The Afghan man accused of shooting two National Guard members in Washington on Wednesday will face first-degree murder charges for an attack that prompted US president Donald Trump to declare he would freeze migration from “Third World Countries” to the US.
The US attorney for Washington, DC, Jeanine Pirro, said on Friday that there will be other charges as well against Rahmanullah Lakanwal (29), who she said ambushed the National Guardsmen from West Virginia near the White House on Wednesday.
In a Thanksgiving call with US military service members on Thursday, Mr Trump called the shootings a “terrorist attack” and officials have said they were conducting a terrorism investigation into Wednesday’s shooting.
“What happened at that crime is unmistakable. It is a premeditated murder,” Ms Pirro told Fox News’ Fox and Friends programme. “We are upgrading the initial charges of assault to murder in the first degree,” she said.
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Sarah Beckstrom (20), died of her wounds on Thursday. Ms Pirro told Fox that Ms Beckstrom’s fellow Guardsman Andrew Wolfe (24), was in critical condition.
On his Truth Social platform late on Thursday, Mr Trump escalated his rhetoric on immigration. Since taking office this year he has stepped up arrests of immigrants in the US illegally, cracked down on unlawful border crossings and stripped legal status from hundreds of thousands of people.
“I will permanently pause migration from all Third World Countries to allow the US system to fully recover, terminate all of the millions of Biden illegal admissions, including those signed by Sleepy Joe Biden’s autopen, and remove anyone who is not a net asset to the United States,” Mr Trump said on Truth Social, referring to his predecessor.
After taking office in 2021, Mr Biden reversed many of Mr Trump’s restrictive immigration policies from his first term, saying they blocked people in need of humanitarian protection and were unfairly discriminatory.
Mr Trump did not name any countries. Asked about “Third World” countries, the US department of homeland security on Friday referred Reuters to 19 countries listed in a June travel ban. Earlier, homeland security officials had said Mr Trump ordered a widespread review of asylum cases approved under the Biden administration and green cards issued to citizens of the 19 countries, which include Afghanistan.
Mr Lakanwal entered the US in 2021 through Operation Allies Welcome, a Biden-era immigration programme to resettle thousands of Afghans who helped the US during the war and feared reprisal from Taliban forces who seized control after the US withdrawal.
More than 70,000 Afghans have been resettled in the US under the programme. Officials said Mr Lakanwal was part of a CIA-backed unit in Afghanistan before coming to the US. He was granted asylum this year under Mr Trump, according to a US Government file on him seen by Reuters.
Investigators said Mr Lakanwal drove across the country from his home in the state of Washington and shot the two Guardsmen with a powerful revolver, a .357 Magnum, before being wounded in an exchange of gunfire with other troops.
The shootings may give Mr Trump an opening to argue that even legal pathways such as asylum pose security risks for Americans.
Less than 24 hours after the shooting, Trump officials began ordering widespread reviews of immigration policies.
Mr Lakanwal lived in Washington state with his wife and five children, according to investigators. Asked whether he was planning to deport the suspect’s wife and five children who live in Washington state, Mr Trump has said, “We’re looking at the whole situation with family.”
UN agencies appealed to Washington to continue allowing asylum seekers access to the country and to be given due process.
“We expect all countries, including the United States, to honour their commitments under the 1953 Refugee Convention,” Farhan Haq, the deputy spokesperson for the UN secretary general said.
US human rights office spokesperson Jeremy Laurence told a Geneva press briefing: “They are entitled to protection under international law, and that should be given due process.”
Jasmin Lilian Diab, director of the Institute for Migration at the Lebanese American University, said freezing Afghan applications or reconsidering thousands of approved asylum claims would disrupt families and local communities and erode the integrity of the migration system.
“While the recent incident is tragic, using an isolated incident to justify mass restrictions is inconsistent with evidence showing no link between refugee arrivals and increased crime,” Ms Diab said. – Reuters
