Reuters: Exclusive-'They'll kill us'

Columbus OH

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(Reuters) - The U.S.-trained Afghan pilots and others held at a camp in Uzbekistan already feared being sent back to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. So it was little comfort when an Uzbek guard unsympathetically quipped the other day: "You can't stay here forever." The offhand warning added to an already grinding sense of unease at the camp just across Afghanistan's northern border, recounted one of the Afghan pilots who fled there with aircraft when ground forces fell to the Taliban in August as the United states and its allies withdrew their forces. What follows is the first, detailed inside account among Afghans who, for nearly three weeks, have been waiting in vain to be evacuated by the United States. If they send us back, I'm 100 percent sure they'll kill us," said the pilot, who declined to be named because of fear of reprisal. Speaking to Reuters on a cell phone that the Afghans there try to keep out of sight, the pilot described feeling like a prisoner, with highly restricted movement, long hours in the sun, and insufficient food and medicine. Some have lost weight. "We are kind of like in jail," said the pilot, who estimates the Afghans held there number 465. "We have no freedom here."