Unmarried journalist Charlotte Bellis found out in September that she was pregnant and has been trying to get back home to New Zealand. She is currently in Afghanistan because that is the country willing to take her in.
She can’t get back home because of the strict COVID rules. They won’t let her back into the country.
Seriously, New Zealand is leaving her stranded in Afghanistan – pregnant – over their COV rules.
The Taliban has offered her protection but the medical care is lacking. “When the Taliban offers you – a pregnant, unmarried woman – safe haven, you know your situation is messed up,” she wrote Saturday in a column for the New Zealand Herald.
New Zealand has tightly controlled its borders since the beginning of the COVID pandemic, and even Kiwi citizens can only return home through a tightly regulated and near-impossible-to-win lottery system.
She temporarily moved to Belgium with her boyfriend, New York Times photographer Jim Huylebroek, but couldn’t stay for more than a few months. That left two legal options: New Zealand or Afghanistan, where they both have visas.
So Bellis called some old Taliban contacts.
“I am pregnant and I can’t get back into New Zealand. If I come to Kabul, will we have a problem?” she asked.
“No we’re happy for you, you can come and you won’t have a problem,” the Taliban leaders answered, according to Bellis’ column. “Just tell people you’re married and if it escalates, call us. Don’t worry. Everything will be fine.”
“The decision of who should get an emergency…spot is not made on a level playing field, lacks ethical reasoning, and pits our most vulnerable against each other,” Bellis wrote. “As a journalist, I have asked people in much more vulnerable positions to tell their story because – maybe – it will make a difference. Now it is my turn.”
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