London, uk – Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government is being roundly accused of betraying the Afghan people, with criticism levelled at his administration from across the political spectrum and splashed over national newspapers.
The United Kingdom’s abrupt military withdrawal from Afghanistan has met widespread dismay as deadly chaos unfolds in Taliban-controlled Kabul.
But the foremost stinging condemnation has come from within the UK’s Afghan diaspora Leading figures within the estimated 80,000-strong population, which has grown within the 20 years since the 2001 US-led invasion of Afghanistan, say London and its allies have effectively abandoned the country to the Taliban by carelessly managing the conclusion of their incursion with a hurried drawback of foreign troops.
“The government has betrayed Afghanistan itself,” Mohammad Hotak, the chairman of the Afghan Council of Great Britain (ACGB), told Al Jazeera This may be a moment that our people, British Afghans, won’t forget. We are deeply hurt.”
‘Catastrophic failure’
Johnson’s government has said it had little choice but to follow US President Joe Biden’s lead when he committed to withdrawing American forces by August 31, a promise made on the rear of a pre-existing peace deal brokered between the Taliban and Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump.
Since Biden’s announcement in April, the us and its NATO allies operating in Afghanistan, including the united kingdom , have reduced their military presence in line with an “in together, out together” mantra.
But 20 years after the Taliban was toppled by the coalition forces after the 9/11 , 2001, attacks, the group has seized on the pullback of troops.
In a blistering nationwide offensive, it’s taken control of about during a ll|one amongst|one in every of”> one among Afghanistan’s provinces in a matter of weeks, forcing elected President Ashraf Ghani to escape the country – a move that effectively symbolised the top of a Western-backed experiment with democracy.
Despite the Taliban’s assurances that it’ll not seek to punish people that worked for foreign forces – and promises that it’ll respect human rights more generally – there are huge doubts among Western leaders, international rights groups, observers and lots of Afghans.
Hotak argued that while Washington was largely liable for the increasingly precarious situation within the war-torn country, London could have done far more .
He suggested that by working with other allied forces, the united kingdom may are ready to coordinate a more gradual troop withdrawal and safeguard the progress Afghan civil society had made during the past 20 years.
“‘Global Britain’ has been a slogan [of Johnson’s government], but the vision has not been followed in the least in Afghanistan,” he said. “Britain could have come up with a special solution … there has been a catastrophic failure at the very best level of our government,” said Hotak.
“There are young women and men in Afghanistan, many them, who believe the slogans of the West, of england , Europe and America.
“They were building a replacement country but, unfortunately, now all of these people are betrayed.”
Refugee resettlement
The UK currently has about 1,000 soldiers personnel deployed in Kabul to assist oversee mass evacuations from the capital’s Hamid Karzai International Airport.
Thousands of Afghans and foreigners have flocked to the US-controlled airport since the Taliban captured Kabul on Assumption during a desperate bid to flee the group’s rule.
At least 20 people have reportedly been killed within the turmoil, mostly in shooting incidents and stampedes.
The UK has pledged to resettle 5,000 people this year as a part of its Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy scheme, which offers refuge to people that worked alongside UK forces or officials during the Afghanistan intervention, like translators.
Johnson’s government has also committed to welcoming another 20,000 Afghan refugees across subsequent few years as a part of a replacement resettlement programme. About 5,000 people are expected to arrive within the UK within the first year of this initiative, which is analogous to a British programme established in 2014 for Syrians.
But critics like British Afghan Shukrullah Ludin, who fled Afghanistan as a 12-year-old in 2012 and later settled within the UK, have dismissed the scheme as inadequate.
“The UK, along side the US, led this war and invaded Afghanistan within the first place,” Ludin, the founder and secretariat of the All-Party Parliamentary Afghanistan Group and executive of the opposition Labour Party’s Friends of Afghanistan group, told Al Jazeera.
“They need to now accept the responsibility to guard its people, 5,000 is nothing,” he said, citing Afghanistan’s population of 38 million.
Ludin involved the resettlement programme to be expanded, saying 20,000 or more Afghan refugees should be welcomed within the next 12 months alone.
“At the instant , the united kingdom is washing its hands [of Afghanistan],” he said. “If you’re leaving people in chaos, you’re not protecting them – this is often abandonment.”