A year after a Christian worker was killed in Afghanistan, and just a few weeks after an attack on a UN guesthouse in Kabul, BMS World Mission has called for a prayer focus on ex-pat workers in Afghanistan.
BMS General Director, David Kerrigan, said: "The recent attack on the UN guesthouse, coming so close to the anniversary of the murder of Gayle Williams, must remind us how volatile Afghanistan still is, and how much we need to pray for the BMS team there."
NGOs working in Afghanistan were involved in 42 security incidents between July and September this year, according to the Afghanistan NGO Safety Office (ANSO), the agency that provides security updates and information for BMS workers and partners in Afghanistan. The latest ANSO quarterly report suggests that criminal murders, attacks using improvised explosive devices and ambushes by armed opposition groups like the Taleban have been the leading causes of casualties among NGO workers this year.
BMS currently has 11 personnel in Afghanistan, working with an umbrella development charity, in areas as diverse as administration/logistics, medicine, education and business development. They adhere to a strict security regime in order to maintain safety against a volatile situation.
Len Clift, a former BMS worker in Afghanistan, had some responsibility for his team’s security arrangements. "Every evening I would ring round every house or compound in our organisation and ask if everybody was in," he says. "During the day, I would constantly be monitoring information coming in from the security agencies like the UN, ANSO and the embassies. Everybody carried a personal form of communication that meant we were able to contact people and get them to wherever we wanted them to be in case of a major emergency."
Such security precautions are still in place across the country. Rita, a BMS worker based in the north of Afghanistan, sees the security precautions as just an ordinary part of daily life: "Often we’re so busy we don’t have time to dwell on it much," she says. "I take it one day at a time, take each situation as it arises and seek wisdom and trust in God."
Recently, roads to her area have been deemed too dangerous for travel and the recent incident in which an Afghan policeman killed several of the soldiers who had been mentoring him has given cause for concern. "Every one of our local friends is vulnerable, because they could be put in a threatened position by powerful people, or people with bad intent," she says. "There is always a sense of not quite knowing, even with people with whom we think we can be very relaxed and who we trust. It means you can never be 100 percent comfortable or relaxed with anyone. Which is a little sad."
Paul, another BMS worker, based in Kabul, likens the situation there to that in Northern Ireland in the past: "During the troubles, there were one or two places you didn’t go, and the rest of the country was relatively peaceful," he says.
"But you could always be in the wrong place at the wrong time. We feel like that here. You can never be complacent." That said, Paul says that things have been "pretty much business as usual" over the last few weeks for NGO workers. And that, it seems, means volatile, if currently stable.
David Kerrigan said: "I continue to admire the resilience of our team, who, in spite of the risk that surrounds them, are committed to staying in order to fulfil their calling."
This article first appeared in the Baptist Times. Please continue to pray for workers and their neighbours in Afghanistan.