The UK's Afghan data leak stinks of another miserable betrayal

The National

2 days ago

One of the most enduring until he died some years ago of cancer was with a former mujahideen guerrilla commander whom I first met back in the days when he was involved in the resistance to the Soviet occupation of his country.
Later, he would fight as part of the Northern Alliance against the Taliban, and it's for this reason that I'm not prepared to name him here.
I do know that much of his immediate family were forced to flee shortly after I last saw them in Kabul in 2020, just before the Taliban came to power following the ignominious withdrawal in August 2021 of the US-led coalition forces of which Britain was a part.
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My late friend's immediate family are now in neighbouring Iran, where they swapped the dangers of one war and repressive regime in Afghanistan for that of another because they had no choice. To stay would have meant almost certain death at the hands of the Taliban.
I know for sure they are in Iran because one of my late friend's sons with great difficulty got a message to me asking for help to get his family out from Iran to the UK.
His request is not the first I've had from old Afghan friends, and doubtless will not be the last. Another, still trapped in Afghanistan, also managed to contact me a few months ago seeking similar help. I have not heard from him since.
To say I feel a sense of unease at being unable to do much would be an understatement, for friendships run deep in Afghan culture and our bonds were often forged in the most trying times of war, making them all the more profound.
I mention all this right now in the context of the scarcely believable cock-up by the previous Tory government that was disclosed this week over the highly secret Operation Rubific.
For those catching up with the story, in short, up to 100,000 Afghans could have been placed at risk after a British Royal Marine mistakenly emailed a database to multiple wrong contacts. That spreadsheet contained personal data on tens of thousands of applicants to the UK's Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (ARAP).
In what ended up on Facebook, names, emails and phone numbers in the leak included up to 33,000 people connected to those who supported British forces.
As the data was circulated even further, fears grew that it could provide the basis for a Taliban 'kill list', and this is where the whole affair gets even more shameful.
For not only did the then Tory government defence secretary Ben Wallace obtain a 'super-injunction' preventing several media organisations who knew of the leak from reporting it, but by doing so added cover-up to cock-up.
In panic, ministers then authorised a covert emergency relocation scheme known as the Afghan Response Route at an estimated cost of £7 billion to the taxpayer. That has now been closed according to current Labour Government Defence Secretary John Healey, who on Tuesday admitted the catastrophic data breach.
Everything about this whole shambolic affair stinks. To begin with, there is the utter incompetence of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and its failure to safeguard all those in the dataset.
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Then there is the gagging of the press and the fact the super-injunction was allowed to continue to last for so long. All this before the unimaginable fear and pressure it must have placed on countless ordinary Afghans. Hard as it is to imagine, but the entire affair is on a par – if not surpasses – the betrayal meted out to Afghans back in 2021 as they were left to their fate at the hands of the Taliban.
And before anyone simply lays the blame squarely on the previous Tory government, let's not forget that court documents revealed that the current Labour Government continued to defend the injunction after coming to power, citing national security concerns.
What also sticks in the craw is that Healey this week told news outlets that 'most of those names on the list… didn't work alongside our forces, didn't serve with our forces, aren't eligible for the special scheme.'
Healey also had the audacity to argue that their inclusion in the list did not automatically make them targets, citing an independent review which found it 'highly unlikely' that presence on the dataset increased the risk of Taliban reprisals.
Really, Mr Healey, can you be absolutely sure of that? If the threat was so slight why then did both Tory then a Labour government tie themselves in knots adding to the cover-up of the leak?
Are we actually supposed to take the word of UK Government officials – whose ineptitude appears to know no bounds – that they are categorically certain the Taliban did not benefit from the leak and target those inside the country related to those on the list?
Justified as it is to focus on what led to the leak and the question over freedom of the press to report, it's vital to remember that at the core of this whole issue are people's lives and the terrifying threat they face daily from the barbarism of Taliban rule.
Those in Westminster might think that the war in Afghanistan is over, but countless Afghans are still imperilled by its outcome – not least the country's women and girls. Rather than pulling out all the stops to make them safer – the least the UK could do after its earlier betrayal – it instead puts them in even greater danger than before.
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Is it really beyond the intelligence of politicians – whatever their stripe – to put the obvious facts together and recognise the real reason why in 2023-24, Afghans topped the list of those trying to make that Channel crossing in small boats?
For the bottom line here is that the UK screws up massively in terms of legal routes for legitimate Afghan asylum seekers to get here, while at the same time making their lives back in Afghanistan more dangerous than ever.
What an indictment we have witnessed this week of the systems that are meant to protect the victims of war and oppression. There now needs to be a full independent inquiry into what by any standards is a scandalous affair on so many levels.
In the meantime, should my Afghan friends once more be in touch seeking help, I will be more bereft than ever of offering any useful reply. I will also be hanging my head in shame at the UK's miserable betrayal – yet again.