Two and a half million Afghans, most of them women and girls,
will receive urgent life-saving humanitarian support thanks to
£50 million of funding announced by the Prime Minister
today.
The funding, which is drawn from the UK’s £286 million aid
commitment to Afghanistan announced by the Prime Minister in
September, will be channelled via UN agencies and the
International Committee of the Red Cross.
The humanitarian situation in Afghanistan has been rapidly
deteriorated since the Taliban seized control of the country in
August. Under the UK’s evacuation effort ‘Operation PITTING’
15,000 British nationals and vulnerable Afghans were brought to
the UK.
Since the conclusion of the NATO withdrawal two months ago we
have provided extensive support to those Afghans now starting
their lives in the UK, including £25 million to provide housing,
schooling and healthcare this year. Further UK military flights
have also brought additional Afghans to the UK in the last
fortnight.
The funding announced today will help the critical need for food,
nutrition, shelter and medicine over the winter months in
Afghanistan and bolster the UN’s wider humanitarian response.
Protecting women and girls from gender based violence will also
be prioritised.
The Prime Minister said:
“Two months ago this week NATO withdrew its final forces
from Afghanistan after the most extensive evacuation effort in
the alliance’s history, an effort which saved a huge
number of lives.
“We now have a responsibility to protect the people of
Afghanistan most at risk under the Taliban regime, particularly
women and girls.
“Today’s funding will provide urgent protection for the
most vulnerable people. But preventing a humanitarian disaster in
Afghanistan and preserving the gains of the last twenty years
will require a truly global effort.”
At the G20 Summit today the Prime Minister will underscore the
need to prioritise the rights of women and girls in all our
international development efforts. In particular he will
highlight the role girls’ education can make in unlocking
opportunities for both individuals and whole
societies.
Addressing a session on sustainable development, the
Prime Minister is expected to say:
“We must educate our daughters as surely as we educate
our sons. That is the silver bullet, the Swiss army knife, the
Black and Decker toolkit that solves an abundance of
problems.
“For every extra year a girl in the developing world
spends in secondary school, her future income rises by 25 percent
and her own children will be twice as likely to go to school
themselves - and 50 percent more likely to be immunised against
killer diseases.”
In July, the Global Partnership for Education summit in London
raised $4bn to support education in developing countries. The
Prime Minster will also use his intervention at the G20 to call
for countries to step up to raise the further $1bn the
organisation needs to fund its activities over the next five
years.
The UN agencies and ICRC will work with a number of international
and national NGOs to deliver the £50 million Afghanistan funding
announced by the UK today. No funding will be provided to the
Taliban or through government systems. The partners we are
working with have measures in place to ensure funding gets to
those who need it most.
Notes to Editors:
- The UK has set out plans for a resettlement scheme for Afghan
citizens under which we will welcome up to 5,000 vulnerable
Afghans over the next year and up to a total of 20,000 in the
coming years. Further details on the scheme are published
at: Afghanistan resettlement
and immigration policy statement - GOV.UK
(www.gov.uk).
- The Afghan Citizens’ Resettlement Scheme is in addition to
the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy, an open-ended offer
to those who have worked for the UK in Afghanistan and their
families. More than 11,500 Afghans have come to the UK under this
scheme so far.
