Hero Afghan pilot reunited with his wife and daughter

The air force lieutenant welcomed his young family to the UK earlier this month, after a long-running Independent campaign. Holly Bancroft met them as they try to rebuild their lives after fleeing the Taliban and years of separation

- Holly Bancroft

A campaign by The Independent to allow a hero Afghan pilot who served alongside British forces in Afghanistan to rebuild his life with his family in the UK has finally been won.

The air force lieutenant, who fled the Taliban and came to Britain on a small boat because it was “impossible” to get here via a legal route, was refused asylum under the government’s Afghan resettlement scheme – sparking fury from top politicians and military figures who called it “shameful” that the country should turn its back on the war hero.

Massud* was finally granted permission to remain in the UK in August 2023 but it was a bittersweet victory as his wife and toddler daughter remained stranded in Iran. But after a long-running campaign by this newspaper the family is now reunited, after his wife Zahra* and three-year-old daughter Maryam* were granted the right to live in the UK earlier this month.

The Independent met the family as they tentatively begin to rebuild their lives after years of separation, never knowing if they would be able to see each other again.

Massud was apprehensive when he arrived at the airport to meet his family off a late flight from Dubai. He had been waiting for this moment for over two years – hopeful but not believing that it would ever come. The last time he had seen his baby daughter Maryam she hadn’t been able to speak. Though he’d tried to call her and his wife Zahra in Afghanistan as regularly as the weak internet would allow, he was nervous his three-year-old wouldn’t recognise him at the airport gate.

But when she finally ran excitedly into his arms, his fears were allayed. Describing the moment, he said: “I couldn’t stop grinning and smiling. I was thinking, maybe I am in a dream.”