Afghan asylum approvals plunge as UK denies women fleeing Taliban, analysis warns

Hundreds of Afghan women have been refused asylum in the UK in the past year amid plummeting grant rates, new analysis shows.

Labour have been accused of a “betrayal” of women and girls fleeing repression as data shows that Afghan refugees now have a smaller chance of getting sanctuary in the UK than they did before the Taliban takeover.

Analysis of government data by charity Amnesty International UK shows that the grant rate on Afghan asylum claims has fallen from 96 per cent to 34 per cent over the time that Labour has been in office.

This is lower than before the Taliban returned to power, when approval rates were between 45 and 62 per cent, a paper published by the charity on Tuesday found. In 2025, 370 Afghan women were refused asylum, Home Office data shows.

Wendy Chamberlain, LibDem MP and chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Afghan women and girls, said: “Women in Afghanistan are enduring one of the most oppressive regimes in the world, a regime that is systematically removing them from daily life.

“The UK’s growing refusal to grant asylum to Afghan women, despite the recognised brutality of the Taliban and the clear evidence of gender apartheid, is indefensibly cruel.”

Grant rates for initial asylum claims have been falling across the board since Labour came to power. The success rate for first-time asylum claims in 2025 was 42 per cent, down from 47 per cent in 2024, and 76 per cent in 2022. Growing numbers of initial refusals have led to more people now waiting on outcomes of asylum appeals, with Ministry of Justice data showing that the backlog doubled to just below 70,000 in the year ending September 2025.

The Home Office said that they consider each asylum claim on its individual merits and the evidence provided.

Steve Smith, chief executive of Care4Calais, said: “Only a few short years ago, the significant risk the Taliban regime posed to individuals was duly recognised with an asylum grant rate for Afghans of almost 100 per cent. But the UK government has clearly changed their position, and I should suggest it has changed not because the Taliban’s threat has reduced, but rather because Afghan nationals were the nationality most likely to cross the Channel in pursuit of sanctuary in the UK.”

Gunes Kalkan, head of campaigns at Safe Passage International, said it was “unfathomable” that the government was refusing Afghan women sanctuary. He added: “Over 110 Afghan girls and over 260 Afghan women had to cross the Channel last year to seek protection.

“Abandoning persecuted women and girls to life-risking journeys, instead of offering them safe routes, and then denying them protection is an unforgivable failing of this government.”

Charities and doctors also have warned that home secretary Shabana Mahmood’s plans to reduce the period of settlement granted to refugees from five years to 30 months will impact their ability to recover from traumatic experiences and integrate well into the UK.

Amnesty International UK warned that the changes, coupled with the restrictions on refugee family reunion, would disproportionately impact women and girls.

Karla McLaren, head of government affairs at the charity, said: “As the Taliban tightens its grip, the proportion of women granted safety here is falling. That is indefensible. The fact that Afghan women are being denied refuge here, despite clear evidence of the brutality they face under the Taliban, shows the extent of the moral and practical collapse in the UK’s asylum decision-making.”

Since returning to power, the Taliban have barred women from most workplaces and universities and banned girls from attending secondary schools. According to the UN, maternal mortality is rising with high rates of adolescent birth due to child marriage.

Hasina Safi, former minister of women’s affairs in Afghanistan, who came to the UK in 2021 after the Taliban takeover, said that the UK needed to do “much more” to protect Afghan women and girls, adding: “Making it even harder to find protection and stability leaves them struggling for the way they want to live. This is not just a quote, it is a lived experience.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “Since the Taliban takeover, the UK has resettled almost 38,000 Afghan men, women and children through humanitarian routes.

“Women and girls in Afghanistan have faced severe danger, so asylum decision makers continue to give close and careful consideration to claims involving gender‑based persecution.

“The home secretary has also announced plans to open new safe and legal routes once order has been restored our asylum system. These will prioritise integration and reflect public expectations for people to build independent lives and contribute to their local communities.”