for our Afghan scholars to have a voice, and to speak out about the situation in Afghanistan, and to be the strongest advocates they can in the international community, for their fellow Afghan citizens, and especially for Afghan women and girls.

And we're doing that already. We've just finished a 16-days campaign against gender-based violence, focused and dedicated to Afghan women and girls. And we've been able to use that campaign to showcase a video of a different Afghan youth leader speaking about women's rights and human rights, and why they're so important and how they're being violated, how each one of those rights is being violated every day.

And now we've just started a pilot mentoring coaching program with Monash students mentoring and coaching Afghan young women on a research paper to allow them to continue their education, but also to have a voice, and to publish and develop their voice in the context of a university that has a platform.

Parisa Sekandari: When I heard that Monash finally succeeded in having these humanitarian reasons for us, at that time I thought that could be a point of starting for me again, to build my future, to help my… women in Afghanistan, by the help of Monash and by the help of Australian government out of Afghanistan. So that was somehow like a starting point for me again.

Professor Sharon Pickering: We are so fortunate that they got through.

Dr Susan Carland: It really was a life-and-death situation that you were trying to manage.

Professor Sharon Pickering: There was a whole team. It wasn't just me. There was a whole group of us.

And when I say, Jacqui True's leadership was phenomenal. To see her step into this space and say, “This is what we need to do”, and to hold fast. And it was just coming at us. And of course, what was coming at us was nothing compared to what was coming at those scholars that were trying to flee, but that embodied leadership that she offered through that time is... I don't think I've seen a more impressive, or more humane, and a more effective kind of leadership.

Dr Susan Carland: Mm. The ultimate scholar-in-action.

Professor Sharon Pickering: It was incredible.

And also, I would just say, can you imagine being a 19-year-old student? And once we knew everyone was on the plane, I pulled all the students and Jacqui together to do a debrief. Because of the areas I've worked in over my career, I'm very much aware that vicarious traumas are very real and big thing. And these young Monash students, these brilliant Monash students, had lived every minute of this.

And so we had this debriefing session and it will forever stay with me where our students were like, “I'm just 19, and I live in suburban Geelong, and I'm not a political person. I don't know anyone, and all the rest of it. And suddenly here I was, doing the messaging in the middle of the night to get these people through.” And to hear them say, “I was part of this and I stepped up and I went in, and I didn't know anything. And beforehand, I wouldn't have thought I'd got any skills or capabilities…” But these incredible students stepped in and connected with the needs of these students in Afghanistan.

It was glorious. And these Monash students will never be the same, and what they will go on to do will be incredible. And it will be – at least in significant part – shaped by, what I think, is an effort that most people would live their whole lives and not have the opportunity, let alone the wherewithal.

Dr Susan Carland: And they did it at 19.

Professor Sharon Pickering: They did it at 19, and they are absolutely glorious.

[Music]

Parisa Sekandari: I hope one day, again we will have what we had. Again, our women can raise their voice. Again we could see women leaders, women political leaders, women in universities, in schools, who have the right to dream. Again, we could see and feel the women in Afghanistan, their voice, their knowledge, their skills. And I’m hoping to see, one day again, that Afghanistan is living again.

[Music]

Dr Susan Carland: What an incredible, life-changing story for all involved.

The future leaders of a country in crisis, Parisa and her fellow scholars have made it their purpose to keep advocating for and protecting those left behind in Afghanistan. Thank you to all our guests for sharing their experiences. More information about their story and work can be found in our show notes.

Next week, we'll continue to explore the situation in Afghanistan, focusing on the crucial role of women in peacekeeping and international relations. What does the future look like? Find out on our final episode of this season on What Happens Next?.