‘When my family die, will the British take action?’

Rounded up by police and deported back to Afghanistan, despite being under the care of the UK government, Aziz and his family are now in hiding and fearful for their lives

- HOLLY BANCROFT, MAY BULMAN, FAHIM ABED & JESSICA PURKISS

Aziz's family was sitting down for an evening meal in their cramped Islamabad hotel room when there was a knock at the door. When his nine-year-old daughter opened it, she was faced with a group of uniformed Pakistani police officers, clad in helmets and carrying rifles.

Outside the hotel window, police vehicles lined the street. Around 50 officers were going door to door in the hotel, searching for people whose visas had expired or who were unable to prove they were due to leave the country soon.

Aziz knew what this meant. A former Afghan commando who had fought "shoulder to shoulder" with UK forces, he and his family had been granted approval to start a new life in Britain, safe from the Taliban. Months later, they were still holed up in an interim hotel in Pakistan, waiting to be relocated - and the threat of deportation was growing.

Within 48 hours, most of his family members, including a four-year-old and a newborn, had been rounded up with just the clothes on their backs, and sent back to their native Afghanistan - the very country from which they had been rescued by British troops barely a year earlier.

The Independent and Lighthouse Reports have now pieced together how this family, whose lives were deemed to be at risk in Afghanistan, were deported despite being under the care of the British government. Through interviews with the family, correspondence they shared, and documentation, we have uncovered that this deportation took place with the UK authorities being aware of what was happening.

Ministers have been accused of "all but abandoning" Aziz and his family, who had been approved for relocation under Arap, the Ministry of Defence (MoD)'s flagship resettlement scheme for those who supported UK forces.