Afghanistan

John Howell Excerpts

Wednesday 18th August 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Hunt]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that. It is not sustainable to ask America to spend 4% of its GDP on defence when the entirety of Europe spends no more than just over 2%.

The threat we face is a threat that all of us face. For 15 consecutive years, the number of free countries in the world has been in decline. Since 2013, according to Reporters Without Borders, press freedom has been in decline. This decade, for the first time in any of our lifetimes, the largest economy in the world will not be a democracy, when China overtakes the United States.

We are proud of our country not just because of what we have achieved and not just because of our wealth, but because of what we stand for. When those values are under threat, and when the Atlantic partnership appears to be fraying, we should be stopping at nothing to rebuild them. That means investing in our armed forces, reversing the aid cut, developing our own technology and rebuilding our global alliances. There is something we can do right now: cut through bureaucracy and ensure that we look after every single Afghani who took risks for themselves and their families because they believed in a better future and trusted us to deliver it.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Jeremy Hunt]

I am just coming to my conclusion.

We cannot reverse what happened this week, but we can limit the damage and learn from what went wrong. That means not just grieving silently at the actions of a close ally, but recognising the threats we face and roaring defiantly in defence of the values we share.

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[Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)]

Like others, I have been to Afghanistan—not as a solder, but as a 16-year-old teenager in 1978. It was in the last days of President Daoud’s regime. A couple of days after he returned from Islamabad, where my father was working, Daoud was overthrown, executed and strung up. Afghanistan has been a failed state since, which is tragic because it is a beautiful country. I remember it as vibrant and developing fast.

Much has been made and will be made in this debate about the tremendous sacrifice of our armed forces in Afghanistan. I know that many soldiers who served cared passionately about the Afghan people, and the job they were trying to do to bring about peace and security. We should not forget that our involvement in Afghanistan secured 20 years of freedom for its people. I can only hope that, from the ruins, some sense of how that feels will remain, and it will not totally revert back to extremist Islamic rule under the new Government.

The past 20 years have not been wasted. We have seen 40% of girls in education—9 million girls where there were none—with literacy rates of 56% and 70,000 female teachers. Four thousand midwives have been trained, up from 400 in 2001, and female MPs make up 28% of Parliament—we only make up 34% here, so they were doing incredibly well. That is what has been achieved, and that is what our brave men and women have died for, but, like many in this House, I am a realist and hope is not much of a safeguard. The chance of any sort of progressive shift by the Taliban, now in complete control, seems remote. As co-chair of the all-party group on women, peace and security, I have spoken in this House several times in the past few months expressing my concern about the future of women in Afghanistan following the withdrawal of NATO troops. The premise of my concern has always been the encroachment of the Taliban, which has been going on for many years, and no one should have been surprised by its entry into Kabul. In the face of Taliban rule, my concern now has turned to deep anger and frustration that women and girls may again face subjugation in Afghanistan, despite the words of the Taliban leaders.

[John Howell]

Will my hon. Friend join me in the work to try to ensure the protection of the Afghan women’s orchestra, which came to this country in 2019 and made a big impression on the UK, and is now seriously under threat?

[Mrs Drummond]

Absolutely. There are many women’s organisations that have come to the fore over the past 20 years, and it would be very sad if they disappeared.

Those brave women who joined the Afghan army now fear beheading. Girls face having their education taken away from them and women their rights to go and do as they please. There is the fear of sexual violence. There will be no women teachers, no women police officers and no women in political life. Women face being wiped from the face of Afghanistan unless they are prepared to subject themselves to Taliban rule. There are already signs that Afghan women have no faith whatsoever in any lessening of the Taliban grip. In Kabul, there are reports of nail shops blackening out their windows, music shops, destroying stock and women not going to work or walking alone. These mundane, simple, everyday things that all women in the world should have the right to do are all at grave risk. Although the feeling of impotence in this place is palpable, there is no reason to give in or to give up on Afghanistan and its people. We must do all we can to engage with the new regime and any country that has influence with it, and I am particularly focused on what Pakistan can do as a country that harboured Taliban leaders, plus any Gulf backers that have been supporting this group.

Afghanistan will need aid. Delivering it must come with stringent conditions on honouring women’s rights, human rights and those of the ethnic minorities as well. This will need global consensus, and I hope that the Government are working extremely hard in this regard right now to ensure that the Taliban has the international community breathing down its neck from day one.

My one final thought is how lucky I am to stand here in the House of Commons able to say what I think, and, in honour of those brave Afghan women fearing the very worst right now, I will not forget it.

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[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

I have never been in the military and I have never visited Afghanistan, but I represent a constituency, and actually live in a village, where large numbers are and have. RAF Benson has provided helicopters to Afghanistan. Its Pumas have served in Afghanistan since 2015. How do I represent to them that what they have achieved has been a success? Yes, they have been involved in anti-terrorism, but they have also been involved in the process of state building. They are an exceptional team who have served well. They have been based at Kabul airport and have provided vital airborne transport. Look at the statistics of what they have achieved. They have done 12,800 flying hours. They have carried 126,000 passengers. They have also carried 660,000 kg of freight. We will offer our congratulations to them, I am sure, right across the House, for giving so much to that mission.

I also want to raise the status of a number of girls in Kabul who are active musicians. The young women and girls of the Afghan women’s orchestra and their peers at the Afghanistan National Institute of Music were special guests of the UK Government, and of an orchestra in my constituency, for performances in the UK in 2019. Promoting girls’ education and reducing the impact of conflict on women and girls used to be key priorities for the Foreign Office in Afghanistan. The achievements of the Afghan women’s orchestra embody the values at the core of those priorities, and for those reasons the Foreign Office was proud to be playing a role in the orchestra’s visit to the UK.

On Sunday night we received a text message from some of the orchestra. It said:

“Today I went to school. I wanted to practise. After a few minutes our teacher said go home because the situation and security is not good…It’s really dangerous because the Taliban even can’t hear the sound of music…I have no hope for the future of music development in Afghanistan.”

I feel great sympathy for those girls, and I ask Ministers to do what they can to make sure that those girls are released from that captivity and brought safely to the UK.