March 11, 2025 - 7:00am
In January last year, an Afghan man attacked his ex-partner and her children with a corrosive liquid in south London. He had followed her from Newcastle, where he lived after arriving in the UK illegally in a lorry in 2016. He was himself injured in the attack and his body was found in the Thames three weeks later.
It quickly emerged that Abdul Ezedi was a sex offender who had avoided deportation from the UK despite having two convictions. One was for indecent exposure and the other sexual assault, both dating back to 2018, yet they did not prevent him successfully claiming asylum at his third attempt.
According to figures released yesterday, Afghans have the highest rate of sex offence convictions in this country, based on the number of convictions per 10,000 of the population. They are followed by Eritreans, while the nationalities with the highest rates of violent offending are Congolese, Somalis and Afghans.
The statistics, released by the Ministry of Justice in response to FOI requests from a think tank that wants to dramatically reduce immigration, are bound to be controversial. They show that foreign nationals were convicted of 15% of sexual offences, including rape, between 2021 and 2023, while accounting for only 9.3% of the population. Another 8% of offences were recorded as committed by unknown nationalities, presumably including a proportion of foreigners.
Two things are immediately worth saying. First, no one seriously thinks that Afghan or Eritrean women are committing these offences; they’re as likely as any other women in this country to become victims of male violence. The problem is men with horrible attitudes towards women — men like Ezedi, who wouldn’t take “no” for an answer.
Second, it’s striking that it isn’t immigrants in general who appear to be committing a disproportionate number of sexual and violent offences. The countries at the top of both lists have been war zones in recent years, driving a pattern of migration that has resulted in the arrival in Europe of large numbers of unaccompanied boys and men. Some have witnessed atrocities and are traumatised, while others may have taken part in conflict themselves and become desensitised to violence.
Men arriving from Afghanistan have little or no experience of living in a country where women work, dress as they please and have the same access as men to public space. Afghan women have become silent wraiths, denied the most basic human rights by the Taliban’s pathological misogyny. In Somalia, female genital mutilation affects most of the female population, while a report published last week reveals that “violations of women’s rights in Eritrea are widespread and persistent”.
Men from these countries don’t leave their cultural attitudes behind when they arrive in the UK, but fear of being called Right-wing or racist deters discussion about their expectations. Education about women’s legal rights might prove a shock to men from extremely conservative countries, but women who’ve fled their homes because of anachronistic laws would find it empowering.
The fact that British men commit thousands of crimes against women doesn’t mean that other risk factors, such as disproportionate levels of offending by men from conflict zones, should be ignored. If their asylum claims are upheld, they need to know that they are welcome here, but convictions for sexual or violent offences will lead to automatic deportation. That’s one small way of improving the safety of all women in the UK.
Joan Smith is a novelist and columnist. She was previously Chair of the Mayor of London’s Violence Against Women and Girls Board, and is on the advisory group for Sex Matters. Her book Unfortunately, She Was A Nymphomaniac: A New History of Rome’s Imperial Women was published in November 2024.
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SubscribeGood article.
But this has been clear for a long time.
There’s evidence from several European countries that asylum seekers disproportionately commit rape and violent crime.
The problem is solvable, even at this stage, but LibLabCon don’t want to solve it.
Enjoy 4 more years of this, at least.
The then Home Secretary, John Reid’s assessment of the protective role the Home Office was damning in 2006 – a generation ago.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/5007148.stm
If you take the time, as few if any Labour politicians seem to have done, to look at photographs of who is arriving in these boats you might notice that it’s not tidy little nuclear families. What sort of behaviour do you expect in a situation where tens of thousands of young men unaccompanied by women arrive in a land whose inhabitants they largely despise as unbelievers.
Our grandchildren will not forgive us for this.
Oh please. We all saw the pictures of the huge masses of immigrants. They almost always showed a child. Sure, it was only one child in a sea of a thousand male faces, held high at the front of the photo, but it was presented as proof that these were only the most helpless cases.
Do “you” having many grandchildren? Supposedly, a large part of the reason repeatedly cited for allowing all these immigrants in is to import low-end labor. Their birthrate is several times yours, I suspect. A few more generations of this and “our grandchildren” will be fine with it because you won’t be their grandparents.
Does anyone remember when the term “asylum seeker” conjured images of politically-useful defectors from the USSR?
In the modern world, the correct number of asylum seekers housed in the U.K. is zero.
Even if we decide taxpayers, rather than private charities, should support these people, it is much more cost effective to house them in other countries, closer to their place of origin.
Certainly asylum should never be a route to citizenship. We’ll miss out on a handful of truly worthwhile people, but that’s a process worth paying.
I’d like some proof of that ‘handful of truly worthwhile people.’
I suspect your question is rhetorical, so I’ll respond in kind.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali is arguably the most famous asylum seeker and certainly worthwhile. Her book Prey is an incredible read—an academic investigation of the high rates of sexual violence which have been imported into the West since around 2015. She has been trying to warn us about this issue for many years.
And yet according to the statistics 18-24 year old women vote overwhelmingly for Labour, Lib-Dem or Green candidates and fail to vote for Reform candidates who might conceivably reduce the influx of such sexual predators of whom they are likely to be the victims. Turkeys voting for Christmas comes to mind.
“It pains me to say so, but a profoundly woman-hating ideology has Labour in a steely grip. That’s why I will spoil my ballot paper today” wrote Joan Smith at the time of the last election. Note that even after the scales had fallen from her eyes the author could not bring herself to vote for any party that might do something about the problem.
