Why Johnson is under fire on Afghanistan in the House of Commons
The point of Daniele Meloni
The last time the House of Commons met in mid-August in an extraordinary session was in the summer of 2013 when the then Prime Minister David Cameron faced a burning defeat on the authorization for bombing on Syria, torn apart by the civil war. The current prime minister, Boris Johnson, is a shrewd and ambitious politician, it is now understood. Under the motto of "I wasn't born yesterday", "I was not born yesterday", he had a majority motion drawn up that does not commit his government to anything on Afghanistan and simply recognizes that today in Westminster the recent crisis in Kabul. "To approve such a political document they would have done better to stay at home," said bitingly Andrew Neil, dean of conservative commentators and president of the newly formed GB News TV.
Be that as it may, the government, as expected, was hit by the crossfire of its parliamentarians and those of the opposition, in a meeting of the municipalities as crowded as before the outbreak of the pandemic. If Labor leader Sir Keir Starmer said that the UK "betrayed the Afghan people due to the inertia of the Tory government", harsh words also came from former Prime Minister Theresa May, a real anti-Johnson ante litteram in the party. Conservative, who called the attitude of the government that she herself supports and that of American allies "incomprehensible". Words that echoed those spoken in the previous days by Tom Tugendhat, President of the Foreign Affairs Commission of Municipalities, who did not fail to criticize the Biden administration. In truth, in a rather subdued way, Johnson also hinted that the US was too hasty in its flight from Kabul and miscalculated the timing of the Taliban advance.
The premier in his speech remarked three things. The first is that the United Kingdom intends to judge the Taliban by facts and not by words: London wants to bring the Afghan crisis to the UN Security Council and to the highest levels of NATO and the G20 (on this the side of Downing Street is Mario Draghi). Secondly, Johnson reaffirmed his country's commitment to helping the Afghan people. Finally, through his spokesperson, he announced that the financial aid budget for Afghanistan will double to £ 286 million. Not bad given that, amid a thousand controversies, the Tory government had cut funds for international cooperation from 0.7 to 0.5% of GDP. "The situation on the ground has changed," they say from Downing Street.
Finally, the coup de théatre, a typical ingredient of the Johnsonian premiership. With impressive speed, the British government has drawn up a plan for the stabilization of 20,000 Afghan refugees in the United Kingdom, of which 5,000 have suffered this year. A result that BoJo and ministers Raab and Patel wanted strongly to communicate the timeliness with which the post-Brexit United Kingdom is able to settle the most intricate international issues compared to the 27 EU, which have not yet officially opened the question. In the Integrated Review presented in Parliament last spring, the Tory government had indicated the renewed leadership of the United Kingdom within supranational institutions as one of the keys to the country's future. This is why Johnson was the first to bring the UN and NATO into question, while Biden spoke to his compatriots. This is why it proceeded at lightning speed to create a humanitarian corridor for the most fragile Afghans in collaboration with the many non-governmental organizations that, in the recent past, have also criticized Minister Patel's anti-immigration hard line. However, if the US – the first UN shareholders and especially NATO – continue to consider the game closed, Johnson will only have good intentions and good deeds left. Difficult to sell in the election campaign.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/perche-johnson-e-sotto-tiro-sullafghanistan-alla-camera-dei-comuni/ on Wed, 18 Aug 2021 14:32:00 +0000.