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WPCNR THE LETTER TICKER From Greenburgh Town Supervisor Paul Feiner. August 25, 2021

 Attorney, single woman, someone disabled by a roadside bomb needs help getting out of Afghanistan

This memo will make you cry!  Professor Sheldon Malev is a Professor at Westchester Community College. One of his favorite former students, Sophia Bator, has a cousin who is desperately trying to get out of Afghanistan. Today HER COUSIN was beaten up by the Taliban on the way to the airport. 

I invited Sophia and Sheldon to appear on my WVOX radio program this Friday from 10 AM to 11 AM (1460 AM or www.wvox.com).  Have also been in contact with Senator Charles Schumer’s office asking their office to help. And, Sophia and Sheldon have been in contact with Congressman Mondaire Jones who is also trying to help.

Some residents of Greenburgh may know people who can help this brave, young, Afghanistan attorney who only wants one thing: a better life for herself. She is disabled from a road bomb.  Read her story.

If she succeeds in coming to the United States I hope to organize a group of people who can “adopt” her –and help her in her efforts to have a good life.  If you know anyone in the state department…anyone in Afghanistan who can help her…have any other ideas please advise.  I can put you in contact with her cousin who lives in Westchester.

PAUL FEINER

Greenburgh Town Supervisor 

My name is Sofia Bator and I am from Afghanistan. I’m desperately trying to help my Cousin from Kabul. She is a young woman who graduated from Law School and became a Women Rights Activist in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif.  Four years ago she suffered major injuries when a roadside bomb exploded killing several of her co-workers and severely injuring her. Before the Taliban took over the city of Kabul she was working with the Afghan Government under the local Department of Combating Corruption.

> Now my cousin is hiding in a small room unprotected trying to escape from the Taliban. She fears that she will be torture, sexually abused or killed by the Taliban if she gets capture. She is desperately asking for help as her time is running out.

> 

> I’m currently here in New York contacting all the Senators and Congressmen to help save my cousin. My college professor Dr. Sheldon Malev

> Thank You

> Sofia Bator

(I deleted her name  for security reasons but Sofia is available to speak…)

        I was born in the village of Dawlat Abad in the north of Afghanistan. I’m the only child from my parents and the first woman from my family to attend school and higher education. We are from a small village that has no running water, no electricity, no hospital, no teachers and far away even from a main road. Due to our poverty situation my parents have always work hard in farms, cleaning houses and caring for life livestock. They put all of their money and send me to Kabul for me to have the opportunity to go to school.

Seeking for a better future I study very hard and worked at the same time to help with my expenses and send little money back to my parents. I was grateful that the presence of the United States army kept Kabul safe for women. Many young girls like me we had the chance to have a higher education and for the time our dreams were slowly becoming a reality.

After graduating from Kabul University, I joined a group of Women’s Rights Activists in Mazar-i-Sharif. Our mission was to provide books and school supplies to small villages in the north. We focused on all the children but especially young girls who were marginalized from education. Our focus was also to teach the mothers about safety, feminine hygiene and giving them access to any resources available for them. One day I was traveling in a vehicle to a small village and all of the sudden I heard an extreme loud noise and the vehicle I was in started rolling. In seconds I could not hear or see anything and the extreme pain on my body blackout my mind. When I became conscious, I could not move my legs, my hip was in extreme pain and I had blood all over my body. I was paralyzed.

For one year I was paralyzed as the doctors informed me that my hip and legs were almost shattered. I also learned that the cause of the vehicle rolling and burning was due to a roadside bomb that the Taliban had placed killing and injuring many of my coworker. Now after several surgeries and with the help of my parents who sold all of their animals to pay the medical bills I’m slowly recovering.

I did not give up and I continue my work as an Afghan woman rights activist. I work at the same time with Department of Combating Corruption in Afghanistan. I was in my office and everyone started running around burning all documents in small flower pots. Everyone scared, terrified screaming

“Taliban has surrounded Kabul, run for your life”. Few minutes later I was informed that president Ashraf Ghani had run away and left the country to Taliban invasion. As I get out of the office suddenly, I saw an army of Taliban with machine guns approaching towards me and everyone in the street run away.   

