In response to the rapidly deteriorating crisis in Afghanistan, Cabinet has made a series of calls for Kiwi troops to embark on an international rescue, writes political editor Jo Moir.
News cycles were overrun at the weekend with live footage of Afghan nationals fleeing for safety as the Taliban approached the capital, Kabul, at a blistering pace on Sunday.
It came after US troops without warning moved out of the country in the middle of the night, after a presence of two decades.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and key colleagues including Defence Minister Peeni Henare and Associate Immigration Minister Phil Twyford were in communication at the weekend as the situation in Afghanistan deteriorated.
On Sunday, along with the Chief of Defence Kevin Short, they got the ball rolling as to how they might help evacuate both New Zealanders and Afghan nationals with Kiwi links.
Their recommendations were put to the full Cabinet on Monday when ministers met in Wellington at 11am where three key steps were signed off in-principle.
There are 53 New Zealanders currently in Afghanistan who are all receiving consular support, and Ardern told media at her weekly post-Cabinet press conference on Monday that getting New Zealand citizens and family members out safely is a priority.
In addition to that are the Afghan nationals who assisted the New Zealand Defence Force while personnel were deployed to Afghanistan.
More than 3500 Kiwi personnel were deployed to Afghanistan over two decades and 10 comrades lost their lives while serving there.
Cabinet has made an in-principle decision to evacuate those who worked with the NZDF, Police, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade and those who provided material assistance for the Operation Burnham inquiry - believed to be about 37 individuals.
These cases will be based on whether there are “reasonable grounds to believe their safety is at risk due to their association with New Zealand’,’ Ardern says.
Evacuation for these people will be for the individuals involved and their immediate “nuclear family’’ and visas will be processed and expedited in the safety of a third-party country near to Afghanistan before arrangements are made to fly them to New Zealand.
The Government has been under fire for not reacting fast enough to the escalating situation and potentially putting in danger those Afghan nationals who have helped New Zealanders in the past.
Ardern responded to this on Monday, saying a definition for who could be resettled was agreed on in 2012 by the then-National government.
Roughly 65 individuals, minus dependants, fitted into that category and there were some who chose not to come, Henare pointed out.
As the situation has changed in recent weeks, Afghan nationals have made contact with the Government and Ardern told media Twyford had been “coming to the view that the criteria needed to change’’.
That has now all been overridden by the advancements made by the Taliban in recent days and Cabinet is moving to help those individuals who have contacted the Government.
In addition to getting those in danger to safety, Cabinet has approved an NZDF C-130 Hercules being deployed to Afghanistan along with about 40 personnel.
Short told media on Monday he was planning for the deployment to last a month “but I don’t know if the security situation will allow us to operate for that long, so we will do as much as we can over the next few weeks’’.
Ardern says this doesn’t mean everyone the C-130 brings home will be a New Zealander as personnel will be working with other governments to bring home whomever needs assistance.
Decisions are still being made about whether SAS troops will be part of the personnel who travel, but Short says it won’t be in a combat role as there are troops already in Afghanistan from friendly countries who are securing the airfield for evacuations.
A more long-term decision to be made by the Government is whether to resettle other individuals from Afghanistan who have applied for reunification visas that have been impacted by both Covid and recent events.
Ardern says humanitarian aid relief will also be discussed when international leaders and organisations work out who will be best to carry out that work.
