Afghanistan: Aid for Women

Baroness D'Souza Excerpts

Monday 11th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for her kind remarks. As I say, it is about doing your job, but I pay tribute to her and to all other noble Lords who have worked collectively on this important agenda. There is no easy solution, but I assure my noble friend that we are working directly with leaders from various representative groups of women in Afghanistan and more broadly too. We continue to engage with key personnel on the ground in Afghanistan who were previously involved within administration while it was still functioning, but equally we are working with key international partners, notably Indonesia and Qatar among others, to ensure that the issue of Afghanistan is kept on the front burner and that inclusivity—the restoration of women’s rights and all rights, including minority rights—is not forgotten.

[Baroness D'Souza (CB)]

My Lords, the Minister will be aware of the growth of cluster education, or cluster classes, whereby groups of secondary school girls gather in neighbourhood houses and qualified teachers visit them. The scheme with which I am involved is now educating upwards of 1,000 girls in three provinces in Afghanistan. In a very few cases, local Taliban commanders have asked whether their daughters can join those classes. Is this something that the UK Government would support, since it is often difficult for those international aid agencies operating in Afghanistan to do it as it runs right across the policy of the Taliban? Maybe the UK has got a channel for funding this kind of education.

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, recognising the important work that the noble Baroness has done, of course we fully support such initiatives. As she will know all too well, we protect the agencies that we work with on the ground to allow them to continue their important work, particularly when it comes to girls’ education. In our general assessment, there are now six to eight regions within Afghanistan where, because of the fragmented structure of the Taliban, there are initiatives which allow health access but also allow women in certain respects to go to work and allow girls to be educated.