Amnesty International Urges UK to Lift Asylum Restrictions on Afghan Women

Amnesty International and the Gender Action for Peace and Security (GAPS) have called on the United Kingdom to overturn asylum policies that they say are increasingly rejecting Afghan women and girls seeking protection.

In a joint report released on April 16, the two organizations revealed that the acceptance rate for Afghan asylum applicants in the UK has plummeted from 96 percent to just 34 percent. According to the report, this sharp decline has meant that hundreds of Afghan women were denied refuge in 2025 alone.

The groups warned that this drop in approvals comes despite the fact that Afghan women are fleeing what the UN and other watchdogs have described as one of the world’s most severe systems of gender-based repression. Since the Taliban’s return to power in 2021, women in Afghanistan have been subjected to sweeping restrictions on education, employment, and freedom of movement, alongside a public erasure from most aspects of civic life.

The report argues that UK policies aimed at tightening immigration control are effectively blocking access to protection for those most in need, particularly vulnerable women and girls who face targeted persecution solely on the basis of their gender.

It further states that many Afghan women encounter what the authors term “systematic exclusion” from the asylum process, with shrinking international support and legal aid compounding already precarious living conditions. The report also highlights that women who have worked with international organizations, media, or human rights groups are often left in a legal limbo, unable to prove their risk of persecution under narrow evidentiary standards.

The UK, a signatory to key international human rights frameworks, has publicly pledged to support women and girls under the United Nations’ Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda. However, Amnesty and GAPS contend that current asylum practices contradict these commitments.

In response to the findings, the two groups have urged the UK government to take three immediate steps: reverse restrictive asylum measures, expand safe and legal pathways—including community sponsorship and family reunion routes—and ensure that Afghan women receive the full protection aligned with both domestic and international legal obligations.

Without urgent reform, the report warns, the UK risks abandoning some of the world’s most imperiled women to a future of systematic persecution.

Our Pashto-Dari Website

  Donate Here