A FORMER Royal Marine has said he may return to Afghanistan after fleeing the country when the Taliban took over.

Paul “Pen” Farthing had no choice but to leave his staff behind in the dangerous evacuation from the country.

He described their safe arrival in Pakistan on Saturday as “absolutely mind-blowing”.

Mr Farthing said the Nowzad staff are now safely in Islamabad awaiting their visas before being flown to London.

The 52-year-old remains in Oslo following his own evacuation from Kabul and is awaiting PCR tests before flying back to the UK.

Harwich and Manningtree Standard:

He now plans to support his staff in getting housed, his animals rehomed, and reuniting other pets with their owners – including British Embassy representatives.

“Maybe I’ll return to Afghanistan in six months to a year, it all depends on whether the Taliban have changed or not,” he said.

“But for Nowzad the work doesn’t stop.

“I think we’ll set up shop in a safer country first, branch out and then assess if it’s time to move back to Kabul or move on for good.

“I need to move into my own house which I bought over Zoom – there’s not even any furniture there at the moment.

“For now, Afghanistan isn’t on my radar. I’m looking forward to a normal pint in a normal pub back home.”

Following Saturday’s successful operation, which saw 67 Nowzad staff leave Afghanistan, Mr Farthing was able to sleep properly for the first night in a month.

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“I was absolutely ecstatic when I heard they had made it,” he said.

“I was jumping around the room, it had been too long and we had no idea whether it was actually going to be able to happen.

“It was so stressful not being able to be there and direct things.

“Having to watch from afar and basically look at a phone screen waiting for a message to come through wasn’t exactly the best.

“It was so poignant that it happened to fall on the 9/11 anniversary too – that was the whole reason why I’m so involved with Afghanistan, having been sent out there as a Marine. 
“67 British nationals were killed on that day and on Saturday we managed to get 67 members of staff out of the country. It’s just an incredible coincidence.”