US to halt entry on humanitarian parole for Afghans; set focus on new model

The United States will discontinue the use of a humanitarian parole to admit at-risk Afghans and will instead focus on resettling certain Afghan evacuees who qualify for immigration programs

The United States will discontinue the use of a humanitarian process known as parole to admit at-risk Afghans and will instead focus on resettling certain Afghan evacuees who qualify for immigration programs that provide permanent legal status, as per reports.

"We are adopting a new model where Afghans will travel directly to the communities where they will be moving with the help of Refugee Resettlement organizations without a safe haven stopover in the United States," White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre during a press briefing said on Thursday (local time).

She was responding to a question about if the Biden administration is ending humanitarian parole for Afghan refugees, as per Sputnik News Agency.

The White House emphasized that the Biden administration will now focus on work to improve efforts to help Afghan allies resettle in the United States and reunite with family members still in Afghanistan. The administration will also seek to provide these individuals with a pathway to permanent residency status in the United States, Jean-Pierre added.

Since the United States withdrew from Afghanistan in August 2021, it has resettled about 86,000 Afghans under the "Operation Allies Welcome." Around 90 per cent of them came in through the parole process.