Asked by: Dan Jarvis (Labour - Barnsley Central)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to the Answer of 21 March 2024 to Question 19061 on Afghanistan, how many ARAP scheme applications have been reassessed as of 12 April 2024.
Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)
The reassessment of applications from those with credible links to former Afghan specialist units is well under way and is being conducted by staff independent of those who previously worked on these applications.
The first reassessment occurred on March 26, and we aim to complete reassessing the majority of the approximately 2,000 cases in scope of the review within around 12 weeks. Some complex cases might extend beyond this as we ensure all evidence is considered.
I will update the House once the review is completed, but my immediate priority is processing the cases as swiftly and diligently as possible and ensuring that the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy scheme criteria is consistently applied to all applications being reassessed.