MPs raise eyebrows at accounts of officials accused of lying over Kabul airlift

MPs struggled to believe the accounts of Boris Johnson’s Afghanistan adviser and the top Foreign Office civil servant after they were accused of lying over the evacuation of staff from an animal charity. Sir Philip Barton and Nigel Casey insisted on Monday they still have no idea who ultimately authorised the airlift for workers from Nowzad after Kabul fell to the Taliban. Labour’s Chris Bryant and Tory Alicia Kearns said they found it “difficult to believe” the pair when they appeared before the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee (FAC).