Woman Afghan AF Pilot Seeks Asylum
Thread Starter
"She is still waiting for her asylum request to be considered by the state department. Could take months. "
Fonsini,
She must've been pretty well "vetted" when she came here for training.
Is an organization supporting her in the meantime ? There are living expenses and there must be legal fees. That takes money...
Fonsini,
She must've been pretty well "vetted" when she came here for training.
Is an organization supporting her in the meantime ? There are living expenses and there must be legal fees. That takes money...
Thread Starter
Here are the circumstances into which she was headed. Looks like every pilot loss would be felt:
https://aviationvoice.com/afghan-air...-201608171028/
https://aviationvoice.com/afghan-air...-201608171028/
Thread Starter
Update from about a year ago:
“Motley, Rahmani’s lawyer — who has known the pilot for three years and has helped support her as she waits in limbo for the U.S. to make a decision on the request — said her client was remaining emotionally 'strong' through the process, as diplomatic backchanneling plays out in Washington, D.C., and Kabul. The aviator, who has been allowed to achieve more than most women in her home country, has temporarily stopped giving public interviews due to the sensitivity and confidentiality surrounding the matter, which has gained worldwide attention. They are also not disclosing her location at this time as a safety precaution.”
https://www.rightsuniversal.org/afgh...sylum-request/
“Motley, Rahmani’s lawyer — who has known the pilot for three years and has helped support her as she waits in limbo for the U.S. to make a decision on the request — said her client was remaining emotionally 'strong' through the process, as diplomatic backchanneling plays out in Washington, D.C., and Kabul. The aviator, who has been allowed to achieve more than most women in her home country, has temporarily stopped giving public interviews due to the sensitivity and confidentiality surrounding the matter, which has gained worldwide attention. They are also not disclosing her location at this time as a safety precaution.”
https://www.rightsuniversal.org/afgh...sylum-request/
Thread Starter
A bit of an update on Afghan pilots training in the USA. The woman who is the subject of this thread, Niloofar Rahmani, is mentioned in the 2nd link below but still no statement about what she's doing now:
https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/y...ol-in-america/
"After being granted asylum, Ms Rahmani told The Wall Street Journal: 'All I want now is to go back to my dream of flying'."
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-a8336051.html
https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/y...ol-in-america/
"After being granted asylum, Ms Rahmani told The Wall Street Journal: 'All I want now is to go back to my dream of flying'."
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-a8336051.html
Last edited by bafanguy; 3rd May 2019 at 11:27.
Thread Starter
Kind of wondered what she had in mind for herself. Looks like a tough row to hoe:
“Rahmani said she has not been able to fly since she has gotten to America, but she wants to fly again and join the U.S. Air Force.”
https://www.stripes.com/news/assassi...lying-1.552494
“Rahmani said she has not been able to fly since she has gotten to America, but she wants to fly again and join the U.S. Air Force.”
https://www.stripes.com/news/assassi...lying-1.552494
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One of the first women to fly in the Afghan air force, Niloofar Rahmani was feted as a global feminist icon and honored by Michelle Obama. But as the decade closes, she’s separated from her family, her dreams in tatters.
Megha Rajagopalan
One of the first women to fly in the Afghan air force, Niloofar Rahmani was feted as a global feminist icon and honored by Michelle Obama. But as the decade closes, she’s separated from her family, her dreams in tatters.
Megha Rajagopalan
Posted on December 14, 2019, at 11:11 a.m. ET
TAMPA, Florida — Sitting outside a sidewalk café on the waterfront in Tampa, a light breeze making for one of those perfect fall afternoons, is a feminist icon.
You might not recognize her — and the tourists eating ice cream and skateboarding kids certainly didn’t — but Niloofar Rahmani is one of the best-known Afghan women in the world.
That’s because Rahmani, 28, shot to fame in 2013 after she became the first woman to pilot a fixed-wing jet in Afghanistan’s air force. Photographs of her in dark aviator sunglasses, with a scarf loosely covering her black hair, went viral across the world. Look at what the women of Afghanistan can do, the pictures seemed to scream.
Niloofar Rahmani, 23, Afghanistan's first female pilot to serve in the air force since the fall of the Taliban.
For Rahmani, it should have been a time of triumph. After all, she had dreamed of flying a plane since she was a little girl — however impossible that might have seemed to a young woman growing up in a conservative society.
But in the years since, her dreams have all but fallen apart. She has been accused of desertion, of acting improperly for an Afghan woman, and she and her family have received hundreds of death threats — some from anonymous trolls, some even from members of her own extended family. As Rahmani became more successful as a pilot and more famous, the threats against her multiplied until her life in Afghanistan became unbearable.
Rahmani’s family has been forced to move again and again, leaving behind the house in the capital, Kabul, that her family had lived in for generations. Her father lost his job because his employer saw the threats as a liability; her siblings couldn’t find work. Rahmani ended up having to cover her face with a niqab just to leave the house.
After years of living in hiding with her family, Rahmani — who prided herself on never giving a damn what anyone thought of her — did something she never believed she’d have to do: She fled.
Rahmani’s story is a testament to the cost born by the women in Afghanistan whom the West has elevated as feminist heroes. As the US negotiates with the Taliban in hopes of a peace deal, women’s rights have been largely ignored, and women across the country face an uncertain future.
