Benghazi attack suspect caught, extradited to US: DOJ

(NEW YORK) — More than 1,100 Afghan refugees and family members of active duty U.S. military personnel are stranded on an unused Doha military base that has become a target since the start of the U.S.-Israel war with Iran, according to U.S. non-profit organization Afghan Evac.

Qatar Armed Forces have been intercepting incoming attacks from Iran, but residents at the facility, known as Camp As Sayliyah, told ABC News they have been hiding in buildings during the attacks and were not initially given bunkers or proper protections to take cover.

During those weeks, they said shrapnel would fall into their bedrooms, even locations where young children were. Since the war broke out, refugees sent ABC News recordings in secret, outlining what they say are the dire conditions at the camp. They asked for their faces to be hidden and their voices altered, due to their fear of being deported or reprimanded.

Three weeks later, ABC News received videos where residents show how the camp installed new concrete walling near the entrances and exits of buildings. They say workers urge residents to enter the bunkers in the “event of a duck and cover alert.”

In response to the residents’ claims of terrible conditions, a spokesperson for the a U.S. State Department, which administers the base, also told ABC News they are “addressing all related operational concerns” including “the safety and security of American citizens as well as the safety of residents at Camp As Sayliyah.”

Mahidewran, a young Afghan mother, told us that her child’s first steps were taken in the camp, where the family has been for more than a year, and that raising her child there has been difficult.

“I’m not always able to provide her with the foods she needs or the toys she loves,” she said.

Her daughter was about to turn 1 when they were initially brought to Camp As Sayliyah, and now she is turning 2.

Apart from raising a child on a former military base, she faces another unlikely challenge: war.

Mahidewran told ABC News sirens go off every few hours in the camp, warning residents to take cover in their buildings.

“I left [Afghanistan] through a legal process by the United States, and when they transferred me to Qatar, we were given safety, an opportunity to rebuild our lives,” she told ABC News.

Ahmad, who said he fought against terrorism alongside the U.S. as a member of the Afghan Command forces, told ABC News his son sleeps under the bed, fearing for his life as missiles continue to fire at the camp.

He said he’s been living at Camp As Sayliyah with his children for more than 18 months, and despite being brought to Doha by the U.S. government, his entire family remains in limbo, not knowing where they will go next. ABC News spoke to refugees who shared similar stories to Ahmad’s — saying they were promised a better life in return for risking theirs when working for the U.S. government.

From July to August 2021, the U.S. evacuated more than 100,000 people out of Afghanistan during Operation Allies Refuge, following the withdrawal of U.S. troops during the Biden-Harris administration.

Nearly five years later, the Trump administration has halted relocation and refugee resettlement efforts, impacting many of those who had already been vetted and cleared to travel to the U.S., according to AfghanEvac. The reports detailing the operation have since been deleted from the State Department website.

Refugees at Camp As Sayliyah said that the U.S. government’s promise of a better life on American soil was broken and that being caught in another war brings them back to the terrifying moments they experienced in Afghanistan.

“We came from a country that was under war for 48 years, before living here we were living in constant fear and anxiety,” Farishta, a teenager living on the base with her parents, told ABC News.

When ABC News spoke with Farishta, she said she was still living in a state of fear and that a worker at the camp threatened her with deportation to Afghanistan if she spoke to a journalist again.

Farishta said she has lived at Camp As Sayliyah for 15 months and often dreams of her future, hoping to further her education.

“I feel hopeless because I am a girl who has been deprived of education and whose future is uncertain,” she said.

“Afghan Nationals at the camp do not currently have a viable pathway to the United States,” the department said.

The plan is to relocate the population to a third country by March 31, according to the department. It said this “is a positive resolution that provides safety for these remaining people to start a new life outside of Afghanistan.”

The State Dept said the “Trump administration has no plans to send these” Afghan refugees back to their home country.

However, those people ABC News spoke to said they have not been told what country they would be going to or when.

Afghan Evac said it has been advocating for refugees at the camp, writing several letters to the State Department, urging the government not to leave the residents at Camp As Sayliyah behind.

According to Afghan Evac, 800 of the people at the camp are fully vetted and approved refugees who were cleared to travel to the U.S. The camp’s residents are mainly women and children, it said.

Shawn VanDiver, the president of Afghan Evac, claimed that there was a pathway and that the State Department closed it off.

“There is no structural or legal barrier preventing these individuals from coming from the United States. The absence of a ‘viable pathway’ is a policy choice, not an inevitability,” he told ABC News.

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(NEW YORK) — A suspect in the 2012 terrorist attack on the U.S. embassy in Benghazi, Libya, has been arrested and brought back to the United States, Attorney General Pam Bondi said Friday.

Zubayr al-Bakoush was brought back to Andrews Air Force Base at 3 a.m., she said.

On Sept. 11, 2012, a group of men stormed into the diplomatic compound in Benghazi. Four Americans were killed in the attack.

The suspect is charged with the murder of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three others, according to the U.S. attorney.

