Half of female Afghan MPs left behind in ‘terrifying’ situation, says minister Victoria Atkins
The plight of more than 30 female Afghan MPs stranded in Kabul has been described as “terrifying” by the UK’s minister for Afghan resettlement.
The Home Office minister Victoria Atkins told Times Radio that she was “very, very conscious of the threats that so many people are facing”.
Only half of Afghanistan’s 69 female MPs, who have been some of the Taliban’s most vocal critics over the past two decades and now fear for their safety, were evacuated by western governments.
Times Radio’s chief political commentator, Tom Newton Dunn, wrote on Twitter: “One UK MP has spoken to a female Afghan MP. She says she is now in her third safe house with her husband and children. The Taliban raided her home in Kabul, destroyed everything and hung her dog.
“She is certain to be killed if the Taliban find her. ‘Shooting is the best she can hope for, but they will brutalise her first,’ the UK MP says. Her only hope now is a visa to the UK and safe passage out. But despite repeated pleas, the Home Office has failed to issue one.”
Asked whether the UK has a responsibility to resettle the MPs, Atkins said the government’s focus in the past two weeks had been getting out British nationals and Afghans who had worked for the UK.
“We are very much looking at how we can help people who have supported western values,” she said.
Atkins would not say if the Home Office would issue UK visas. “There are many moving parts to this,” she said.
Former British embassy security guards, who have also been left behind, say that life under the Taliban has become dramatically worse. The men said they were avoiding leaving their homes in daylight to evade militants at checkpoints and only moving between locations late at night.
One of the guards, who said he had been beaten with an AK-47 by a Taliban commander after his security card was found in his wallet at a checkpoint, goes outside only between 10 and 11pm to avoid being discovered and potentially killed for his involvement with “foreign infidels”.
“After the day I was beaten by the Taliban I am really afraid of leaving the house and going into town. If they ask me again at the checkpoint, they will beat me, so we stay at home and we stay undercover,” Ahmad, 36, told the i newspaper. “I am not sure how long we will have to do this for.”
He added: “They are now saying, don’t listen to music, cover your hair.”
Mahmood, 34, who was employed by the private security firm G4S for 12 years, remains in hiding in Kabul. “There is no music, no dancing and no more women on the TV or radio,” he said.
“I will miss my independence. We are going into a dark future ... no work and no plan for business, no money. Even education. I am studying for a BBA [bachelor of business administration] at one private university but I don’t think I will be able to continue it.”
