Hundreds throng passport office in Afghanistan capital Kabul

Hundreds of Afghans have flocked to the passport office in Kabul a day after it was announced it would reopen to issue travel documents.

Taliban soldiers beat back some in the crowd in efforts to maintain order on Wednesday.

Taliban officials said the service will resume on Saturday after being suspended since the armed group’s takeover and the fall of Ashraf Ghani’s government in August, which stranded many of those desperate to flee the country.

“I have come to get a passport but, as you can see here, there are lots of problems, the system is not working,” said one applicant, Mahir Rasooli. “There is no official to answer our questions here to tell us when to come. People are confused.”

Poverty and hunger have worsened since the Taliban took over Afghanistan, which already suffered from drought and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Half a million people have been displaced in recent months, the United Nations says, and the number will grow only if health services, schools and the economy break down.

The hundreds who descended on the passport office came despite advice that distribution of passports would begin on Saturday, and initially only for those who had already applied.

The crowd pressed against a large concrete barrier, trying to hand documents to an official who stood atop it, in a scene reminiscent of the chaos at Kabul airport in the last stages of evacuation after the withdrawal of US troops.

The official urged them to come back on Saturday.

“I am here to receive a passport, but unfortunately I couldn’t,” said Ahmad Shakib Sidiqi. “I don’t know what we should do in this condition.”

The bleak economic outlook drives their desire to leave, said Sidiqi and Rasooli.

“There is no job and the economic situation is not too good, so I want to have a good future for my kids,” said Rasooli.

Sidiqi said he wanted a passport to accompany a member of his family to neighbouring Pakistan to seek medical treatment, but added they had no choice except to leave.

“We have to leave Afghanistan,” he said. “It is a bad situation in Afghanistan – no job, no work. It is not a good condition for us to live.”