“Bakoush was first charged by complaint in 2015 which was sealed for 11 years, an indictment, an eight count indictment, has been unsealed, and it charges Bakoush with the murder of Ambassador Chris Stevens, the murder of State Department employee Sean Smith, the attempted murder of State Department Special Agent Scott Wicklund and conspiracy to provide materials for terrorists and support that resulted in the death of four Americans, as well as arson at the special mission,” U.S. Attorney Jeannine Pirro said alongside the Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(LONDON) — Ukraine launched more cross-border attack drones than Russia in a one-month period for the first time since the start of the ongoing war in 2022, according to daily data published by the Ukrainian Air Force and Russian Ministry of Defense, which was analyzed by ABC News.

Russia’s defense ministry reported downing 7,347 Ukrainian drones during March, the highest monthly total ever reported by Moscow and an average of 237 craft each day. The defense ministry only publishes figures of Ukrainian drones it claims were shot down.

Ukraine’s air force, meanwhile, said its forces faced 6,462 Russian drones and 138 missiles of various types across the course of the month, of which 5,833 drones and 102 missiles — around 90% of drones and just under 74% of missiles — were intercepted or suppressed.

Ukraine, therefore, faced a daily average of just over 208 drones and four missiles during March, according to the data published by Kyiv.

ABC News cannot independently verify the data released by either Russia or Ukraine. It is possible that both sides may seek to exaggerate the effectiveness of their air defenses, or to amplify the attacks against them as proof that their enemies are not interested in pursuing a peace deal, experts have suggested.

The combined tally of 6,600 Russian drones and missiles reported by Ukraine’s air force across the month marks a new record high for a single month of Russian long-range attacks.

Ukraine’s air force publishes what it says is a daily tally of Russian drone and missile strikes, including information as to how many munitions were intercepted and how many hit targets.

Russia launched the month’s largest overall attack in a 24-hour period by either side. Ukraine’s air force said Moscow launched 948 drones and 34 missiles into the country on March 24.

Long-range drone and missile strikes have been a key element of the conflict as both Kyiv and Moscow seek to degrade the other’s economy and undermine their ability to prosecute and fund the ongoing war. The strikes have continued despite the resumptions of U.S.-brokered peace talks.

Russia has thus far been able to launch more drones and missiles into Ukraine, with Ukrainian leaders citing Moscow’s nightly barrages as a severe threat to the country’s strategic position. But March’s data suggests the balance may be shifting more in Ukraine’s favor, as Kyiv’s long-term efforts to expand its drone and missile capabilities bear fruit.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been clear on Kyiv’s plans to expand Ukraine’s long-range strike capabilities.

“Our production potential for drones and missiles alone will reach $35 billion next year,” Zelenskyy said in October. “Despite all the difficulties, Ukrainians are creating their national defense product that, in certain parameters, already surpasses many others in the world.”

“Never before in history has Ukrainian defense been so long-range and so felt by Russia,” Zelenskyy added. “We must make the cost of war absolutely unacceptable for the aggressor — and we will.”

To date, the majority of Ukrainian strikes are believed to have been conducted using relatively cheap, Ukrainian-made drones. Increasingly, Ukraine is also using interceptor drones designed and built by Ukrainian companies to intercept incoming Russian strike drones.

Ukraine is now producing its own cruise missiles — most notably the Flamingo, which Kyiv says has a range of more than 1,800 miles — but its drone arsenal still accounts for the vast majority of projectiles reported shot down by the Russian defense ministry, according to daily data published by Moscow.

Over the past year, Ukraine has put a special focus on attacking Russian oil refining and transport facilities, hoping — according to Ukrainian leaders — to cut into a key funding stream for Moscow and its military.

Ukraine’s most high-profile attacks of March came at Russia’s Baltic Sea ports of ‌Ust-Luga and Primorsk — key oil export hubs. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denounced the strikes as “terrorist attacks.”

Zelenskyy in February said Russia’s energy sector is “a legitimate target” for attacks by Ukraine, because Russia uses revenue from sales of oil to procure weapons used to attack Ukraine.

“We do not have to choose whether we strike a military target or energy,” Zelenskyy said while addressing students at the National Aviation University in Kyiv. “He sells oil, takes the money, invests it in weapons. And with those weapons, he kills Ukrainians,” Zelenskyy said of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Russian officials have broadly sought to downplay the Ukrainian attacks, with most reports of damage or casualties attributed to falling debris from intercepted drones, rather than craft that found their mark. When Russian officials do acknowledge damage, they often describe the strikes as “terrorist attacks.”

But plenty of publicly available information — including video footage and photographs of the attacks — indicate that a significant number of Ukrainian drones do penetrate Russian air defenses and impact at sensitive military and industrial sites.

Meanwhile, drone incursions into neighboring countries — among them NATO allies — have raised concerns of the war spilling over into non-combatant nations.

NATO aircraft are regularly scrambled in NATO nations like Poland and Romania in response to Russian drone attacks along Ukraine’s western borders.

Allied officials have reported Russian drone violations in Romania, Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. Russian drones have also overflown Moldova, which is not a NATO member. Russian officials have denied responsibility for such incursions.

Stray Ukrainian drones have been reported falling in Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

ABC News’ Fidel Pavlenko contributed to this report.

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