Afghanistan

Angela Rayner Excerpts

Thursday 8th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner (Ashton-under-Lyne) (Lab)]

I thank the Prime Minister for advance sight of his statement. First, may I give my apologies on behalf of the Leader of the Opposition, who is on a long-planned visit to meet political leaders in Northern Ireland? May I also associate myself with the Prime Minister’s comments regarding British service personnel and the collective efforts of our partners in NATO?

This is a profound moment for the more than 150,000 UK personnel who have served in Afghanistan during the past 20 years, including my hon. Friends the Members for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) and for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) and many more Members across this House. My own brother served in the British armed forces during that period, too, so I know how it feels to say goodbye to a loved one before a tour of duty. Thankfully, I do not know how it feels not to see your loved one come home again, and the pain that those families have gone through is unimaginable. Hundreds of British men and women lost their lives in the service of our country. Many more were wounded or injured and still suffer the physical and emotional scars. They have shown extraordinary bravery, skill and courage so today, to everyone who served in Afghanistan and to all who loved them and supported them, we say a huge thank you.

There have been moments of huge difficulty in the past two decades, and the situation on the ground in Afghanistan today is more concerning than it has been at any point in many years. That must not take away from the many positives our engagement has brought to Afghanistan and the real difference our services and development sector have made in a country that has suffered so much. We have supported improvements in security, governance, economic development and, as the Prime Minister said, advancing the rights of women and education for girls. Yet these gains have not been secured; the Taliban are making gains on the ground, and serious questions remain about the future stability of Afghanistan.

A security threat remains to the wider world, including to the UK. Nobody wants to see British troops permanently stationed in Afghanistan, but we simply cannot wash our hands or walk away. It is hard to see a future without bloodier conflict and wider Taliban control. Already, they are on the brink of gaining control of provincial capitals, and Afghan security forces are at risk of being overwhelmed. This spells jeopardy for the Afghan people, particularly for Afghan women and girls—and for all the things the Prime Minister talked about earlier—who in a just world would have had the same rights as women everywhere deserve.

In the words of the Prime Minister, this is a situation fraught with risk, and I understand that. So can he tell us whether he argued for or against the withdrawal by the US Government and NATO, and what other steps he proposed? Our British troops made enormous sacrifices and we believe, as a nation, that we have a responsibility to our veterans. Can the Prime Minister really tell them that our work as a nation in Afghanistan is done and that their efforts will not be in vain? On their behalf, I ask the Prime Minister: what plans are now in place to ensure that Afghanistan does not become a failed state and a breeding ground for those who wish to oppress their own citizens and threaten ours? What additional threat does our country now face? What diplomatic plans will be in place in the region to support the peace process? Are the UK Government engaging with the Government of Pakistan about their role? Will the UK embassy in Kabul remain? How will we keep our UK staff there safe?

Afghanistan remains one of the poorest countries in the world, yet our aid funding to that country is being cut by more than £100 million—the Prime Minister referred to this today. The UK funded a project involving 6,000 women that has already been cancelled. When he visited Kabul as the Foreign Secretary he said that girls’ education was our “crowning achievement”, so can he tell the House what impact his cuts to the aid budget will have on programmes there? Will he not rethink those cuts?

I reiterate that we all want to see an end to UK military operations in Afghanistan, but if we leave without putting a plan in place to ensure that Afghanistan does not go back to the conflict and violence of the past, we will have failed those who have given so much over the past 20 years. Building and maintaining the peace and prosperity of Afghanistan, protecting women and girls, and in turn protecting our own nation, should always be our priority. To honour the legacy of those who have served and the lives that were lost, let us make sure, Prime Minister, that we get this right.

[The Prime Minister]

I am very grateful to the right hon. Lady for what she said and particularly the spirit in which she said it, so let me try to address some of her points. It is clear that what is happening now is a follow-up to what was very largely the withdrawal—the end of military operations—in 2014. The presence since then has been much smaller, but a great deal of good work has continued to be done by British aid workers, the British armed forces and British diplomats.

The right hon. Lady is right to draw attention to the work of educating girls and young women. The whole country can be proud of what has been achieved. I reassure her by saying that this country will not only continue to fund education in Afghanistan and continue to support Afghanistan to the tune of £100 million, but we will also increase our funding for the Global Partnership for Education. We will be making further announcements about that later this month, when the Global Partnership for Education summit takes place here in London.

The right hon. Lady asks the most important question that I think veterans of the Afghan conflict will want to have answered, which is whether we think that the threat from Afghanistan has now been reduced. The answer is yes, we do think the threat from al-Qaeda is very substantially lower than it was in 2001. There remain threats from Islamic State Khorasan and the Haqqani network—of course there remain terrorist threats from Afghanistan—but the answer is to have a peaceful and a negotiated solution and that is what our diplomats will continue to work for.

I would just say to the Taliban that they have made the commitment that I read out to the House, in their negotiations with General Khalilzad. They must abide by that commitment. I am sure they will be aware that there is no military path to victory for the Taliban. There must be a peaceful and a negotiated settlement for the political crisis in Afghanistan, and the UK will continue to work to ensure that that takes place. I believe that can happen—I do not believe that the Taliban are guaranteed the kind of victory that we sometimes read about.

The UK will continue to exert all its diplomatic and political efforts to ensure that there is a better future for the people of Afghanistan, for the women of Afghanistan and for the young people growing up in Afghanistan, and to ensure that the legacy of the 150,000 British serving men and women who went through Afghanistan and, above all, the 457 who laid down their lives, is properly honoured.