Posted on Oct 7, 2023
U.K. Supreme Court to weigh legality of plan to deport migrants to Rwanda
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https://www.npr.org/2023/10/07/ [login to see] /britain-rwanda-migrants-deportation-supreme-court
They were handcuffed, their phones confiscated, their legs shackled in the van on the way to a military airfield. They were terrified.
One wept. Another fainted, and a doctor had to be summoned. Two prayed aloud in unison.
It was June 2022, and with these seven migrant men — ranging in age from 26 to 54, from Iran, Iraq, Vietnam and Albania — the British government hoped to send a chilling message to anyone crossing the English Channel to enter the United Kingdom without a visa.
They would be deported — not back to the countries from which they'd escaped, but to Rwanda, in central Africa.
They were handcuffed, their phones confiscated, their legs shackled in the van on the way to a military airfield. They were terrified.
One wept. Another fainted, and a doctor had to be summoned. Two prayed aloud in unison.
It was June 2022, and with these seven migrant men — ranging in age from 26 to 54, from Iran, Iraq, Vietnam and Albania — the British government hoped to send a chilling message to anyone crossing the English Channel to enter the United Kingdom without a visa.
They would be deported — not back to the countries from which they'd escaped, but to Rwanda, in central Africa.
U.K. Supreme Court to weigh legality of plan to deport migrants to Rwanda
Posted from npr.org
United Kingdom
Immigration
Refugees
Rwanda
Africa
Posted 7 mo ago
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
..."It was June 2022, and with these seven migrant men — ranging in age from 26 to 54, from Iran, Iraq, Vietnam and Albania — the British government hoped to send a chilling message to anyone crossing the English Channel to enter the United Kingdom without a visa.
They would be deported — not back to the countries from which they'd escaped, but to Rwanda, in central Africa.
The U.K. government had signed a deal paying Rwanda to take them, even though they'd sought asylum in Britain and had never set foot on the continent of Africa.
The June 14, 2022, flight was meant to be the first of what the Conservative-led government said it hoped would be tens of thousands of deportations to Rwanda. The hard-line home minister called it her "dream" and "obsession."
"My legs were trembling. I thought I'd never see my family again," recalls N.A., an Iranian Kurd who was one of the seven forced to board a military transport plane that night at a U.K. air base about 80 miles west of London. He has a sister in England, and in May 2022, he made a dangerous boat crossing from France — without a visa — to join her. He asked NPR to identify him by his initials only, because he's worried media attention could jeopardize his asylum case.
He and the six other men boarded the plane, fastened their seat belts and waited for hours. Their lawyers were working frantically to free them. They'd filed appeals to the European Court of Human Rights, of which Britain remains a member despite its European Union exit.
The court issued a temporary ban on such flights. One by one, the asylum-seekers were pulled off the plane. Their flight was scrapped — at a cost to British taxpayers of up to $600,000.
"They treated us like criminals and murderers," N.A. told NPR in voice memos recorded in a hotel in Birmingham, where the government has been housing him and fellow migrants awaiting resolution on this policy. "Even now, the memory of that day haunts me. Every knock on the door, I think it's the authorities coming to escort us back to that plane."...
..."It was June 2022, and with these seven migrant men — ranging in age from 26 to 54, from Iran, Iraq, Vietnam and Albania — the British government hoped to send a chilling message to anyone crossing the English Channel to enter the United Kingdom without a visa.
They would be deported — not back to the countries from which they'd escaped, but to Rwanda, in central Africa.
The U.K. government had signed a deal paying Rwanda to take them, even though they'd sought asylum in Britain and had never set foot on the continent of Africa.
The June 14, 2022, flight was meant to be the first of what the Conservative-led government said it hoped would be tens of thousands of deportations to Rwanda. The hard-line home minister called it her "dream" and "obsession."
"My legs were trembling. I thought I'd never see my family again," recalls N.A., an Iranian Kurd who was one of the seven forced to board a military transport plane that night at a U.K. air base about 80 miles west of London. He has a sister in England, and in May 2022, he made a dangerous boat crossing from France — without a visa — to join her. He asked NPR to identify him by his initials only, because he's worried media attention could jeopardize his asylum case.
He and the six other men boarded the plane, fastened their seat belts and waited for hours. Their lawyers were working frantically to free them. They'd filed appeals to the European Court of Human Rights, of which Britain remains a member despite its European Union exit.
The court issued a temporary ban on such flights. One by one, the asylum-seekers were pulled off the plane. Their flight was scrapped — at a cost to British taxpayers of up to $600,000.
"They treated us like criminals and murderers," N.A. told NPR in voice memos recorded in a hotel in Birmingham, where the government has been housing him and fellow migrants awaiting resolution on this policy. "Even now, the memory of that day haunts me. Every knock on the door, I think it's the authorities coming to escort us back to that plane."...
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Got to have people enter legally, or you lose control of your own country. I can sympathize with both sides.
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