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A female Afghan police officer who was a high-profile role model for women in the war-torn country is on the run in Kabul after she said she was brutally assaulted by Taliban thugs.
Gulafroz Ebtekar, who rose through the ranks to become deputy chief of criminal investigations, had been a visible face in the media, East2West News reported.
But Ebtekar, who is believed to be 34, told Russian newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets that she is now fighting for her life after being brutally beaten by the Islamist extremists, according to East2West.
“I spent five nights at the gates of Kabul airport without water or bread, in a rain of bullets and surrounded by the Taliban,” she said. “I witnessed the death of children and women.
“I sent messages to the embassies of many countries to save myself and my family, but all to no avail,” Ebtekar told Moskovsky Komsomolets.
She said she believed that American troops she encountered during the chaos in Kabul were helping her to fly abroad with her boyfriend and relatives.
“We got to the refugee camp where the Americans were stationed. When the American soldiers were already near, I exhaled, I thought we were finally safe. I speak a little English,” Ebtekar said.
“I explained that it was not safe for us to remain in Kabul. They checked our documents. I had my ID, passport and police certificates with me,” she continued. “We were asked: ‘Where do you want to go?’ I replied: ‘It doesn’t matter, to a safe country where there is a chance we may survive.’
“They looked at me and answered quite impudently, ‘OK,’ and they asked one soldier to show us the way. I thought they would escort us to a plane or provide security,” Ebtekar recounted.
She claimed she was escorted out to a crowded street and ordered to leave at gunpoint, East2West reported.
“At that moment, I didn’t want to live anymore,” she said. “I realized that there was nothing human left in people — but it was not safe to stay in Afghanistan.”
Ebtekar, who earned a master’s degree at a top police academy in Russia, also was declined by Moscow’s embassy — evidently not wishing to upset the Taliban and telling her it couldn’t intervene because she did not have a Russian passport or residency.
When she later went home, her mother told her that the Taliban had come for her while she was out, so she moved to the first of three apartments she has been using to try and evade the militants.
And when she tried to head to the airport again, she said Taliban guards beat her.
“All their words were accompanied by blows. When I was hit again, I could not get up, I could not say a word,” Ebtekar said. “They beat me with fists, boots, weapons and even stones.”
The Post has reached out to the US Central Command for comment.
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