The man accused of shooting two National Guard soldiers near the White House in Washington on Wednesday is an Afghan national who cooperated with US intelligence services in Afghanistan.
The federal prosecutor for the District of Columbia, Jean Pirro, identified the shooter as Rahmanullah Lakanwal (29 years old), and stated that he arrived in the United States in 2021, after the Taliban returned to power with the withdrawal of American forces after twenty years of their presence.
Lakanwal was received into the United States as part of a program to resettle Afghans who had worked with the Special Forces in various capacities, some as interpreters, during the war.
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He lived in Bellingham, Washington state, on the West Coast, with his wife and five children, and drove across the country to reach the US capital, where the attack was carried out. He will be charged with first-degree murder.
Trained. Lakanwal was part of Unit Zero, an elite Afghan counterterrorism squad that worked for the CIA with direct American military support, according to Afghan Evac, an NGO that helped resettle Afghans.
Lakanwal applied for asylum during the Joe Biden administration and obtained it during the Trump administration in April of this year. He did not have the green card that grants him permanent residency.
A relative of Lakhanwal told NBC that he arrived after spending a decade in the Afghan army supporting US Special Forces.
A family member said that Lakanwal was originally from Khost Province in southeastern Afghanistan, and spent part of his military service at a base in Kandahar Province, the historical birthplace of the Taliban.
Arriving in the United States According to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, the suspect “was among several people accepted en masse, without prior verification, under Operation AlliesWelcome” launched by then-President Joe Biden. The suspect arrived in the country on September 8, 2021, less than a month after the Taliban seized power.
At the time, more than 40 percent of Afghans in the program were eligible for a Special Immigrant Visa (SIV), reserved for those who took “substantial risks in support of U.S. military personnel and civilian personnel in Afghanistan.”
Other vulnerable groups, such as human rights defenders and journalists, have also entered the United States under this program. Authorities have not confirmed whether Lakkanwal obtained a special immigrant visa, which is necessary to obtain a green card.
Hundreds of thousands of Afghans have worked for foreign forces, embassies, and U.S.-funded NGOs during the 20 years of foreign presence in Afghanistan. Therefore, many fear that they will become the target of Taliban retaliation.
Since August 2021 and the Taliban’s return to power, more than 190,000 Afghans have been resettled in the United States, according to the State Department. Tens of thousands more, including many military translators and members of the Afghan security forces, are waiting for this benefit.
But the US Federal Citizenship and Immigration Agency announced the immediate and indefinite suspension of processing immigration applications submitted by Afghan citizens, pending a new review of security and investigation protocols.