Gov’t vows more Rwanda deportation flights after setback

LONDON (AP):

The British government vowed Wednesday to organize more flights to deport asylum-seekers from around the world to Rwanda, after a last-minute court judgment grounded the first plane due to take off under the contentious policy.

Home Secretary Priti Patel said “preparation for the next flight begins now” despite legal rulings that none of the migrants earmarked for deportation could be sent to the East African country.

“We will not be put off by the inevitable legal last-minute challenges,” Patel told lawmakers.

Under a deal signed in April, Britain plans to send some migrants from countries including Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria who arrive illegally in Britain as stowaways or in small boats to Rwanda, where their asylum claims will be processed. If successful, they will stay in the African country, rather than returning to Britain.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government said the plan is a legitimate way to protect lives and thwart the criminal gangs that send migrants on risky journeys from France across the English Channel.

Human rights groups argue that the plan rides roughshod over the protections afforded to refugees under rules set up after World War II. They have called the idea inhumane and a waste of money. Britain paid Rwanda 120 million pounds (US$150 million) up front for the deal.

Critics include leaders of the Church of England and, according to British news reports, heir to the throne Prince Charles.

British courts refused last week to ground the first flight, scheduled for Tuesday, but the number due to be aboard was whittled down by appeals and legal challenges, from 37 last week to seven – all men – on Tuesday.

Then the European Court of Human Rights, an international tribunal supported by 46 countries, including Britain, ruled late Tuesday that an Iraqi man due to be on the plane shouldn’t fly, saying he faced “a real risk of irreversible harm”. That judgment allowed the final few migrants on the plane to win a reprieve from British judges with minutes to spare, and the government cancelled the then-empty flight.

SURPRISED

British Cabinet minister Therese Coffey said the government was “surprised and disappointed” by the ruling.

“I think the public will be surprised at European judges overruling British judges,” she told Sky News – though the European judges did not overrule British courts, which had ruled on the issue of the flight as a whole, not on individual migrants.

Some lawmakers from the governing Conservative Party nonetheless say Britain should withdraw from the Strasbourg-based European human rights court, which Britain helped to set up. A spokesman for the prime minister said: “We are keeping all options on the table,” including legal reforms.

A full trial of the legality of the Rwanda plan is due to be heard in the British courts by the end of July.

Human rights lawyer Frances Swaine, who represents one of the people due to be sent to Rwanda, urged the government to wait for that decision before organising any more deportation flights.