‘There are celebrations, dance, singing’
A baby lost in the chaos of the US Afghanistan evacuation has finally been reunited with his family five months later.
Amid the rushed evacuation of Kabul in August, many Afghans were lost, displaced, and separated from their families. Two-month-old Sohail Ahmadi was handed to an American soldier over a wire fence but never made it to the rest of his family.
The desperate act was seen across the globe, but now, it has somewhat of a happy ending.
Baby Sohail was lost in the chaos at the Kabul airport and taken home by a taxi driver. He has now been reunited with his grandparents. pic.twitter.com/0kGQAjylCP
— DW News (@dwnews) January 9, 2022
When his family finally managed to break through the crowd and into Kabul’s airport, their baby was nowhere to be found. The boy’s father, Mirza Ali Ahmadi, mother Suraya and their four other children were evacuated to the US without their baby boy.
For months they had no idea about the fate of their son, but after reading a report from Reuters in November, he was traced to the home of a 29-year-old taxi driver named Hamid Safi.
Safi claimed he found Sohail alone and crying on the ground of the airport, and despite trying to find the boys family, he ended up returning home with him. He had intended to raise the boy with his wife and children under the name Mohammad Abed.
After finally locating the boy, his grandfather Mohammad Qasem Razawi journeyed from the northeast province of Badakhshan to Kabul in the hopes of retrieving him.
However, Safi allegedly refused to hand over the baby and instead demanded that he and his family be evacuated to the US.
Seven gruelling weeks of negotiations eventually led to the brief detainment of Safi before Taliban police were able to reach a settlement between the two families. It has now been confirmed that Sohail was returned to his grandfather on Saturday, reports Reuters.
“There are celebrations, dance, singing,” Razawi said. “It is just like a wedding indeed.”
The boy’s parents were happy and content to watch the boy via facetime but are hoping to get him to Michigan, where they are currently settled.
Related links:
- All-female cabin crew dismissed by new Taliban bosses in Afghanistan
- Marcus Rashford calls for government to axe universal credit cut
- Taliban hides female students behind curtain as Afghan universities return
