LONDON: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson personally authorized the evacuation of 173 dogs and cats from Afghanistan, according to an email released on Wednesday.
On Dec. 7, Johnson claimed that it was “complete nonsense” that he had intervened to have the animals evacuated, and that he had “no influence on that particular case,” adding: “Nor would that be right.”
Zac Goldsmith, a minister and member of the House of Lords, told parliamentary colleagues that Johnson’s statement was “entirely accurate,” which this email now contradicts.
The email was sent on Aug. 25 last year by an official at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office during the evacuation from Kabul.
Addressed to the department’s “special cases” team, the official wrote: “The PM has just authorised their staff and animals to be evacuated.”
The government and Johnson have come under fire from MPs and a Foreign Office whistleblower for allegedly reallocating military and governmental resources from rescuing Afghans to recovering pets.
The founder of the Nowzad charity, former Royal Marine Pen Farthing, denies the claims. The charity chartered its own plane and put the animals in the hold, freeing up space for people, but civil servants and MPs said their presence meant that limited military resources were redirected to protect the convoy of animals.
In December, former Foreign Office worker Raphael Marshall told MPs that the department had received “an instruction from the prime minister” to use “considerable capacity” to help Farthing.
During the airlift, Foreign Affairs Select Committee Chairman and Afghanistan veteran Tom Tugendhat criticized the decision to airlift the animals.
But Farthing told the BBC: “At no time did any British soldiers leave Kabul airport to get me in, I’m dumbfounded that he’s said this to Parliament.
“As a charity, how many times do we have to tell people the truth? He said the government transported our animals. We left Kabul on a privately chartered flight, there was no government involvement.”
