THE mother of a baby boy injured in the Kabul airport bomb just before he was due to be ushered to safety by British troops is begging UK authorities to rescue him.
Tiny Muhammad Raza, just 23 months old, underwent life- saving surgery after being lacerated by shrapnel in the deadly IS suicide blast.
Moments before the attack, his mum Basbibi was waved through gate checks by British soldiers to an RAF mercy flight out of Afghanistan.
She was waiting for seven other relatives to be processed as the bomb went off on Thursday.
In heart-rending, chaotic scenes troops refused to let her back and bundled her on to the aircraft as she faced an agonising wait to see if any of her family had survived.
Muhammad’s father and his British grandad were among at least 170 people killed in the carnage.
Basbibi, 19, told HOAR on Sunday after landing in London last night: “I am just desperate to be reunited with my baby. I am praying the British government can do something to bring him here and save him.
“The rest of my surviving family too. I also have a five-month-old daughter still out there who was not injured.”
Muhammad was raced to a children’s hospital where surgeons, who have not been paid for three months, removed shrapnel from his abdomen and repaired a rip in his intestines.
Basbibi said: “Words cannot explain what I’m feeling.
“I am still in shock from the bomb and have not eaten anything.
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“All I can think about is getting Muhammad with me here to safety so he can get the best medical treatment. I am thankful to be alive but there is so much emotional pain and hurt to deal with.”
However a Ministry of Defence official said last night that Muhammad was too unwell to fly and they could not risk airlifting him to the UK.
Basbibi’s heroic father Sultan, 48, died in the explosion after a daring attempt to rescue his family.
He had been granted British citizenship just ten days earlier after living and working in England as a taxi driver since 2002.
His family had been granted special permission to board the RAF mercy flight to the UK to escape the Taliban.
Muhammad’s father Miraj, an Afghan national, also died in the aftermath, possibly from gunfire.
At least 170 people, including 13 US troops and three British nationals, were killed in the suicide horror on Thursday evening.
The force of the blast hurled bodies into an open sewer while bloodied, half-conscious survivors were carted away in wheelbarrows.
US troops responded by welding shut the airport gates.
Britain said it was not admitting any more evacuees through its emergency processing centre — leaving tiny Muhammad and other family members stranded.
A top defence source admitted Britain was powerless to act as troops were drawing down and the US controlled the airport perimeter.
Sultan’s family last night paid tribute to his bravery in attempting to rescue his family from a hellish life under Taliban rule.
His sons Shakrullah and Mansoor, who live in North London, told how their dad had “never stopped dreaming for a better life for his family”.
PAID ULTIMATE PRICE
Shakrullah said: “He sacrificed his life to bring them back here and paid the ultimate price.”
Sultan flew to Pakistan on August 23 before driving into Afghanistan to help bring back relatives, including his wife Mangala, little Muhammad and his five-month-old sister Kalsoom.
Sultan scooped them up in the eastern city of Jalalabad and drove them to Kabul.
They spent three days in a deadly scrum outside the airport fence, where 21 people died in crushes and falls.
They were inches from the gate when the suicide bomber detonated his device.
Tearful Shakrullah described how his brother Bakhtyar in Kabul rushed to their dad moments after the explosion.
He said: “Bakhtyar told me when the bomb went off they were left shell-shocked with ringing in their ears. There was such confusion, everyone fell to the floor and split up.
“The force of the blast ejected my father backwards into the water and my brother was trying to get him out of there.
“There were dead bodies falling over him as he was trying.
“The water was red with blood, there was death everywhere. But when my brother saw blood coming out of our father’s mouth, and there was no response, he knew he was dead.”
Relatives in Kabul said Miraj survived the blast but was then shot in the head when shooting started in the aftermath.
Cousin Abdul Mutalib carried little Muhammad, limp and bloodied, from the scene.
At first the toddler was taken to a government children’s hospital — the Indira Ghandhi.
Surgeons performed an emergency laparotomy to remove two pieces of shrapnel — but gave him only a 20 to 30 per cent chance of survival.
He was transferred yesterday to the French Medical Institute for Mothers and Children, where doctors said he was stable, but at risk of sepsis and peritonitis.
However they said his chances of survival had increased to 60 to 70 per cent.
‘MAD WITH GRIEF’
Abdul, standing vigil at his bedside, said: “We are going mad with grief.”
Shakrullah told how Basbibi called him in the aftermath of the bombing, fearing all their family were dead.
She was held back and not allowed to leave the airport to try to find her family amid the bloody carnage outside.
He said: “She called me from there and was crying saying to me, ‘Where is our family? I heard the bomb but can’t get out of here to go to them. Where are my babies? No one is answering their phone.’
“I couldn’t tell her the truth, that I hadn’t been able to contact any of them and we feared they might all be dead.
“It was an incredible feeling when we heard Muhammad was still alive. We are just praying that he survives and will still be able to fly to the UK. It is not safe for him to stay out there.
“My father had gone out there to bring all the family back to the UK. He had been sent an email giving him and all the others special permission to board an evacuation plane to the UK.
“It has been a terrible time for all of us here waiting for news.”
Last night all their surviving relatives had been found, except seven-year-old Ahmad, who is still missing.
The last British flight evacuating civilians left Kabul yesterday after 15,000 were airlifted out in two weeks.
The few remaining of the 1,000 UK troops deployed as part of the airlift were also last night flying out.
Britain’s ambassador Laurie Bristow insisted: “We haven’t forgotten the people who still need to leave, and we will do everything we can to help them.”
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