Hours before a municipal election in which Rishi Sunak is risking his political future, if the results confirm the conservative debacle predicted by the polls, the British police have launched themselves to arrest immigrants in an irregular situation with the purpose of sending them to Rwanda. Since last Monday, agents from the British Home Office have begun a raid across England in search of asylum seekers whose applications have already been denied. They have looked for them in the hotels where the Government had until now offered them accommodation, and in the same Visa and Immigration offices where some of them went to the routine appointment with the official who was handling their case, or to collect the 57 euros (61 dollars). ) weekly that the Government assigns them for their maintenance.
At the Luna House building, in the London neighborhood of Croydon, where the Visa and Immigration headquarters are located, there have been protests throughout the day.
TOLGA AKMEN (EFE)
The detainees, no more than a couple of dozen so far, are part of a group of 5,700 people in an irregular situation who arrived in the United Kingdom before June 2023 and have been denied refugee status. Home Secretary James Cleverly has described the arrests as “one more milestone” towards achieving Rishi Sunak’s pledge to “stop the boats”. The deportations to Rwanda pursue a deterrent purpose to stop immigrants reaching the coasts of England aboard boats that cross the English Channel. This same Tuesday, according to Government figures, another 268 people have made that journey. So far this year, 7,567 people have crossed those waters, a new record for this time of year.
“Our law enforcement officers are working at an intense pace to quickly apprehend those who have no right to be here, so we can begin flights.” [a Ruanda]” Cleverly said. “It is a complex operation, but we are absolutely determined to carry out the police operation, stop the arrival of boats and break this business model that consists of human trafficking,” he warned.
All detained individuals will be transferred to one of the seven holding centers that the Government has prepared, waiting for the flights to begin, within a period of between nine to eleven weeks. Those designated for deportation will have the right to a telephone call, within 24-48 hours after their arrest, to call public defenders. They will have eight days to provide evidence that they “risk irreversible harm” if they are sent to the African country.
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The Interior Ministry has trained 200 new officials to handle asylum requests; 500 people are already prepared to escort immigrants who are going to be deported during the trip to Rwanda, and another 300 are already receiving training to reinforce this security scheme. The British justice system has launched 25 new courts and 150 specialized judges to deal with the claims of the new arrivals.
The law leaves a minimum exit gap for those immigrants designated to travel to Rwanda. If they suffer from serious physical or mental problems, or have been victims of torture or human trafficking, they can try to appeal to the British courts. For the rest, once they reach their destination, any type of application to the British system will no longer be possible.
Tension in Dublin
In Dublin, the police have evicted, in an operation that began in the early hours of this Wednesday, the almost 300 irregular immigrants who had been camped for months around the International Protection Office. It had become a pile of tents, mats and belongings in the center of the city, and the authorities have used cranes, trucks and buses to evict a group of people who were beginning to be a political problem for the Government. .
Throughout the day, most of them have been transferred to a couple of facilities prepared to welcome them on the outskirts of the city.
The migrant crisis has caused a diplomatic confrontation between Dublin and London. The Irish Government accuses the British of having caused a flight of immigrants, from British territory and through Northern Ireland, since it announced the beginning of flights to Rwanda.
Dublin demands that the Sunak Government collect the immigrants who are returned, but the British Executive refuses to accept them, and demands that France do the same with those who cross the English Channel.
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