Former Afghan Refugee Who Fled Kabul Warns Taliban News Conference Was ‘PR Stunt’ – Sky News

Peymana Assad, a former Afghan refugee who settled in the UK and is now a London councillor, said she escaped Kabul on Sunday.

She told Sky News it was “so good to be home” as it was getting “really scary”, with the embassy telling her it was evacuating her last Sunday.

She said she started running to the airport alongside hundreds of other people.

At one point she ran past shopkeepers, with one pointing at her and saying “if the Taliban catch you they’re going to kill you so you better run fast”, she said.

She added: “That really set the fear in my heart.”

Asked about the 5,000 refugees due to come to the UK this year, she said the government was “failing to understand we are in a critical moment right now”.

“We need to get these people out, we need to deal with the bureaucracy later. Bring these people to safety now, people’s lives are at risk,” she said.

She slammed the “Taliban show in Kabul”, adding: “That’s a PR stunt. I believe they’re trying to gain international legitimacy.

“People are living in fear and they are just waiting for the Taliban to turn up at their doors and execute them in front of their families.”