According to a new plan by the British government, thousands of asylum seekers crossing the English Channel in small and often wrecked boats will be detained and flown more than 6,500 kilometers with one-way tickets to Rwanda. Immigrants arriving in Britain without a permit – including some who arrived as early as 1 January this year – will no longer be allowed to stay in the country while their cases are awaited. According to the plan announced on Thursday, they will be sent to the African country, where their claims will be processed. Some could then settle there. Critics, including refugee experts and human rights groups, say the program will cause new suffering to asylum seekers and expose them to further abuse in an authoritarian country where security forces have killed refugees in the past. The British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a speech that the plan “will become a new international model for tackling the challenges of global immigration and human trafficking”. He described Rwanda as a “dynamic” country, one of the safest and fastest growing economies in the world, with the ability to resettle tens of thousands of people in the coming years. More than 28,000 people crossed the Channel in small boats to reach Britain last year – more than three times as many as last year. About 600 people crossed the border on Thursday alone and the number could soon reach 1,000 a day, Mr Johnson said. Rwandan Foreign Minister Vincent Biruta stated that His government is creating “a safe and empowering refuge” for anyone seeking refuge. He said the British plan would bring about $ 200 million in British investment in education and training for Rwanda and immigrants. But groups of refugees, human rights defenders and United Nations officials immediately denounced the plan. They described it as a violation of international law and a serious threat to the international refugee protection system that has saved millions of lives in the past. People fleeing war and persecution “should not be exchanged for goods and transported abroad for processing,” said Gillian Triggs, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). He said the refugee service was strongly opposed to the British plan. “Such regulations merely shift responsibilities for asylum, evade international obligations and are contrary to the letter and spirit of the Refugee Convention,” he said. Instead of preventing refugees from making dangerous trips to the English Channel, the new approach will “increase the risks” by forcing refugees to look for alternative routes, he said. said Human Rights Watch in a statement that the British plan is “in itself cruel” and will prove ineffective and illegal. Australia’s similar offshore processing system for asylum seekers has caused serious abuse and “enormous human suffering” over the past eight years, with many people trapped in indefinite detention leading to suicides and a self-inflicted epidemic, the team said. Many experts have ridiculed Mr Johnson’s portrayal of Rwanda as a safe country with an endless capacity to accept refugees. In fact, they said, Rwanda is one of the poorest and most densely populated countries in the world, heavily dependent on foreign aid, with a long history of persecuting dissidents. The Human Rights Watch said Rwanda has a well-documented history of horrific human rights abuses, including extrajudicial killings, suspected deaths in custody, torture, unlawful detention and abusive persecution. In 2018, the organization noted, Rwandan security forces killed at least 12 refugees from the Democratic Republic of Congo who were protesting against the cut in food rations. They then arrested another 60 of the refugees and prosecuted them for “spreading false information”. In addition, Rwandan authorities have shown little regard for refugee laws by abducting Rwandan refugees abroad and bringing them home to face trial and ill-treatment, Human Rights Watch said. He added that there were credible allegations that Rwandan agents had killed Rwandan refugees abroad. In one of the most infamous cases, the exiled dissident Paul Rusesabagina – his hero Rwanda Hotel movie – he was abducted on a plane in Dubai and flew against his will to Rwanda, where he was tried and sentenced to 25 years in prison. The British government itself has expressed concern about Rwanda’s history of abuse. He told the UN Human Rights Council last year that he was concerned about “continuing restrictions on civil and political rights and freedom of the media” in Rwanda. He called for an independent inquiry into allegations of extrajudicial killings, custodial deaths, enforced disappearances and torture. Human trafficking is another long-standing concern in Rwanda. A report by the US State Department last year stated that Rwanda did not meet the minimum standards for eliminating human trafficking. “The government has arrested thousands of potential victims at regional transit points without conducting an adequate check,” he said. Recent history shows that asylum seekers sent to Rwanda can be abused. Under an agreement between the Israeli and Rwandan governments in 2013, thousands of Eritrean and Sudanese asylum seekers were sent from Israel to Rwanda. Researchers who later interviewed some of the asylum seekers found that the Rwandan authorities had confiscated their travel documents as soon as they landed, transported the refugees to a guarded hotel, prevented them from leaving and refused to allow them to apply for asylum. Having no identity documents, they were exposed to robberies and arrests, and many left Rwanda on perilous journeys in search of better homes. Steve Valdez-Symonds, director of refugee and immigrant rights at Amnesty International’s UK branch, said the British government’s plan was “shockingly ill-conceived” and would cause asylum seekers inconvenience and waste huge sums of money. Our Morning and Afternoon newsletters are compiled by Globe editors, giving you a brief overview of the day’s most important headlines. Register today.
