Countdown for Qais: N.S. woman calls for action to help Afghan family flee to Canada

Nicole Wood says Canadian immigration officials have let the family down

Jack Julian · CBC News · 

A woman from Windsor, N.S., says her Afghan friend is at imminent risk of death because of his work supporting Canada’s mission to Afghanistan.

Nicole Wood says Mohammed Qasim Hassan Zada has been continually let down by Canadian immigration officials and by Canadian diplomats in Pakistan, where he and his family have fled.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada has little more than a week to support Hassan Zada’s refugee claim, Wood says, or his family’s Pakistan visas stipulate they’ll have to temporarily return to Afghanistan. That could mean he falls into the hands of the Taliban, which have been hunting him.

“Just nobody’s answering to anything, and it’s disgusting to me, it’s deplorable,” Wood said in a recent interview. “Shame on them.”

The Canadian government has been criticized by former Canadian military commanders for being too slow to help Afghans flee their country. Last month, the federal government acknowledged it could take two years to resettle all 40,000 refugees it has promised to bring to the country.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada told CBC News it is in the process of preparing a response to the issues raised by Hassan Zada’s case.

Wood met Hassan Zada in 2012 when she and her husband began working in Kabul for Innovative Allied Technical Services. The Afghan-owned company leased out armoured vehicles to countries like Canada that joined the UN-mandated mission to support a fledgling national government.

Hassan Zada and his family. Images have been blurred to protect the safety of the individuals involved. (Mohammed Qasim Hassan Zada )

Wood says IATS held an important contract with Canada’s diplomatic mission in Kabul. The company customized and repaired the leased armoured vehicles used to transport Canadian officials, including the ambassador.

Wood worked as an administrator handling clients with ongoing contracts. Her husband was the multinational company’s lead in Afghanistan.

Hassan Zada, who goes by the nickname Qais, worked for IATS, translating for clients and helping source and deliver parts for the company’s fleet.

“Qais was our fixer, he was our translator, he was our driver. He was our logistics guy,” Wood said. “If you need it, he would make it happen.”

Wood and her husband, Mark, liked Hassan Zada right away. And after years working side by side, Wood says, he became like “my brother” and a member of their family.

Since the Taliban takeover, Wood says she’s been living in daily fear for his safety, and that of his wife, Shila, 34, and their children, Najla, 8, Ismail, 6, Wasim, 4, and Donya, 2.

Wood, husband Mark and son Oliver are shown. The dogs are street rescues from Afghanistan. (Submitted by Nicole Wood)

CBC News reached Hassan Zada, 36, by phone in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, where he is living with his family.

“We have got a lot of problems, so I can’t sleep. I didn’t sleep for a few days now,” he said. “I’m just waiting for the news.”

Hassan Zada loved working with foreigners in Afghanistan. But associating with foreigners supporting the International Security Assistance Force was unpopular with some of his neighbours.

While foreign employees stayed mainly in the company’s compound, Hassan Zada says his role sourcing parts and equipment for armoured vehicles took him out in public.

He accepted the risks of his job on the understanding Canada would protect him and offer an opportunity to immigrate some day, he says.

“We’re going to leave if we need, we’re going to be in Canada. So this was our insurance. Basically, this was how we took this job and we work with the Canadians,” he said.

ANALYSIS

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But the meteoric military success of the Taliban last summer threatened everything, and the fall of the capital Kabul took him by surprise.

He says he’d sent his children to school that day, but got a call from a Afghan military contact warning him of the Taliban advance. He took his children to his father’s home, “and then from there we just keep hiding,” moving frequently between the homes of family and friends.

Hassan Zada attempted to get to the Kabul airport to join evacuation flights. He says he had documents and spoke with Canadian Forces members, but he couldn’t get out of the country.

He says he and his family were at the airport in late August when a nearby Islamic State suicide attack killed at least 180 people. He was not near the scene, but decided not to try to go the airport again.

Taliban closing in

As the weeks passed, Hassan Zada heard from neighbours that the Taliban were looking for him at his abandoned apartment.

Finally on Oct. 2, an email arrived offering the family sanctuary in Canada, if they could present themselves at a Canadian embassy.

Hassan Zada with Mark Wood on his birthday. (Nicole Wood)

It started an all-or-nothing bid to escape Afghanistan. The first step was securing visas to enter neighbouring Pakistan.

Hassan Zada says he tried to apply through government channels, but to no avail. Instead, he purchased tourist visas from a broker, which cost over $410 US apiece, a punishing sum for a family of six.

To pay for them, Hassan Zada’s wife and father returned to their apartment one last time to sell their belongings.

“We sell everything. I had a small car. We sell that as well… This stuff we had, nobody’s buying at the price we paid for it because nobody has the money. The banks are closed, so it was very difficult,” he said.

With help from family in Afghanistan and Europe, the family made the payment.

The visas arrived on Dec. 24. On Dec. 27, Hassan Zada and his family attempted the most dangerous part of their journey, crossing the eastern border with Pakistan.

A day of fear

Hassan Zada says he stood in line outdoors with his wife and children from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m., waiting to be processed by Pakistani border guards.

He says the lineup was scrutinized by Taliban officials, comparing faces in the crowd with images on their cellphones. The consequences of discovery played out when border guards recognized another man in line.

“They come and they took a family,” Hassan Zada said. “He was military, something. So they took him from the line. They were beating him in front of the people, in front of the woman and everything.”

He didn’t know if the Taliban had his picture, because he hadn’t been able to erase a computer he’d left behind at his home.

“I carry my two kids with me all the time because when I see the Taliban, I’m shaking, I’m shaking and thinking they have my picture. Maybe now they will ask me,” he said.

Back in Nova Scotia, Wood was terrified too. Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada wasn’t answering emails, she says, and the embassy wasn’t answering the phone.

She heard from Hassan Zada the night of Dec. 27. He had made it.

30-day countdown

After three weeks in Pakistan, Hassan Zada is living in a rented apartment in Islamabad. He says his emails to the Canadian embassy generate only auto-replies. Phones are answered by voicemail. He says he’s run out of money for rent, food and cellphone.

Nicole Wood on an armoured vehicle in Afghanistan. (Submitted by Nicole Wood)

When he presented himself at the embassy, guards turned him away, saying embassy staff only make contact on their own initiative.

“They do nothing. They don’t, they don’t care about us. They don’t care about humanity,” he said.

And while the family’s visas are valid for four months, they are conditional on exiting Pakistan every 30 days, then re-entering. Unless Canadian officials provide the proper paperwork to show the Pakistani government, the family will be forced to make this trip by Jan. 26.

Wood thinks it unlikely Hassan Zada will survive a second crossing, that he will be “grabbed” by the Taliban. She despairs for what would then become of Shila and their children.

“His wife could beg, you know, there’s always that,” Wood said.

Last-minute movement

Hassan Zada finally received a call from the Canadian embassy on Thursday, inviting him and Shila for biometric scans, the first stage of the immigration permitting process. The biometric checks were performed Saturday.

It’s all to take his family forever beyond the reach of the Taliban.

“I’m going to take them there… I’m going to be a Canadian,” Hazzan Zada said. “I know many things about Canada. I know I know many people, as I told you. So this was my dream.”

But Wood says there are less than 10 days separating Hassan Zada’s dream from a terrifying alternative. All she wants is for Canada to quickly provide proof the family are legitimate refugees, so he can stay in Pakistan while the bureaucracy grinds forward.

“We have left these people with nothing. And it is shocking, shocking to me that nothing more is being said and done about it,” she said.