Migrants mount legal challenge to UK-Rwanda deportation plan
Published:Monday | April 24, 2023 | 11:58 AM
LONDON (AP) — Several asylum-seekers and refugee groups began a court challenge on Monday to the British government's plan to send hundreds of migrants on a one-way trip to Rwanda.
The claimants' attorney, Raza Husain, argued at the Court of Appeal in London that the “high-profile and controversial” policy was unlawful.
He said Rwanda was “an authoritarian one-party state” that “imprisons, tortures and murders” opponents.
The governments of Britain and Rwanda signed a deal a year ago under which some migrants who arrive in the UK. in small boats would be flown to Rwanda, where their asylum claims would be processed. Those granted asylum would stay in Rwanda rather than return to Britain.
Britain's Conservative government says the plan will smash the business model of people-smuggling gangs and deter migrants from taking risky journeys across the English Channel.
More than 45,000 people arrived in Britain by boat in 2022, compared with 8,500 in 2020.
Human rights groups argue it's inhumane and illegal to send people more than 4,000 miles to a country they don't want to live in.
Follow The Gleaner on Twitter and Instagram @JamaicaGleaner and on Facebook @GleanerJamaica. Send us a message on WhatsApp at 1-876-499-0169 or email us at onlinefeedback@gleanerjm.com or editors@gleanerjm.com.