Kent asylum seekers 'terrified' of being returned to Afghanistan after Kabul previously deemed 'safe' by Home Office
15:36, 19 August 2021
updated: 15:59, 19 August 2021
Afghan asylum seekers are living in fear of being returned to their homeland which has fallen into the hands of the Taliban.
A prominent Kent charity has warned that many refugees who arrived in the county as unaccompanied asylum seeking children, some of them because their families had been targeted by the militants, are "terrified" because their applications for asylum have not yet been decided or have been turned down.
Kent Refugee Action Network (KRAN) says the Home Office has been routinely refusing asylum claims from Afghan refugees on the grounds that the capital Kabul was a "safe" destination for them to be returned to.
However many of the more than 100 Afghan refugees the charity works with in towns including Folkestone, Ashford and Maidstone fled their homeland because they had been told they were expected to join the Taliban forces.
KRAN is now calling on the Government to ensure that young people from Afghanistan who are in the UK, but have been previously refused asylum because the country was deemed safe, are urgently granted asylum.
Speaking during yesterday's Commons debate on the situation following the fall of Kabul to the hardliners, Canterbury MP Rosie Duffield said: "In my constituency, our excellent Kent Refugee Action Network, as part of the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, has laid out what is needed.
"They are asking questions that they need urgent answers to relating to family reunion and the mental health of young people from Afghanistan, which has already been severely impacted.
"What happens to those who are in the UK who have been previously refused asylum because Kabul was considered safe? Can their cases now be considered urgently?
"Will local authorities, especially those in Kent, receive sufficient financial support to house asylum seekers in suitable accommodation?"
Bridget Chapman, as spokesman for KRAN, says the government response to the crisis in Afghanistan since the decision by the US to withdraw its forces "raises more questions than it answers".
"We need a focused and urgent response from them to the points that we have raised," she said. "The young people we work with from Afghanistan have been through enough. They are a part of our community and they deserve to feel safe.
"The proposed Nationality and Borders Bill will criminalise many of those seeking asylum depending on their method of arrival.
"Let me be clear, you are no less needy if you've arrived on a boat than on a plane. The current situation in Afghanistan will mean many more people are displaced.
"We need to ensure that everyone who arrives is treated fairly and given the same access to the asylum process."
KRAN is also calling for unaccompanied children from Afghanistan currently in Belgium or northern France trying to reach the UK to be identified and given safe passage.
It also asks for funding to be set aside to give urgent specialist support to help with mental health issues experienced by young refugees living in Kent whose family and friends often remain at risk from the Taliban.
The government is proposing a resettlement scheme to bring the most vulnerable to the UK, and many Kent councils have already come forward to offer their assistance in housing refugees.
