Guards at the British Embassy in Kabul are pleading for their lives after allegedly being told that they’re unsuitable for rescue because they were hired through an outsourced contractor.
Most of the 125 person team of security personnel got letters explaining they weren’t suitable for help because they weren’t directly employed by Her Majesty’s Government.
Security for all British embassies globally was outsourced decades ago.
The guards at the Embassy in Kabul are employed by security firm GardaWorld. Meanwhile, personnel who were doing the same work for the now-closed US Embassy under a separate GardaWorld contract have been evacuated, and others are getting assistance from the Americans.
The guards are now pleading with the British Government to review its decision to refuse their applications, and one said to a newspaper outlet that they served in frontline positions, doing the most dangerous job to keep British officials safe. That they endangered their lives for them, and now they discover themselves in this unfavourable situation, not just them, but their families are at risk as well.
The allegations are expected to put British ministers under further pressure to redouble efforts to evacuate as many people as possible, and it follows reports of rescue flights leaving Afghanistan with just a few people on board, while thousands of people struggle outside the airport as they attempt to flee the threat of persecution under the new Taliban regime.
Defence Secretary Ben Wallace insisted that Britain is using every space imaginable on its rescue flights and emphasised every hour counts in the evacuation effort, and he added that Western forces are working to ensure not a single seat is wasted.
According to a newspaper outlet at least one RAF jet had been forced to leave Afghanistan half empty because Taliban militants were refusing to let people get to the airport, and several British Embassy guards told the paper that after helping British diplomats get to Kabul airport on Saturday night, they were told by phone that their services were no longer provided, and were asked to hand back computers, body armour and radios.
Nearly all 160 GardaWorld employees working on the British Embassy contract applied for help from the Ministry of Defence run Afghan relocations and assistance policy, intended to help people working for UK organisations, and all except 21 translators were rejected last month.
According to a newspaper outlet, they received letters explaining they weren’t eligible because they weren’t directly employed by Her Majesty’s Government, and it seems that this government is morally bankrupt and an outright disgrace.
These security guards were not working for the British Government, they were working for a private security company, hence the government think they can now simply wash their hands of any responsibility because the government have no obligation whatsoever to these people, of course, that was the whole point of hiring them in the first place, and who in their right mind after this pantomime would work for this government abroad?
But the government will now have blood on its hands, and politicians should be imprisoned for this, and it looks as if the British embassy is the worst in the world. They’re not there to help their own people, they’re there to help themselves.
However, GardaWorld is a private Canadian security company, and they should have had a strategy to liberate their workers from hazardous situations like this, and next time, because there will be a next time, we deploy people to help it will be far more difficult to get that help if they’re being recruited unaware that they will be left behind in the battle.
