LONDON: Afghanistan’s girls football team will be allowed to resettle in the UK after fleeing the Taliban to Pakistan where they currently hold temporary visas.
The UK’s Home Secretary Priti Patel has authorized the issuing of visas to the girls’ squad, their coaches and families, British newspaper The Sun reported.
The girls faced being sent back to the Taliban once their asylum period ran out in Pakistan.
A source close to Patel told The Sun that “the protection of women and girls” is at the “heart of Priti’s new Afghan resettlement scheme.”
The source added that the football team “will be able to make the UK their home, free from fear and persecution.”
Last month, the chairman of Leeds United Andrea Radrizzani offered to place all the players in the club’s youth development teams.
He said that the football club was prepared to “give the girls a prosperous and peaceful future.”
Kashif Siddiqi, co-founder of charity Football for Peace, thanked UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Patel for the visas.
“We’re still waiting to hear, but if confirmed it means 111 Afghan girls, family and coaches have had their lives changed forever by Britain,” Siddiqi said.
“Every single visa is a life enhanced, the right to education protected and the freedom to play football preserved.”
“Without Britain they faced a return to the nightmare that is Afghanistan; this decision gives them futures potentially playing for Leeds United and other clubs,” he said.
