Afghan nationals: have you arrived in the UK under the Afghan Response Route?
Personal information about more than 33,000 Afghans seeking relocation to the UK after the Taliban takeover was released in error by a defence official. Fears that the individuals named would be at risk from reprisals from the Taliban led the last government to set up a secret relocation scheme, the Afghan Response Route (ARR), involving 20,000 people.
The secret scheme, which can only now be reported after a High Court judge lifted a superinjunction on Tuesday, was first obtained by the MoD in August 2023.
The scheme is closing down but the government has said it will honour any outstanding offers. Have you arrived in the UK under the ARR?
We would like to hear from any Afghans who have arrived in the UK under the ARR scheme or are due to come.
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ITV News
3 hours ago
- ITV News
Politics and protests: What to expect from Donald Trump's Scotland visit
Donald Trump will arrive in Scotland later on Friday, on his first visit to the UK since his re-election. The US president will be met by both political leaders and protests during the visit, which is expected to last five days, and will see him inaugurate a new golf course in Aberdeenshire. The trip comes two months before the King is due to welcome Trump for a formal state visit to the UK. The Trump administration continues to deal with turmoil on the home front, as the president struggles to salvage his reputation with voters amid reports around his friendship with convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. But Trump's visit to his ancestral home will hardly provide an escape from controversy. The visit has faced criticism from both political opponents and local residents, and will see a significant police operation across Scotland. Why is Trump visiting Scotland? Trump is expected to visit his Turnberry golf resort, as well as his course at Menie in Aberdeenshire. His trip also comes as a new golf course is about to debut on August 13, which the Trump family business has billed "the greatest 36 holes in golf." Trump is dedicating the new course to his Scottish-born mother, Mary Anne MacLeod, who grew up on the Isle of Lewis. But Trump's existing Aberdeenshire course has been mired in controversy in recent years, after it struggled to turn a profit, and was found by Scottish conservation authorities to have partially destroyed nearby sand dunes. Trump's company was also ordered to cover the Scottish government's legal costs after the course unsuccessfully sued over the construction of a nearby wind farm, arguing in part that it damaged golfers' views. Critics also argue the trip - which is expected to cost tens of thousands of dollars - is a blatant example of Trump blending his presidential duties with promoting his family's business interests. The White House has brushed off questions about potential conflicts of interest, arguing that Trump's business success before he entered politics was key to his appeal with voters. White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers called his visit "a working trip", but added that Trump has "built the best and most beautiful world-class golf courses anywhere in the world, which is why they continue to be used for prestigious tournaments and by the most elite players in the sport." Who will Trump meet during his visit? The president will meet with Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer during his stay, when the pair are expected to discuss the UK-US trade deal. Trump said the meeting would likely take place at one of his properties. He will also meet with Scottish First Minister John Swinney. The SNP leader previously said he would take the opportunity to raise various issues with the president, including tariffs, Gaza, and Ukraine. Speaking ahead of his arrival, Swinney said the global attention the visit will receive provides the opportunity to promote Scotland's tourism sector and economic investment potential, as well as to allow people to respectfully demonstrate the principles of freedom and justice. "Scotland shares a strong friendship with the United States that goes back centuries," he said ahead of the visit. "The partnership remains steadfast through economic, cultural and ancestral links - including, of course, with the president himself." The first minister said Scotland is a "proud democratic nation" that "stands firm on the principles of equality and freedom for all, and a society that stands up for a fair and just world." Swinney has been vocally critical of the US president in the past, and openly endorsed Trump's political opponent Kamala Harris before last year's election - a move branded an "insult" by a spokesperson for Trump's Scottish businesses. John Swinney has argued that it is "in Scotland's interest" for him to meet the president, and for the visit to go ahead. But some Scots disagree, and a major police operation is being mounted during the visit in anticipation of protests. Thousands of officers are expected to be deployed by Police Scotland, who will deal with planned mass protests around Trump's golf courses and major Scottish cities. Trade unions, disability rights activists, climate justice campaigners, Palestinian and Ukrainian solidarity groups and American diaspora organisations are among those holding demonstrations in protest of the visit. The Stop Trump Scotland group has encouraged demonstrators to come to Aberdeen and 'show Trump exactly what we think of him in Scotland.' A spokesperson for the organisation said: "The people of Scotland don't want to roll out a welcome mat for Donald Trump, whose government is accelerating the spread of climate breakdown around the world." They also said that people in Scotland "simply wanted to live in peace near what is now [Trump's] vanity project golf course", and have "experienced Trump's abusive and high-handed behaviour first-hand, long before he entered the White House." Protests are planned in Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dumfries. During Trump's visit to Scotland in 2018, similar gatherings drew thousands of protestors.
The Guardian
3 hours ago
- The Guardian
Islamophobia isn't just socially acceptable in the UK now – it's flourishing. How did this happen?
