Afghan Women and English-Speaking Countries' Crumbling Relationship, From Experience

Is it even possible to leave Afghanistan in 2026?

Just a year ago an Afghan man named Ahmad posted to Reddit1 inquiring this very question. The comments ranged from pessimistic to pessimistic; three separate users cited personal experiences of attempts from years ago which have yet to see the light of day. One ends with this paragraph: “Whatever you do, do NOT pay someone who says they can get you legal status in another country. They cannot. Do NOT pay someone who says they can get you a job in another country. They cannot.”

I found this post while attempting to gather resources for my student in Kabul, a woman with little resources or international connections who is trying to go to an Anglophone country. I don’t know what to tell her.

Having never had to immigrate myself, when she asked for support, I began completely lost and naturally looked to see if there were international organizations with more resources and knowledge who could help her.

The International Organization of Migration was the first result: EU-affiliated, boasts of having safely supported the immigration of tens of thousands of Afghan nationals to Canada and similar countries, and provides relief where they couldn’t. Exactly what my student was looking for. But their website shows no portal for requesting support, they don’t respond to their email, and when you look at their page on their work, the first sentence reads:

“Please note that due to the current situation in Afghanistan, certain services have been temporarily put on hold.”2

Is it ironic that help flies away when people need it most?

They’ve opened some other programs to give relief unrelated to migration, such as their Community Centre3 and an Afghanistan Crisis Response Plan from 2024—which at this moment is 28% funded.4 It’s not enough, though, is it?

I looked to the UN instead. Same deal. Repatriation, relief, no refuge.5 Just an email from the Kabul office asking what exactly she needs help with other than emigration.

I discussed this with my student and she tersely replied: “I don't trust the UN too late. They left us alone.” She followed this up with a video of a man’s corpse killed by the Taliban just the day before. While time runs out, the wait times for these organizations’ responses grow longer as more and more people knock on their door, and as more and more organizations close up shop.

To look to the other side, trying to enter without the help of professionals—you find another wall. Beginning with the U.S.: nearly all visa applications from Afghanistan (alongside 19 other countries, growing from 2025’s 14) are closed. The Trump administration cut many federal Afghan refugee and immigration facilities (such as the ones previously hosted by the USCIS). Nor is it safe to hold a current visa application as a refugee: president Trump promised to re-evaluate refugee admissions given during the Biden administration, not to mention the many accepted applications who got stranded at the beginning of the administration.

One is wont to recall the ban list resulting from the period of paranoia resulting from 9/11. It is only tragic that neither travel bans help prevent much violent or “terrorist” attacks and serve purely to harm civilian Afghans attempting to flee the country.

Canada is perhaps the best option, for they don’t have the same trauma with “Muslim terrorist attacks”: the government provides an official link to donate and sponsor Afghan refugees: https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/services/refugees/afghanistan/volunteer-donate.html

They even have a permanent residency option for potential refugee applicants if you have a private sponsor! How generous!

There also seemed to exist an emergency response program in 2023, but not only has this program (amongst many other national refugee programs) been filled up for years—having filled up instantly—accepted immigrants are also waiting for sponsorship. Some got turned away. (The article is from 2025; some 5,000 have been brought in of 15,000 waiting since then.)

Britain also had some recent programs, and they’re still accepting some requests, though the stream has been bottlenecked quite a bit since 2023. There’s more opportunities here than the other two anglophone countries, but Britain still has the least overall intake.

Everywhere you go, every method you search for, it feels as if there’s a recent past which had more hope. But it’s important to remember: Afghans have been struggling for asylum for generations. Remember that Reddit post? Of the comment of several clients waiting over a decade with no response, and scarcely any progress? Perhaps India has some trickles, even though it is growing more xenophobic, and perhaps Pakistan is nearby, even though the war is making the border violence, and perhaps some countries offer student visas, though many Afghan foreign embassies are closing, making visa acquisition increasingly difficult. How, then, does an Afghan national physically travel?

Because of quotas and maximums, because of lotteries, there exists an element of competition in immigration. Your ally, your friend, your parents and siblings are enemies. My student has no source of information except me and her own research on the Internet (which she can barely afford now that the Taliban laid her off) because her cousin is rejecting any share of support in her endeavors to emigrate.

Is this a way to create travel policy? Is this worth the “job stability” which xenophobes beg for in their antiimmigration policies? When organizations pull out, do they know this is what happens?

As I enter a new stage of my life, all my student sees are closed doors. I am lucky to be able to work with Omid for Girls to help and to meet colleagues and people around the world, while competition isolates her.

What do we do?

I don’t know anymore.

I’m still looking for schools she could apply to, visas she qualifies under, countries where the language requirement doesn’t prevent her from getting in somehow. I’m still cheering against our latest national governments’ turn to xenophobia. Despite everything, my student is still alive, standing, and I don’t know when, but one day, I believe, we can find a way for her to escape. Right now we have to keep searching and keep yelling.

1: .reddit.com/r/afghanistan/comments/1n3zdwr/need_help_to_leave_afghanistan/

2: afghanistan.iom.int/migration-management

3: afghanistan.iom.int/stories/how-community-centre-becoming-place-hope-women-eastern-afghanistan

4: crisisresponse.iom.int/response/afghanistan-crisis-response-plan-2024

5: .unrefugees.org/news/afghanistan-refugee-crisis-explained/

6: opencanada.org/in-canada-an-immigration-backlog-has-left-our-afghan-allies-with-little-to-no-hope/