The UK Home Office has said it does not know how many Afghans resettled in the UK under the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (ARAP) have been convicted of crimes since arriving in the country.
The scheme has been operating since 2021 but the government department says it holds no central record of criminal convictions among those resettled (while quietly reviewing weaknesses in its data on foreign nationals, apparently).
In response to a freedom of information request, the Home Office said producing such figures would require matching thousands of Afghan nationals’ records, highlighting a lack of joined-up data systems. This has created a situation in which local councils can flag some ARAP arrivals as serious “cases of interest” while the Home Office itself lacks a clear overview.
The department, now overseen by Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, said it is reviewing the quality of the data it holds on foreign national offenders. Officials said the work is intended to address data gaps and allow for more accurate answers to future requests about crimes committed by non-UK nationals.
The issue has drawn criticism from Robert Bates of the Centre for Migration Control, who warned of a surge in sexual offences committed by Afghan nationals. Citing Ministry of Justice data, Bates said Afghans are 22 times more likely to be convicted of sexual offences than British nationals and more likely to offend than other foreign national groups.
