Safeguard Afghan Cyclists

Since August last year, individuals and small groups have been doing the work of governments to evacuate and safeguard at-risk Afghans. I’ve been focused on evacuating the Afghan cyclists that I knew and worked with since 2013. The original National Cycling Team members from Kabul who were nominated for the Nobel peace prize and National Geographic adventures of the year in 2015, and the young women from Bamyan who founded and led the first women run teams and clubs. These are the women who created the first women’s races in the country, the first bike led protests, and defied the gender taboo. These women didn’t just start riding bikes for sport, they rode to reclaim space and gain equality of access and freedom of movement in their communities.

Now Afghanistan is the only country in the world to ban cycling along with all women’s sports and most other public activities. These young women risked their honor and their lives to ride bikes, and in August they had to flee their homes. We have been helping everyday since then.

So far over 135 Cyclists and family members have been evacuated and 112 have been resettled into six countries thanks to the support of my partners at iProbono.

Each month we are crowdfunding the money to pay for guesthouses, safehouses and food stipends. $500 per person per month on average to cover lodging, food, medical, paperwork (passport or visa renewals, etc). We have scraped by, but each month we got further and further behind. Now we still need to cover June and July bills for the group of 65 we were able to safeguard in Pakistan for 9 months and just got to Italy.

We are still covering costs for a group of Afghans in Pakistan that are waiting for visas. We are still trying to get passports and looking at the long term support for the cyclists that are now out. Mental health support, cycling, and the original plan of getting everyone together next year to reconnect in person to process and ride.

BABSEACLE will accept donations on behalf of UK charity iProbono who I work with to facilitate the on-the ground work and support the evacuation logistics and safeguarding support of over 120 Afghan cyclists and family member since the fall of Kabul.

More information about BABSEACLE Inc: BABSEACLE’s mission is to help establish, strengthen and support Access to Justice and the Rule of Law globally through justice education, including a core focus on legal ethics, professional responsibility, and pro bono awareness-raising.