It’s not as if Rahmani ever really wanted to become a feminist hero — she just wanted to be a pilot. Now, she believes her only path forward lies in the US, where she sits in administrative limbo waiting for her life to begin again.
Sitting beside her sister at the café in Tampa last month, Rahmani wore her long hair loose and a black floral dress. Most of her face was covered — by a big pair of sunglasses, even if they weren’t the aviators she’d like to be wearing right now.
Rahmani has been living in Tampa since the US granted her asylum in 2018, while her sister Afsoon is still seeking asylum. Rahmani said she might be safe now, but it’s a hollow feeling. No longer able to fly, she works as a translator between the three languages in which she is fluent: Farsi, Dari, and English.
Rahmani dreams of flying planes again; this time for the US Air Force. To do that, she would have to become a citizen first, and, as it’s unclear how long that might take, she worries that her skills will decline in the meantime.
TAMPA, Florida — Sitting outside a sidewalk café on the waterfront in Tampa, a light breeze making for one of those perfect fall afternoons, is a feminist icon.
You might not recognize her — and the tourists eating ice cream and skateboarding kids certainly didn’t — but Niloofar Rahmani is one of the best-known Afghan women in the world.
That’s because Rahmani, 28, shot to fame in 2013 after she became the first woman to pilot a fixed-wing jet in Afghanistan’s air force. Photographs of her in dark aviator sunglasses, with a scarf loosely covering her black hair, went viral across the world. Look at what the women of Afghanistan can do, the pictures seemed to scream.
Niloofar Rahmani, 23, Afghanistan's first female pilot to serve in the air force since the fall of the Taliban.
For Rahmani, it should have been a time of triumph. After all, she had dreamed of flying a plane since she was a little girl — however impossible that might have seemed to a young woman growing up in a conservative society.
But in the years since, her dreams have all but fallen apart. She has been accused of desertion, of acting improperly for an Afghan woman, and she and her family have received hundreds of death threats — some from anonymous trolls, some even from members of her own extended family. As Rahmani became more successful as a pilot and more famous, the threats against her multiplied until her life in Afghanistan became unbearable.
Rahmani’s family has been forced to move again and again, leaving behind the house in the capital, Kabul, that her family had lived in for generations. Her father lost his job because his employer saw the threats as a liability; her siblings couldn’t find work. Rahmani ended up having to cover her face with a niqab just to leave the house.
After years of living in hiding with her family, Rahmani — who prided herself on never giving a damn what anyone thought of her — did something she never believed she’d have to do: She fled.
Rahmani’s story is a testament to the cost born by the women in Afghanistan whom the West has elevated as feminist heroes. As the US negotiates with the Taliban in hopes of a peace deal, women’s rights have been largely ignored, and women across the country face an uncertain future.
It’s not as if Rahmani ever really wanted to become a feminist hero — she just wanted to be a pilot. Now, she believes her only path forward lies in the US, where she sits in administrative limbo waiting for her life to begin again.
Sitting beside her sister at the café in Tampa last month, Rahmani wore her long hair loose and a black floral dress. Most of her face was covered — by a big pair of sunglasses, even if they weren’t the aviators she’d like to be wearing right now.
Rahmani has been living in Tampa since the US granted her asylum in 2018, while her sister Afsoon is still seeking asylum. Rahmani said she might be safe now, but it’s a hollow feeling. No longer able to fly, she works as a translator between the three languages in which she is fluent: Farsi, Dari, and English.
Rahmani dreams of flying planes again; this time for the US Air Force. To do that, she would have to become a citizen first, and, as it’s unclear how long that might take, she worries that her skills will decline in the meantime.
More in the rest of the article:
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/meghara/the-badass-afghan-pilot-who-went-massively-viral-is-now
Gotta love that squadron patch: Combat Cessnas Afghanistan: No Guns, No Armor, No Problem.
Thread Starter
'bubba,
She was on my list of things to Google but just hadn't gotten around to her yet. She's an interesting case study on a couple of levels. All things considered, I'm on her side.
I don't know about 'global feminist icon' but perhaps she is in some quarters. She's keeping a pretty low profile for an icon. She's rarely mentioned in the media where icons live...and the media control that. Apparently, she's also slipped Michelle's mind of late (funny how one's usefulness can be so fleeting).
But women from her part of the world appear to have a tough go of it.
I'm surprised no one has picked up her banner and run with it in a more public way. A few tweaks in immigration with some more flying time and she'd be flying for a regional. Her celebrity status would be PR fodder for an employer with social justice tendencies (cough...cough...a big southern-based airline).
I wish her luck.
She was on my list of things to Google but just hadn't gotten around to her yet. She's an interesting case study on a couple of levels. All things considered, I'm on her side.
I don't know about 'global feminist icon' but perhaps she is in some quarters. She's keeping a pretty low profile for an icon. She's rarely mentioned in the media where icons live...and the media control that. Apparently, she's also slipped Michelle's mind of late (funny how one's usefulness can be so fleeting).
But women from her part of the world appear to have a tough go of it.
I'm surprised no one has picked up her banner and run with it in a more public way. A few tweaks in immigration with some more flying time and she'd be flying for a regional. Her celebrity status would be PR fodder for an employer with social justice tendencies (cough...cough...a big southern-based airline).
I wish her luck.
Last edited by bafanguy; 14th Dec 2019 at 21:24.
