The Afghan embassy in Canberra has quietly closed its doors, lowering the country’s tricolour flag and dimming one of the last remaining lights of a fallen democracy. The decision, by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, reportedly followed a request from the Taliban and has left members of Australia’s Afghan community on edge.
Background of the Conflict
Shadi Khan Saif, an editor, producer, and journalist who worked in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Germany, and Australia, recalls being a cadet journalist in 2012 when Julian Assange took refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. He was amazed that diplomatic rules barred British police from entering. At the time, he was covering the bloody Afghan conflict, with the US deploying the 'mother of all bombs' and the Taliban using child suicide bombers. The Taliban would boast that Americans might have watches but 'we have the time,' dragging on the conflict with no regard for death and destruction.
The Doha Deal and Its Aftermath
A deal signed in Doha, Qatar, between the Trump administration and the Taliban led to the collapse of the nascent Afghan democracy. All rights and freedoms, especially for women and girls, were lost. Before the Taliban stormed Kabul, most western countries shut their embassies and flew staff out. For hundreds of thousands of Afghan soldiers, rights activists, and officials fearing persecution, the country’s diplomatic missions in Iran, Pakistan, and other countries became safe havens.
Embassies as Hubs of Resistance
When Saif embarked on his journey out of the country, he saw women shedding tears outside the Afghan embassy in Islamabad as they looked at the tricolour flag still flying high. Unlike inside Afghanistan, where the Taliban replaced the flag with their own and enforced gender apartheid, embassy staff kept the old flag and treated women as human beings. They offered more than emotional support—consular services stayed busy beyond official hours to issue crucial documents for private, financial, educational, and other needs. In the first couple of years of Taliban rule, Afghan embassies in most capitals remained hubs of resistance, keeping the tricolour flag flying with host country support.
Impact on the Diaspora
The closure of the Canberra embassy is another blow for people on the brink of losing identity and hope. For the bustling diaspora, including members of the Afghan female cricket and football teams living in exile, this represents a further erosion of trust. On Australia’s part, there seems to be reluctance to fight the Taliban diplomatically, instead choosing to ignore the country altogether. But for Australian soldiers, diplomats, and aid workers who lived through the war, together with Afghans who made huge sacrifices for a fair and free future, the embassy’s closure is heartbreaking.
A Call for Diplomacy
Among Canberra’s political power brokers, the Afghan war and the fall of Kabul may now be a distant memory. But Saif argues it is still possible to salvage a better future for the next generation by not abandoning modern diplomacy when it is needed the most.
