Migrants‘ flimsy final arguments to stay that UK judges dismissed
As demo tries to stop flight...
PROTESTERS laid in the road outside an immigration centre and locked themselves together to block last night’s flight from leaving.
Activists from Stop Deportations tried to block the main road to prevent a coach carrying asylum seekers from Colnbrook Immigration Removal Centre near Heathrow.
Two were arrested in the group’s attempt to prevent asylum seekers from being flown to Rwanda.
The migrants legal bids to be removed from last night’s flight failed in the UK yesterday. The men, three from Iran and one from Vietnam have not been named.
Here are the grounds that they claimed should have allowed them to remain:
RM, Iranian Kurd
Claimed to have been a victim of slavery because he was ordered to help carry to the shore the small boat that ferried him from France to England last month.
His barrister, Alasdair Mackenzie, said he was ‘beaten, slapped and kicked, and verbally abused’ by the people traffickers who forced him ‘at knife or gunpoint’.
In the High Court yesterday, Judge Jonathan Swift said: ‘There is a qualitative difference between being forced to work in a cannabis farm or carwash, and helping to carrying down the beach the boat that is to carry you across the Channel from France.’
Mr Mackenzie said it would be unjust to send the man – whose journey to Britain was paid for by his uncle – to fly to Rwanda because there are no interpreters there for the Kurdish dialect Sorani, the only language he speaks. He claimed this meant he would not be able to speak to lawyers about an asylum claim there, nor could he speak to doctors about his mental health issues.
But Mr Justice Swift was assured that all those removed to Rwanda were issued with a mobile phone simcard that gave them access to a translation service.
NS, Iranian ‘convert to Christianity’
The court was told he received refugee status in Greece after fleeing there from his homeland. He claimed to have been harassed in a camp there travelling with his
adult son to Germany, where they again applied for asylum.
Not waiting for the result, they left for France. The son got to Britain in April, and is applying for asylum. But the father arrived last month from Calais, after the Rwanda policy was introduced.
A doctor’s assessment suggests his separation from his son is adding to his ‘depressive disorder’ and PTSD, which would worsen if flown to Rwanda alone. It was claimed separating him from the son infringed his human right to a family life.
But Mr Justice Swift accepted Home Secretary
Priti Patel’s view that ‘there is no evidence of a dependence beyond normal emotional ties’ between the father and his son.
And he said since the recommended treatment for his mental health treatment was a course of cognitive behaviour therapy, healthcare in Rwanda would be adequate.
HN, from Vietnam
Claims he and his family are at risk from loan sharks in Vietnam.
He accepts he passed through France on his journey to the UK, but claims he was denied the chance to tell the Home Office why there were exceptional circumstances stopping him making an application there.’
He said he should not be flown to Rwanda because when he was given a letter in English telling him of his destination there was no interpreter. But the Home Office insisted the man was given a Vietnamese translation of the letter, albeit belatedly, and that an interpreter was present several times.
NA, Iranian Kurd
Said he suffered PTSD in Turkey while on the way to Britain last month.
He also claimed being flown to Rwanda would take him too far from his sister, who lives legally in Britain.
But Mr Justice Swift dismissed this, pointing out: ‘Since 2010 it appears that the claimant and his sister have maintained regular contact, perhaps even daily, via telephone. The claimant will be able to maintain the relationship in the same way.’
He added that a ‘memorandum of understanding’ between Britain and Rwanda over the scheme meant health services are guaranteed for those sent to Africa.
The judge also said that the man would have access to healthcare in Rwanda.