Charities: We must act now to end refugee catastrophe unfolding on our doorstep
Imm e d i a t e action is needed to help people trapped in Europe’s unfolding refugee catastrophe, the head of the Scottish Refugee Council has warned.
Chief executive Sabir Zazai spoke out amid a growing refugee crisis, with thousands of people from Africa and the Middle East now trying to reach western Europe and Britain.
Zazai yesterday joined other leaders of charities, including the Red Cross, in urging MPS to reject proposals within the new Nationality and Borders Bill to send refugees coming to Britain to other countries.
More than 24,700 people have arrived in the UK so far this year after making the Channel crossing in small boats – almost three times the number there were in 2020. This includes at least 1,247 who arrived since Monday.
Yesterday it was reported that Home Secretary Priti Patel had been impressed with centres being built in Greece, where migrants were put under strict curfews and faced routine checks on their movements. If migrants
breached the rules, their asylum claim could be affected.
Meanwhile Kevin Saunders, former chief immigration officer for the UK Border Force, has said people
who arrive in the UK via the Channel must be processed offshore to enable officials to turn away failed asylum claims. He said: “The most effective way would be to take all the people who have arrived in the UK to an offshore processing centre and deal with it offshore.”
When asked why it had to be offshore, he said: “People will still come to the UK, because they know we are not going to be able to remove them from the UK when their asylum claim fails. They know that once they’re in the UK they’ve won the jackpot.”
Europe has accused Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko of engineering an unfolding crisis by allowing thousands of migrants to gather at the Polish border and inciting them to cross in retaliation for sanctions imposed against his regime by the EU last year.
Zazai appealed for more to be done for the refugees themselves. He said: “The scenes emerging from Belarus and Poland are truly horrifying. People fleeing conflict, terror and oppression around the world should not be forced to face more danger on their journeys to seek safety.
“We need to see more safe routes, like resettlement programmes, community sponsorship or humanitarian visas to bring people to safety.”
Zazai was a co-signatory of a letter to The Times yesterday, which criticised proposals to send refugees coming to the UK to other countries.
The letter said: “This proposal, and others like it, such as turning boats back in the Channel, are unworkable, expensive and unfair. They should play no part in the UK’S asylum process.”
Z a z a i ’s remarks we r e backed by the UNHCR – the UN’S refugee agency – which called on governments to intervene to move refugees to safe locations.
The UNCHR, said: “The situation on the Belarus-poland border is deeply concerning. The instrumentalisation of migrants and refugees to achieve political ends is deplorable and must stop.”