For Racing Louisville striker Nadia Nadim, watching what is going on in Afghanistan is “heartbreaking.” Her native country fell to the Taliban over the weekend after two decades of war.
“I just feel that after 20 years you’re trying to get out of all that s– that was happening and then we’re just back to where it all started. It is upsetting,” she said following Louisville’s 1-1 draw with Gotham FC. Nadim scored in the game.
Nadim, an Afghan refugee, escaped the Taliban over 20 years ago after her father was executed in Afghanistan. She and her family fled the country and settled in Denmark, where she plays for the Danish national team.
On Monday, Nadim shared a Players’ Tribune article from June 2020 on World Refugee Day, in which she detailed her family’s escape from Afghanistan.
“NO ONE would voluntarily leave their home — their houses, their friends, their loved ones — to go somewhere they might not even be accepted,” she wrote.
The capital city of Kabul fell to Taliban rule on Sunday, following the collapse of Mazar-i-Sharif on Saturday and Jalalabad earlier Sunday and completing the military organization’s takeover of the country.