SCOTLAND must show solidarity with Afghanistan as the Taliban sweeps further across the country, it is claimed.

Sabir Zazai, chief executive of the Scottish Refugee Council, was born into war, cowered from bombs under his grandmother’s scarf and spent 10 years in a temporary camp before breaking for safety in the UK. Now fears for the loved ones left behind keep him awake at night after hearing explosions in the background during phone calls. And he is calling for a show of solidarity from Scotland and international pressure for an immediate ceasefire.

“We’re human beings, we have been able to get to the moon,” Zazai says. “I’m sure we can find a solution for a conflict that has been going for as long as I have been alive. There must be something we can do. We can find solutions for pandemics.

“This conflict is not isolated. The international community now sees it as an isolated event but it’s not, it affects families even in Scotland whose children fought in Afghanistan and lost their lives. Today those places are being taken back by the Taliban.

“The international community needs to use its influence and call for an immediate ceasefire and peace talks. A message of solidarity from Scotland would go a very, very long way.”

The Taliban’s increased presence follows the departure of US and UK military from the country after a long and brutal conflict that cost too many lives. The American-led 2001 invasion was supposed to dismantle the fundamentalist Taliban and increase global security after the 9/11 attacks by al-Qaeda, which was also present there.

A total of 455 British military personnel died there between 2001-17, a figure equivalent to 4.7% of its peak deployment level, according to a study by America’s Brown University. They included 22-year-old Sergeant Allan Douglas, who was shot during a routine patrol, 21-year-old Private Marc Ferns, who was killed in an improvised roadside bomb attack, and 27-year-old Lance Corporal James McCue, who suffered shrapnel wounds.

The study found UK soldiers were more than twice as likely to die as American troops. Those forces suffered 2316 losses, or 2.3% of its peak deployment level. In a separate report, the same university estimated civilian deaths at 38,480 between 2001-18. On Friday, the Taliban killed the director of Afghanistan’s government media centre in the capital Kabul, just days after an assassination attempt on the country’s acting defence minister, Bismillah Khan Mohammadi.

The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office has told all UK nationals to leave amidst the “worsening security situation”, telling them: “Terrorists are very likely to try to carry out attacks in Afghanistan. Specific methods of attack are evolving and increasing in sophistication.

“You should note an overall increased threat to Western interests.”

The UK has already said local interpreters that aided it are at risk, and a relocation scheme will bring 7000, including their families, to live here. Critics say that still leaves too many people exposed to militia who will not show mercy and in last week’s Sunday National, we revealed how former bodyguards have themselves been refused protection because they were employed to serve British authorities through a third-party contractor.

Zazai says safe migration routes are crucial, but that many people will not want to leave, despite the dangers, giving yet more urgency to calls for action. “The world can’t afford another Afghanistan in turmoil. Democracy, human rights, dignity, peace, respect – all the things that the international community fought for will be lost. Afghans don’t deserve this.

“In war, the only hope that you are left with is a prayer,” he goes on, explaining how news of current events has taken him “back to hiding in my family’s basement”.

“The bombs would get closer, and we would feel dust, debris would be falling,” he recalls. “My grandmother would put her scarf around us and say ‘God is great’. That scarf wouldn’t stop a bullet let alone a bomb, but she put it round us like a shield because that and a prayer was all she was left with. She wanted us to live.

“I can still hear her saying ‘take me, let them live’. I feel for the children whose grandmothers are now putting scarves around them.”

Maryhill and Springburn MSP Bob Doris, who counts a number of Afghans as constituents, is working on a Scottish response to the crisis.

He told the Sunday National: “I share the deep concerns of Glasgow’s Afghan community over the developing situation in Afghanistan. The unfolding horror is deeply distressing, particularly for those in the community who will have family and friends there. It is important that we offer our support and solidarity.

“I have already had initial discussions with community leaders and I plan to meet representatives of the Afghan community shortly to find out what we can do.

“My thoughts are with ordinary Afghans caught up in a conflict not of their making.”