Afghan pilot given asylum in UK begs for wife to join him as report says Home Office keeping thousands apart
A heroic Afghan pilot who helped Britain in its war against the Taliban is begging for his wife to be allowed to join him in the UK. As he makes his appeal, charities are calling for the Home Office’s “broken” family reunion system to be fixed.
The air force lieutenant, who was granted asylum in the UK after a five-month-long campaign by The Independent, is waiting for his young family, including his wife, who are currently in Iran.
He is worried that they will be forced to return to Afghanistan as their visas have run out in Iran.
His story is one of thousands, it has emerged, with figures from summer 2023 showing that more than 11,000 people were then waiting to be reunited with family members in the UK.
The Home Office has repeatedly refused to provide an updated figure for the visa backlog through freedom of information laws.
Charities Refugee Council and Safe Passage have called on the government to “fix and expand the UK’s broken family reunion system” in a new report, which draws on the many cases of separated refugee families that they are supporting.
The Afghan pilot said of his family: “They have been waiting for a visa for five months in Iran, but so far there is no news from the embassy and there is no guarantee it will be issued. My family are facing a lot of problems. They don’t have a proper place to live, and don’t have access to a doctor, because they are living illegally. Their Iranian visas have expired and they need to extend them, but it is impossible.
“My wife is suffering mentally and emotionally, and she is completely [without hope].”
Under current rules, separated refugee children in the UK do not have the right to bring their parents into the country. Afghans evacuated from Kabul during Operation Pitting in August 2021 are also not allowed to bring their close family to the UK, and Ukrainian refugees in the UK are not able to sponsor family members to join them either.
Even those who have been granted the right to resettle in the UK can often find themselves waiting years to be relocated. And many thousands who apply for a family reunification visa are forced to wait months for a decision, despite the Home Office promising to process applications within 12 weeks.
One young unaccompanied Afghan child supported by Safe Passage, Ahmad, tried to join his older brother in the UK. His father had been killed by the Taliban and his mother was also dead but the Home Office did not accept that there were any “serious and compelling” circumstances that would necessitate a relocation to the UK.
His family reunion case was only successful after a UK judge ordered the Home Office to help.
Afghans who were evacuated to the UK during Operation Pitting are also struggling to be reunited with family members. Despite ministers promising in October 2023 that a new route would allow them to bring close family to safety, the pathway has not yet been set up.
Farhad, a teenager who was airlifted from Kabul without his parents, told The Independent: “They promised in 2021 that they’re going to bring the families, but it’s still been almost three years.
“My mum and my siblings are in Pakistan because they needed a doctor and medication. But my father couldn’t get the visa to go with them. I am doing my GCSEs this month and I can’t really focus on my studies knowing that my family is struggling.”
MPs and Lords wrote to the Home Office last week, calling on the government to act faster to reunite Afghan families.
Dr Wanda Wyporska, CEO at Safe Passage International, said: “Nearly three years on, it’s a national shame that Afghans, who risked so much to support UK military operations, are still waiting for a way to bring their family to safety here with them. Their family members are living in fear every day of the Taliban.”
Enver Solomon, CEO of the Refugee Council, said: “The UK has clearly failed the Afghan refugees that it promised to protect, by keeping families separated for so long with no information on how they may be reunited.
“After risking everything for the UK, Afghans and their families should not be forced to make dangerous boat journeys to get here, nor should they face hostile, inhumane policies like the Rwanda plan when they do make it to the UK.”
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We made one of the largest commitments of any country to support people from Afghanistan, and so far we have brought around 27,900 individuals to safety in the UK, including thousands under our Afghan resettlement schemes.
“In October we committed to establish a route for those evacuated from Afghanistan under Pathway 1 of the Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme without their immediate family members, to reunite them in the UK. We remain on track to meet that commitment and open the route for referrals in the first half of this year.”