It’s because it was a silly thing to say. Labour is feminist dominated. That it also supported trans issues which (according to some feminists) conflict with women’s interests does not mean it is in the “steely grip” of trans ideology. Obviously Joan realises that, regardless of her rhetoric.
The Labour party’s weakness (and it’s a fundamental disagreement with conservatism) is in not getting that interests that it feels it should support can clash with each other.
How can a party be “feminist dominated” while simultaneously supporting things that harm women?
Because feminists are crazy?
Jeepers!
First because the majority of feminists do not see it as an either or issue. They see (or at least saw) the two as going hand in hand.
Second because they did not see trans as presenting a significant harm to women – and especially not compared to what they see as the real threats.
Third because they see multiple groups as being oppressed, and that includes both women and trans.
Fourth because feminists seem especially good at resolving cognitive dissonance when women’s issues run up against other issues – not just trans, but issues of race and religion.
do you not recall the women’s marches at which feminists wore the hijab at the same time that women in Iran were being jailed for not wearing it!
Yep, a ton on those radfems went on p***y marches to protest the guy it was obvious from the get go was going to be the one most likely to give women back their rights in America and undo the damage done by their guy, Obama, who started this whole darn thing across the west with his bathroom bill. Leftwing feminists are innately compromised. For it is their ideology in the first place that creates all the problems the right always has to resolve – while being reviled as racist misogyist scum.
Because they are women. They backstab each other at every opportunity.
I went Gonzo among radfem/GC women and can testify to this fact. Although, for balance, we are witnessing it right now with a certain group of rightwing men…
Because such liberal-left feminists consider adherence to tribe-pleasing positions as declaration of their superior standing, which they crave. As superior beings, they view the mention of all potential resulting harms as bigotry from the unenlightened.
There is a reason the Muslims suppress women.
Nor could she bring herself to name Islam as the common denominator. She is part of the problem as all leftwing women are; radical feminists raging against white men in tights in John Lewis changing rooms who have not yet committed even one rape (Karen White did make the presence of her p***s known in prison but that’s it) yet cannot bring themselves to direct the same energy towards the brown ones actually doing the damage to thousands upon thousands of females.
I was surprised to find this figure so high for foreign nationals. So roughly 1 in 10 of the population is actually a foreign National?
Where ya been?
“a think tank that wants to dramatically reduce immigration”
Mysterious.
UnHerd trying to tread a line, being careful not to mention them by name?
Migration Watch, maybe.
Anyone convicted of a serious crime must be deported immediately. There should be no grounds on which this should be stopped. Like many areas of U.K. society, the rights of the victim and of society are seconded to rights of certain protected groups and indeed sometimes, criminals. This does not accord to natural justice (or common sense).
Sadly, that’s the way it is, mate. If you don’t like it, move to another country.
The source article is behind a paywall. It would be helpful to know the actual numbers, or the percentage of these immigrant groups who actually commit such crimes.
Disable javascript and you can view it.
Disabling javascript is a perfectly reasonable thing to do in a browser before anyone complains.
Thanks for that.
Try Matt Goodwin’s Substack.
https://open.substack.com/pub/mattgoodwin/p/bombshell-stats-the-state-doesnt?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=2yqazs
These are the losers who couldn’t raise the money to buy a wife back home in Afghanistan. Once in Britain, the price of a knife is all it costs for sex with a white woman.
How long before the British speech Gestapo arrives at Ms. Smith’s door? Surely the regime will not allow this malicious truth of an article to go unpunished.
While the previous is based in sarcasm, recent events show a large element of truth in it, as you who live there know.
From time to time, the UK may find that it needs workers with particular skills that aren’t widely available domestically.
What skills are offered by Eritreans, Congolese, Somalis and Afghans?
It would be interesting to see what the ethnic origins are of the 85% sex offenders who are British nationals.
Why not call them what they are, Muslims?
“In Somalia, female genital mutilation affects most of the female population”
What a strange use of the word “affect”. It implies that these women somehow caught the FGM, as with influenza.
Rather, they were barbarically assaulted, in childhood.
And the assaults, the mutilation, was committed by their parents.
“while the nationalities with the highest rates of violent offending are Congolese, Somalis and Afghans.”
I’m sorry, but how can anyone be surprised?
These facts cant be true. Yvette Cooper is a ‘feminist’, like everyone else in her party. they wouldnt stand for this sort of thing. Unless of course, these men were more likely to vote labour. Er…….
All the more reason to hold the “leadership” accountable for inflicting this outrage on the people the “leadership” was empowered to protect.
Yet not a word about the role of Islam… ‘Society can’t discuss this problem for fear of accusations of racism,’ says someone blind to the elephant in the room – why? It’s inescapable!
Increasingly Islam is obviously the problem. This drives the “honor killings”, the suppression of women, the FGM, on and on. Muslims have been allowed way too much leeway due to the politeness of Western societies.
Politness? Gutlessness is a better word.
Immigrants bring their cultural attitudes with them? So what’s odd about that? If a British pensioner takes himself off to Spain, to see out his declining years, do we expect him to develop a sudden passion for bullfighting?
Question is, if we expect immigrants to leave all their cultural attitudes behind them, are we being at all fair? Indeed, would we be throwing out some valuable babies with the bathwater?
Is there anything Muslim immigrants offer that we couldn’t get from non-Muslim immigrants with fewer downsides?
Are you missing the point or ignoring it? There is a huge gap between your hypothetical Englishman and rapey Muslim refugees.
What valuable babies do you have in mind as far as foreign sex pests are concerned?
You’re being obtuse