Afghan interpreter and asylum seeker desperate to reunite with his family since 2016

Mohammed Nabi Wardak, an Afghan interpreter who helped the British Army in Pakistan and was described as a ‘hero’ by many has expressed his anger towards the British Government.

Wardak had to flee his home country in 2016 because the Taliban were planning to kill him for helping the British military and had to leave his wife and children behind. He travelled to Greece and has been homeless in Athens, appealing to the government to grant him the status of an Asylum Seeker, but they were rejected until last year when the Taliban took control of the country. Wardak and his family were granted asylum under the ARAP scheme (UK’s Afghan Relocation Assistance Programme), but he has not been able to reunite with his family who fled to a refugee camp in Pakistan.

He said, “From September 24 last year until today, they took my passport. For the six, seven months I spent in the hotel I couldn’t work. I was not understanding how long I’d be staying in this hotel. My children, they don’t want to talk with me. They say dad you’re lying to us. You have another wife, you have children. When I hear that from my children, it’s like a kind of torture in my psychology.”

It has been reported that the British staff granting visas have been diverted to also take care of Ukrainian refugees which has slowed the process even further.