The Spectator

Letters: Afghan interpreters deserve better from Britain

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issue 08 January 2022

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Sir: Lloyd Evans’s sympathetic piece on the fate of Afghans once they arrive in the UK made for sobering reading (‘New arrivals’, 18 December). In the Sulha Alliance we are endeavouring to support those Afghans and their families who served with and alongside British forces in Afghanistan. That is not the totality of Afghan migrants, but of the former interpreters and their families it can be truly said ‘they are here because we were there’ — and we owe them.

I will not go over the whole sorry saga of the UK’s mistreatment of this group, but we really need a step change in how they are looked after. As Mr Evans’s article makes plain, the Home Office default setting for supporting all migrants is ‘survival’: sufficient unto the day and not a penny more. For the former interpreters and their families, we demand a different standard: that they be given the means to thrive, not simply survive.

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