Paralympic Games: the two Afghan athletes managed to flee Kabul and still dream of being in Tokyo – archyde

Staggering story like that of Zakia Khudadadi and Hossain Rasouli. The two Afghan athletes have long believed they could no longer achieve their dream of participating in the Tokyo Paralympic Games (August 24-September 5). After a week of diplomatic negotiations and a final desperate flight, they were finally able to flee the Taliban regime in recent hours, on the eve of the opening ceremony.

The information was revealed on Monday noon by the Australian media ABC. We are able to confirm it after having been able to exchange a few seconds by phone with Arian Sadiqi, the head of the Afghan delegation. He said that “about fifty athletes” were able to leave Kabul international airport for Australia, including the two Paralympic representatives Khudadadi and Rasouli, who practice para taekwondo.

According to ABC, three people are at the heart of this secret exfiltration carried out on the night of Sunday to Monday while several thousand families are for their part still massed in front of the airport and still trying to flee the regime returned to power for ten days.

Arian Sadiqi, taekwondo coach based in London, was able to count on the talents of former Canadian swimmer Nikki Dryden, now a human rights lawyer, the director of the NGO Human Rights for All, Alison Battisson, as well as the invaluable support of former Australian footballer Craig Foster. The latter had already managed to save Bahraini footballer Hakeem al-Araibi in 2019 from unjustified detention in Thailand and almost certain death if he returned to the emirate.

The miracle has taken place

It is this mobilization, as well as the efforts undertaken by the Fifpro, the international footballers union, which convinced the Australian government to get active. All that remained was to put in contact all these athletes, selected because of the risk they were running in Afghanistan, and the Australian forces present at the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul. “Kind of like asking 50 needles to find their own way through a huge haystack,” according to ABC. But the miracle happened. “I would like to thank Ministers Payne, Hawke and Colbeck and all those involved in this news,” Foster tweeted a few minutes after the two athletes arrived on Australian soil.

So today, 23-year-old Zakia Khudadadi is safe, just hours after being filmed by an English television in tears at the entrance to the airport. Last Wednesday, this champion born with only one functional arm launched an appeal for help via the Reuters news agency.

“Please reach out your hand and help me,” she begged. I am currently imprisoned inside the house. I can’t even go out in confidence, in safety to go and buy myself something, to train, to check how others are doing or that I am not excluded from the competition. “

It remains to be confirmed that she and Hossain Rasouli, also registered in para taekwondo, will be able to participate in the Games. A priori, that is no longer a lot of doubts. Asked this Monday morning by us, the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) had indicated that they had no news from the delegation but assured that “if, luckily, they managed to get to Tokyo, they would still be able to represent the ‘Afghanistan’. The CIP also told us that whatever happened, the Afghan flag would be carried this Tuesday during the opening ceremony by a representative of the UN High Commission for Refugees. We are now hopeful that it will be brandished by the two Afghan miracles.