UK apologises for handcuffing girls

Four Omani girls were deported after glitch in British electronic visa for Gulf nationals at Stansted airport Electronic Visa Waiver document serves as a single entry visa that is issued automatically without the need for pre-approval from British authori

The British ambassador to Oman has apologised for the UK Border Agency’s treatment of four Omani girls at London’s Stansted Airport that created an outcry in the Omani media.

Omani newspapers reported earlier this week that four Omani girls studying in the Netherlands were deported after being handcuffed and detained at Stansted Airport for failing to arrive on the flight specified on their Electronic Visa Waiver (EVW) document, which serves as a special immediate-issue visa for nationals of four Gulf countries, Oman, Qatar, the UAE and Kuwait.

“We slept on the chairs in the detention room for the next 20 hours [after being denied entry to the UK]. Feithla [one of the passengers] needed to take her medication, however, they would not let her have her medicines. The next day, security officials came to take us to the detention facility at the Immigration Removal Centre. They handcuffed us and took us through the airport to the van as if we were criminals,” Adhra’a Saeed Hamed, one of the four girls, told the Muscat Daily , adding that they were denied permission to contact their embassy in London.

Handcuffs

“We were four Arab girls in headscarves being taken in handcuffs through the airport. Imagine what people would be thinking... they’d think we were terrorists,” Adhra’a told Oman’s Al Wesal radio.

In an hour-long Arabiclanguage interview with Al Wesal, the British ambassador Jon Wilks issued an impassioned apology to the girls, saying Omanis were welcome to travel to the UK. He added that the UK’s Home Office, its interior ministry, was investigating the matter.

“We welcome tens of thousands of Omani nationals to the UK every year and over 99 per cent of those visitors experience no problems at the border,” he said in a statement carried by the British embassy’s website.

Wilks noted however that the regret was expressed for the way the girls were treated, and not for the deportation, which he said was part of the procedure in case the conditions on the EVW were not met.

Eight-hour window

The issue lies in the specificity of the EVW, which is tied to a pre-booked individual flight. While the EVW serves as a single entry visa that is issued automatically without the need for pre-approval from British authorities, it can only be used with the flight number that was entered during the application process online.

Missing the flight technically deems the EVW void, but British authorities say that an eight-hour window is provided for the passenger in case they can manage to take another flight in that time frame. The four Omani girls took a flight that departed almost 12 hours after the time they had initially booked.