Many citizens of Afghanistan who served alongside U. S. soldiers left after the Taliban took over in 2021, to avoid being imprisoned or killed. Others tried to leave but couldn’t, or chose not to because they wanted to stay with family.
Seven women who were part of a special military unit did get out—and resettled in Blacksburg. Now, they’re advocating for their family and colleagues who are still in Afghanistan.
Azizgul Ahmadi worked as a police officer in Afghanistan. Then she was selected to be a soldier, as part of a special unit, called the Afghan Female Tactical Platoon, or FTP.
“So right now I’m here. My family’s in Afghanistan. It’s very hard for me,” Ahmadi said.
She left Afghanistan in 2021 after the Taliban took over. She knows the oppressive conditions women are faced with now, under Taliban rule.
“I am worried about women in Afghanistan,” Ahmadi told a room full of students, faculty and community members at Virginia Tech, during a recent panel. “And they are not allowed to go to school, college, or work.”
She’s also worried that her family back home could be punished because of their connection to her.
Army veteran Rebekah Edmondson was one of the American soldiers who served alongside Ahmadi and the other women in the FTP.
“I think they’re role models,” Edmondson said. “We need more people like them in our communities and we’re lucky to have that quality of human being living here now.”
Edmondson is now helping some of these women resettle and adjust to new lives on U.S. soil.
Since she moved to Blacksburg, Ahmadi began learning English, and working at a job. Eventually, she wants to join the U.S. military. To do that, though, she would have to be a US citizen.
She and other advocates are asking Congress to pass the Afghan Adjustment Act, a bipartisan bill which would provide a path to US citizenship for people from Afghanistan who supported US forces during the war.
Some women who served in Ahmadi’s unit still live in Afghanistan, as well as others who supported the U.S. military during the war.
