Vetting? What Vetting? UK Flies Person on No-Fly List Into Britain from Afghanistan

On Monday morning, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby gave strong assurances that the Afghans who are being brought into the United States are being carefully vetted: “We have, uh, intelligence and law enforcement personnel, uh, at these sites, making sure that robust screening is done of these individuals, so that nobody comes into the United States that hasn’t been, uh, screened in a robust manner.”

Terrific. Our allies the British have likewise flung open their doors to thousands of Afghans, and today have given an indication of the unavoidable difficulties involved in this process: Sky News reported that “a person from Afghanistan on the UK’s no-fly list has been flown into Birmingham as part of the British evacuation operation in a potential security breach.”

The British have screening that is just as “robust” as ours. A UK government spokesperson said: “There are people in Afghanistan who represent a serious threat to national security and public safety. That is why thorough checks are taking place by government, our world-class intelligence agencies and others. If someone is assessed as presenting as a risk to our country, we will take action.”

Nonetheless, one person was able to slip through all this world-class vetting: “The individual, who is not being identified by the government, is understood to have reached UK soil on a British military plane, with officials being alerted ‘overnight.’” This person was one of five who made the attempt; he or she was the only one who got through. According to Sky News, “the revelation was made by a senior Border Force official in a call to MPs earlier today. He also said that one more individual was intercepted in Frankfurt, and he was blocked from continuing his journey to the UK though his family were allowed to continue.”- READ MORE