WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 03rd May, 2023) The Biden administration plans to allow Afghan refugees renew their temporary legal status for another two years as Congress fails to pass legislation to make them permanent legal US residents, CBS news reported citing people familiar with the matter.
The report said on Tuesday that some 77,000 Afghan refugees in the United States are currently allowed to work and protected from deportation.
US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is expected to begin accepting renewal applications in June, the report said.
The first group of Afghan refugees brought to the United States in 2021 were set to lose their temporary protected status in July, the report added.
In August 2021, the Taliban entered Kabul, prompting then-President Ashraf Ghani to resign and hastily leave the country. The United States then quickly withdrew from Afghanistan, while the nation plunged into greater economic disarray with food shortages that pushed it to the brink of a humanitarian crisis. The US military evacuated more than 122,000 people from Afghanistan.