According to YouGov, more than half of people do not believe Islam to be compatible with British values. I'm often dispirited by these polls, as much by the timbre of the questions as by the responses (how many times do we need to ask one another whether we can afford to avert a climate catastrophe, for instance?) But I can't remember the last time I was stunned. This latest poll found that 41% of the British public believe that Muslim immigrants have had a negative impact on the UK. Nearly half (49%) think that Muslim women are pressured into wearing the hijab. And almost a third (31%) think that Islam promotes violence. Farhad Ahmad, a spokesperson for the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, which commissioned the poll, was surprised that I was so surprised. Things had been really bad for ages, he said, directing me to not dissimilar numbers in 2016 and 2019. This is the first year the community has included the question about the hijab, which strikes its own particularly depressing note. The hijab was a hot talking point in the early to mid-2000s, when military support for the US in its interventions in Afghanistan was often rhetorically justified by the toxic misogyny of the Taliban. Veils of all kinds came to represent the subjugation of women, to the dismay of many at the time. But 20 years have passed, during which time we've seen Boris Johnson use the burqa in what was condemned as a racist callout to Telegraph readers, and the French experiment with banning full face veils – such as a niqab or burqa – in any public place, a chilling curtailment of, if not technically a human right, then what instinctively feels like any woman's birthright to wear whatever the hell she pleases. Understanding has deepened, in other words – of the racism that anti-veil rhetoric often disguises, and the fact that to make a judgment about who's controlling a woman and the extent of her autonomy, you have to know her pretty well. Or at the very least, have met her. If the figures aren't striking to those who have been paying attention, they remain shocking, particularly when you compare the numbers with those who have a negative view of other religions: 7% have a bad opinion of Christians, 13% think poorly of Jewish people, 14% of Sikhs and 15% of Hindus. This has been a 25-year slide, from the idea that 'Muslim extremists have views incompatible with British life' to 'all Muslims'; and if people were making that elision already, it was not previously sayable. Sayeeda Warsi said in 2011 that Islamophobia was becoming socially acceptable – at the Conservative party conference she said it had 'passed the dinner-table test'. The can't be right, I remember thinking then – she must just be meeting too many Conservatives. Now we're at the point where it's not only socially acceptable, but socially dominant. In 2015, the US thinktank Center for American Progress published Fear, Inc 2.0: The Islamophobia Network's Efforts to Manufacture Hate in America, a revision of an earlier report by the author Wajahat Ali. It presented a forensic account of how post-9/11 feelings of grief and threat had been weaponised to produce a prejudice that had barely previously registered, and it made for depressing reading for several reasons. First, it revealed the amount of money pouring in to the creation of this narrative and from what sources (most of it was quite easily traceable back to billionaires and banking interests, which were simultaneously hosing cash at climate crisis counter-narratives among other conservative agendas). Second, it showed how coordinated and organised so many incredibly well-financed thinktanks were, amplifying one another's messages and keeping a stable of ready commenters for broadcasters hungry for a hot-button issue. Third, the report laid bare how incredibly effective this network was in turning what were once 'fringe, extremist views' (in Ali's words) into mainstream talking points and wedge issues. The UK, however, seemed to lack a few core components of this campaign. There weren't any obvious funders with deep pockets; evangelical Christians weren't a strong voice in politics; and it had stronger regulation of hate speech in broadcasting (though weaker regulation in print). As it turned out, it didn't matter. The US lab created this virus, and we caught it. Never have the effects of Islamophobia been so obvious, or so bleak. To read the domestic news, you would think that no grooming gang had ever contained a non-Muslim. In the rolling news cycle of even our public service broadcasting, Muslim lives are considered less valuable than non-Muslim ones, their loss less tragic. It would be functionally impossible to stand up in parliament and justify arms sales to Israel, small boats hysteria and inhumane treatment of asylum seekers, were it not for the groundwork that Islamophobia has laid. In subtler ways, this casual demonisation puffs up a notion of 'British values' that are nowhere in evidence, nowhere defended, except in the supposed dichotomy with a Muslim worldview. Truthfully, if anyone cared to pin down a Muslim value that's incompatible with a British one, it would be unlikely to flatter in the way this framing assumes. Last spring, I met a young woman who had been caring for her autistic brother since she was tiny. She said, in passing, that her faith had helped a lot, because in Islam, people with disabilities were prized, as were their carers, and their treatment as equals was a prerequisite for faithful Muslims. I hadn't heard anything less like a modern British value in my life. Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist
The Independent
4 hours ago
- The Independent
Trump's plans for his private five-day trip to Scotland
President Donald Trump is set to arrive in Scotland on Friday for a five-day private visit, concluding on Tuesday. His itinerary includes visits to his Turnberry and Menie golf courses, and the opening of a new course dedicated to his Scottish mother. The visit will involve a significant Police Scotland operation, with mass protests anticipated around his golf courses and major Scottish cities. Trump is expected to meet with Scottish Secretary Ian Murray, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer to discuss a UK-US trade deal, and First Minister John Swinney. First Minister John Swinney intends to use the meeting to address issues such as tariffs, Gaza, and Ukraine, while also promoting Scotland's tourism and economic potential.
