LONDON—Members of Afghanistan’s women’s youth development soccer team arrived in Britain before the weekend after being flown from Pakistan with the help of a New York rabbi, a UK soccer club and Kim Kardashian West.
A plane chartered by the reality star and carrying more than 30 teenage players and their families, about 130 people in all, landed at Stansted Airport near London. The Afghans will spend 10 days in coronavirus quarantine before starting new lives in Britain.
English Premier League club Leeds United has offered to support the players.
Britain and other countries evacuated thousands of Afghans in a rushed airlift as Kabul fell to Taliban militants in August. Many more people have since left overland for neighboring countries in hopes of traveling on to the West.
Women playing sports was seen as a political act of defiance against the Taliban, and hundreds of female athletes have left Afghanistan since the group returned to power and began curbing women’s education and freedoms.
Khalida Popal, a former captain of Afghanistan’s national women’s team who has spearheaded evacuation efforts for female athletes, said she felt “so happy and so relieved” that the girls and women were out of danger.
“Many of those families left their houses when the Taliban took over. Their houses were burnt down,” Popal told The Associated Press. “Some of their family members were killed or taken by Taliban. So the danger and the stress was very high, and that’s why it was very important to move fast to get them outside Afghanistan.”
Australia evacuated the members of Afghanistan’s national women’s soccer team, and the youth girls’ team was resettled in Portugal.
Members of the development team, many of whom come from poor families in the country’s provinces, managed to reach Pakistan and eventually to secure UK visas. But they were left in limbo for weeks with no flight out of the country as the time limit on their Pakistani visas ticked down.
The team got help from the Tzedek Association, a nonprofit US group that previously helped the last known member of Kabul’s Jewish community leave Afghanistan.
The group’s founder, Rabbi Moshe Margaretten, has worked with reality TV star Kardashian West on criminal justice reform in the US. He reached out to her to help pay for a chartered plane to the UK.
“Maybe an hour later, after the Zoom call, I got a text message that Kim wants to fund the entire flight,” Margaretten said.
Kardashian West’s spokeswoman confirmed that the star and her brand SKIMs had chartered the flight.
Sports leaders appointed by the Taliban, meanwhile, have promised Olympic officials that Afghanistan will continue to allow its athletes and teams to compete internationally.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced the pledge Thursday after its delegation met in Qatar with leaders of the Afghan General Directorate of Physical Education & Sports. The Qatari capital city of Doha has been a political base for the Taliban, which retook control of Afghanistan in August.
“During the meeting, the Afghan representatives stated that they were strongly committed to following and observing the Olympic Charter,” the IOC said in a statement.
Hundreds of athletes and sports officials, including many women who feared being barred from competing and from reprisals, have left Afghanistan since August. They were helped by international athlete representatives and sports bodies including the IOC and Fifa.
Thursday’s outcome could mean Afghan athletes will compete at the Beijing Olympics in February.
“Both parties reiterated the fundamental right to access and practice sport safely for all individuals without discrimination,” the IOC said. “Both sides consider the discussions to have been constructive and agreed to continue the dialogue.”
The IOC noted it “continues to recognize the existing National Olympic Committee (NOC) of Afghanistan,” whose elected leaders were present in Qatar, where the ruling Emir is also a long-time IOC member.
The Afghan delegation was led by Nazar Mohammad Mutmaeen, the IOC said. He was announced in September by the Taliban as a member of the interim government cabinet.
Image courtesy of AP