An Afghan man who served alongside US particular forces and fled his native nation after its takeover by the Taliban died over the weekend shortly after being detained by immigration authorities, in line with his family and an advocacy group.
Mohammad Nazeer Paktyawal died on Saturday, less than a day after he was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement exterior of his Dallas-area condo. His family stated the 41-year-old father of six had no recognized well being circumstances and had been searching for asylum since his arrival to the US in August 2021. The Department of Homeland Security stated his humanitarian parole expired final August.
DHS stated in a assertion that Paktyawal, who was arrested throughout a “targeted enforcement operation” and didn’t report any prior medical historical past, complained of shortness of breath and chest pains throughout his medical consumption examination at a Dallas ICE area workplace after his Friday arrest.
ICE contacted paramedics, who transported Paktyawal to a Dallas hospital, DHS spokesperson Lauren Bis stated. On Saturday, Paktyawal’s tongue was swollen and he acquired an IV drip. His situation deteriorated Saturday morning and he died shortly after 9 a.m. native time after receiving CPR and different resuscitative efforts from physicians, Bis added.
An preliminary report from the Dallas County Medical Examiner listed no trigger or method of dying. Paktyawal’s dying marks the twelfth of a detainee in ICE custody this yr.
It has prompted widespread grief in the close-knit Afghan diaspora neighborhood in Texas, the place most of the extra than 190,000 Afghans who fled to the US after the nation’s authorities collapsed in August 2021 settled, stated Rahmanullah Zazy, a chief in the Dallas-area Afghan neighborhood who knew Paktyawal and his family.
“They’re saying they took our community member alive to the detention center, and now we are getting the dead body,” Zazy stated. “We want peace.”
The Biden administration evacuated tens of hundreds of Afghans after the nation’s authorities was taken over by the Taliban because the US withdrew, ending twenty years of struggle.
The effort was meant to guard Afghans whose work alongside US servicemembers made them weak to reprisals from the brand new Taliban authorities.
Both Zazy and a group that has advocated for Afghan refugees stated Paktyawal served alongside US particular forces beginning round 2005.
DHS stated in its assertion that, upon coming into the US, Paktyawal “provided no record of his military service.” But the advocacy group, AfghanEvac, supplied a certificates of service indicating Paktyawal served alongside a particular forces group in japanese Afghanistan, alongside the Pakistan border.
“We don’t know how he died,” stated the group’s president, Shawn VanDiver. “We just know he’s dead.”
NCS has reached out to Fort Bragg, the army base the place the particular forces group was based mostly, to substantiate Paktyawal’s service alongside the US service members.
After President Donald Trump took workplace final yr, he enacted broad changes to US refugee coverage which minimize off hundreds of weak Afghans who labored straight for or on behalf of the US authorities from essential help.
The program got here underneath larger scrutiny in November, after an Afghan man who got here to the US via Operation Allies Welcome and was granted asylum final yr allegedly shot two National Guard members in Washington, DC, killing one. The taking pictures suspect, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, worked with the CIA in Afghanistan for over a decade earlier than coming into the US in 2021. The Justice Department has stated it’s searching for the dying penalty towards him.
The taking pictures prompted Trump to name for a re-examination of each individual who migrated from Afghanistan through the Biden administration.
In her assertion on Paktyawal’s dying, Bis, the DHS spokesperson, criticized the Biden-era program, which she stated let “thousands of unvetted Afghan nationals” into the United States.
But that claim is misleading. All Afghans who entered the United States had been topic to screenings by intelligence, legislation enforcement and counterterrorism professionals, and officers and consultants have stated evacuated Afghans had been generally vetted extra than as soon as – each whereas they had been in Afghanistan and in transit international locations the place they had been staying earlier than coming into the US.
VanDiver stated Paktyawal had six youngsters aged 18-months to 15-years-old, the youngest of whom is an American citizen.
In a transient interview, Paktyawal’s brother, Naseer, described his brother as a “hero.”
“He was here,” he stated, “and he just got killed in less than 24 hours.”