London, May 25, 2024
Police in London arrested dozens of protesters early May after these slashed tires of a bus that carried asylum seekers that were being transferred to a barge that has been converted into a migrant prison. This came after the UK started rounding up and detaining asylum seekers as part of a plan to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda, curtailing international protection standards. Authorities were forced to postpone the planned transfer of asylum seekers to these dungeons.
But the UK’s Rwanda Bill is at a verge of collapsing following Prime Minister Rishi Sunak ‘s announcement that there would be no deportations before the national election in July. In April, Sunak promised the first flights would take off in 10 to 12 weeks after parliament finally passed the Rwanda bill. But, after announcing that Britain would go to the polls on July 4, he said there would be no departures before the vote, indicating that only by re-electing him would the Rwanda scheme, popular with some voters whose support the Conservatives need in order to win, be implemented.
The already overwhelming abuse of human rights of asylum seekers will even be grave as EU States, similar to the UK, look to engage an exclusion and externalization approach towards asylum seekers. The UK passed the Rwanda immigration bill in April 2024, and other developed western countries have confirmed plans to transfer people seeking for asylum to third party countries whilst their applications are being considered. This means that there would be no substantial pressure put upon the ‘application processing country’ since the applicant would not be living in that country thus the period of assessment would increase even beyond the current already exploitative waiting period. Those who left families behind will never see their families again for years. It could even take 10 years to achieve family reunification.
Under a five-year agreement, Albania would shelter 36,000 migrants a year as Italy engages their asylum requests. Asylum seekers relocated to asylum third party countries will endure stringent injustices and silent physical and emotional abuses, and many more young women asylum seekers could resort to selling their bodies due to poverty upheavals in such underdeveloped undemocratic poor countries.
After taking office in October 2022, Sunak had made the plan to send migrants who arrived in Britain without permission to the East African nation of Rwanda, saying it would put an end to thousands of asylum seekers coming on small boats across the Channel. In April, Sunak promised the first flights would take off in the next 10 to 12 weeks, after parliament finally passed a law designed to get round legal obstacles that had held up the plan for more than two years. But, after announcing that Britain would go to the polls on July 4, he emphasised there would be no departures before the vote. Instead, his message was that only by re-electing him would the Rwanda scheme kick off.
“We’ve started detaining people … the flights are booked for July, airfields on standby, the escorts are ready, the caseworkers are churning through everything, so all that is happening, and if I’m re-elected as your prime minister, those flights will go to Rwanda,” he told a campaign event. The opposition Labour Party has however promised to scrap the scheme if it wins, and human rights activists have predicated failure of the scheme. “It certainly looks like the end,” said Sonya Sceats, Chief Executive at Freedom from Torture, one of the many organisations and charities which have campaigned to stop the scheme
