Today (Saturday 6 January) the Foreign Affairs Committee
publishes a letter from , the Foreign Secretary, to
, Chair of the Foreign
Affairs Committee, on Afghanistan.
This correspondence was received in response to a letter from the
Foreign Affairs Committee following an oral evidence session with
Lord Ahmad, Minister of State in the Foreign, Commonwealth and
Development Office (FCDO) for the Middle East, North Africa,
South Asia, United Nations and the Commonwealth.
In his response, outlines for the first time
the allocation of departmental responsibilities within government
on the resettlement of eligible Afghans into the UK.
Potential deportation of eligible Afghans
The Foreign Secretary says that, to date, “there has been one
case under ACRS Pathway 2” which predates Pakistan’s current push
to deport undocumented migrants.
The letter cites a meeting with the Pakistani Foreign Minister on
30 November, during which the Foreign Minister “repeated the
assurances he had given my predecessor that our cohorts would not
be targeted.”
On Iran, says that “FCDO staff in the
Embassy in Tehran and across HMG are working to relocate ARAP and
ACRS families there to the UK as quickly as we can”.
Chartered flights from Pakistan to the UK
The letter reports that “the first Home Office/IOM charter flight
for ACRS Pathway 3 arrived from Pakistan on 13 December with 246
EPs on board”, with another due to be “in the air” on 18
December.
says that “those two flights
will mean that almost all of the most vulnerable undocumented EPs
will have left Pakistan before the Government of Pakistan’s
deadline of 31 December”.
The Foreign Secretary also says that “over a third of all those
due to come to the UK under this first stage of ACRS Pathway 3
will have got here before the end of the year.” The letter
confirms that “plans are in place to bring the remainder of those
now in third countries to the UK early in the New Year, leaving
only those still in Afghanistan, of which our estimate is there
are less than 700”.
Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, , said:
“This letter provides some much-needed clarity on the current
state of Afghan resettlement schemes and the remits and
responsibilities in government. This is a cross-cutting, complex
area that the Foreign Affairs Committee has pushed the Government
for answers on, and this is the first time these responsibilities
have been set out so clearly.
“Two years since the fall of Kabul to the Taliban – and up
against a hard and fast-approaching deadline from the Pakistani
Government – it appears we are finally seeing some movement in
the right direction.
“There are still serious concerns over the danger that eligible
Afghans – including those who put their lives at risk for the UK
– will be deported back to Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. This
would be a betrayal of the promises we made to them and would
place them in substantial peril.
“It remains the case that two thirds of the Afghans eligible for
resettlement in the UK under the first stage of ACRS Pathway 3
haven’t been resettled, and this letter does not provide details
on the Government’s plans to evacuate them to the UK.
“The Foreign Affairs Committee will continue to scrutinise the
UK’s approach to the fallout from the Afghanistan evacuation, and
advocate for those Afghans who made significant sacrifices on our
behalf.”
