UK Foreign Office admits to prioritising animals over people in Afghanistan exit

The UK Foreign Affairs Committee has responded to a report on the exit from Afghanistan last Summer, raising concern over the prioritisation of animals over humans, a reported on Friday, July 29.

Speaking on the UK Foreign Office’s prioritisation of animals over humans in the Afghanistan withdrawal the FAC began its report:

“The Government is grateful to the Foreign Affairs Committee for its report on the UK’s 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan.”

“The Government agrees that there are fundamental lessons to learn, and to act on, from this experience and the feedback received.”

These fundamental lessons included the “under-resourcing of the evacuation effort in a crucial period” that “likely cost hundreds of people their chance to leave the country, and as a result likely cost lives”.

They also stated their “regrets that it took as long as it did to establish what the decision-making process had been in this case” and that “more care should have been taken within the FCDO in how the decision was communicated to staff.

According to them, the communication of the decision led many to believe that the Prime Minister had approved the Nowzad Charity’s airlift of animals out of Afghanistan.

The charity, which was set up by former Royal Marine Paul “Pen” Farthing, aimed to lift his staff as well as the animals out of the Afghan capital city of Kabul as the Taliban took control of the nation during the exit of the UK, US and other allied nations.

The news follows reports of an alleged leaked email that showed Boris Johnson personally authorising the evacuation of Pen Farthing’s dogs from Afghanistan despite previously denying it.

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