US in talks to send Afghan refugees to DR Congo

Sayliyah camp: The US government is in talks to send Afghans currently residing at a former US base in Qatar to the Democratic Republic of Congo, AfghanEvac, a group seeking to help the former allies said on Tuesday.

The Afghans were relocated to Qatar after US-led international forces withdrew from Afghanistan in 2021 as they had provided assistance to the US military.

Some 1,100 Afghans, around 400 of them children, are staying at the As Sayliyah camp in Qatar.

The group includes interpreters who worked for the US military, Afghan military commandos and family members of US soldiers, according to The New York Times, which first reported on the plan.

What do we know about the plan?
Shawn VanDiver, the president of the AfghanEvac, said his organisation suspects that Washington seeks to send the former US military allies back to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.

AfghanEvac said the plan to send them to Congo is an attempt to "manufacture a refusal."

"Offer these families relocation to an active war zone in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, knowing they cannot accept, Wait for the predictable no. Then use that no as the public justification for sending them back to Afghanistan," it said in a statement. 

"You do not relocate vetted wartime allies, more than 400 of them children, from American custody into a country in the middle of its own collapse," it added.

Congo has some 6.9 million internally displaced people, according to UN figures, particularly in the east of the country that has seen fierce fighting between the army and Rwanda-backed M23 rebels.

Over 517,000 refugees from neighbouring countries are also present in Congo, largely from the Central African Republic, Rwanda, Burundi and South Sudan.

The State Department declined to confirm that Congo was being eyed as a destination but said the United States was looking at "voluntary resettlement" from the As Sayliyah camp in Qatar.

"Moving the (camp) population to a third country is a positive resolution that provides safety for these remaining people to start a new life outside of Afghanistan while upholding the safety and security of the American people," a State Department spokesperson said. 

Trump halts Afghan resettlement program

Over 190,000 Afghans have been resettled in the United States since the Taliban took power in August 2021 following the withdrawal of US-led international forces.

US President Donald Trump has vowed to curb migration since taking office in January 2025, and ordered a stop to processing of refugee status for people from Afghanistan after one Afghan shot two National Guard troops near the White House in November, killing one of them.

The man had worked with US intelligence and suffered post-traumatic stress disorder.

Trump had given a March 31 deadline to close the As Sayliyah camp in Qatar.