I got myself to safety, and enter my little room that I rent in Kabul. Immediately locked my door and block it with a table. I have been unable to get out as I’m alone with no protection as young woman. From a small window I see Taliban with their machine guns walking the streets and often I hear gunshots. Several times my door has been knocked with force but I have made no noise to make them believe no one is living here. My food and water are running out as I eat little pieces of bread once a day. At night every few hours the silence is broken by several gunshots. To my tragedy the landlord of the building has asked me to leave the room ASAP as the Taliban had order him that no single women without men companion is allow to live by herself. At this time, I’m without food, money or shelter and I fear for my life.

I desperately ask everyone for help to save my life. I’m a young woman without any protection and in grave danger to be taken by Taliban. My time is running out please help me. If Taliban captures me, I will be torture, beaten, sexually abuses or killed. I will appreciate any help possible to please get me out of here. I have tried to call all the embassies but no one has able to help me. And this is not how I see my future as I prefer to end my life before being capture by this evil regime.

WPCNR ALBANY ROUNDS. Transcript of Governor Kathleen Hochul comments on National Public Radio this morning on Covid and schools. August 25, 2021:

Governor Hochul: Well my task right now is very immediate. I have to get COVID under control, protect the safety of New Yorkers, and I started with a mask mandate in schools effective immediately. Also, get more vaccinations out there and particularly if we’re looking at the booster shots there’s a lot of older people who feel very insecure and invulnerable because they would have had their first shots just about eight months ago, and that’s when I spoke with Dr. Fauci and the time he said people should be getting their next booster shot. So, I’ll be having a very aggressive program to get the boosters out. But there’s still a lot of people who never got their first dose, and that’s going to be a barrier to getting people feeling secure about going to schools and to work. So I’m laser focused on those two big initiatives.

 
Steve Inskeep: Do you feel that you’re taking office in a crisis that has nothing to do with Andrew Cuomo’s crisis? You were at 300 new cases per day in New York not long ago, and I think you’re now up to 5,000 new cases a day.

 
Governor Hochul: Yes, so it’s very concerning. There’s no doubt about it. I was in the trenches during the first months of last year’s pandemic. I was literally embedded with the local health officials and county executives in upstate New York, so I know how scary this is and what people went through and I have a different approach. We were successful last year, but also as we see this resurgence I’m going to be doing more to empower local government officials who spend all their days training for this, the local health departments, the emergency management individuals who know how to get vaccines out. So, in my opinion it does not have to be so top heavy, but we also need to engage our local partners. That’s something I’ve done all my life from my career in local office to county office to Congress and on up, so that’s natural for me but it’s going to be a different approach, but we’ll get to the same place where we eventually drive this down and protect people the process.

 
Steve Inskeep: Do you have some people who think that you are being top heavy by imposing a statewide mask mandate?

Governor Hochul: This is actually the results of an effort of outreach I did to school superintendents, school boards, teachers, all kinds of groups I assembled on a Zoom call a couple days before I took office. They told me they want this to happen, they just want to cover. They want to be able to go back to their parents at a school board meeting and say this is a state mandate, we had to follow it. So, because they did have that they were the ones that were that front of all the criticism and I have no trouble, problem at all, assuming that responsibly. I’m going do that. The vast majority of my conversations have been this is in the no brainer category as much as politically divisive in some other states. In the state of New York, yes, people criticize, I’ve already heard from them, but the vast majority of New Yorkers want to get through this as soon as possible.

And, number one, keep kids safe in schools. I mean, I’m a parent. This is a time of high anxiety for every mom and dad or anyone who sends kids to school, and I want to alleviate that by saying you know what, your child is going to be protected. We know masks work and then we’ll work on getting the vaccinations are and we’ll have done everything we possibly can to ensure that that environment is safe so kids can start learning again.

Steve Inskeep: Did you literally have school superintendent saying that to you? Force me to do this, twist my arm?

Governor Hochul: Oh yes. We had a conversation with leadership on a call and the leadership, I can’t say they speak for every single member, and I’ve represented the most conservative parts of New York as a member of congress, I know that there will be individuals who disagree with that. I’m balanced, we have to make a decision that affects New York State as a whole for now but also my flexibility is that I’m willing to release the restrictions based on what’s happening in different geographic areas. We’ll have a statewide mandate to start, however I’m going to monitor closely. I’m watching the data like a hawk all day long to see what’s happening. And if there’s an area that’s not really that affected, they’re coming out of it, they have good vaccination rates that we can allow them to lift them.

So, I’m not going to be a dictator about this. I’m going to be flexible.