U.K. to start controversial program flying asylum-seekers to Rwanda
London — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson beat back criticism of his plan to send asylum-seekers to Rwanda on Tuesday, saying that efforts to block the flights were "abetting the work of criminal gangs" involved in smuggling people across borders.
Johnson's government announced the deal with Rwanda in April as an effort to reduce the record numbers of people making the perilous journey across the English Channel to the U.K.
Under the agreement, Britain will deport people who enter the U.K. illegally to the East African country in exchange for millions of dollars worth of development aid. The government contends this will deter people from paying criminals to help them take the risky journey across the Channel in small boats.
The policy has faced a series of legal challenges, but two British courts decided not to block the deportation flights, rejecting on Monday last-ditch appeals filed by immigration rights advocates and labor unions. The nation's Supreme Court dismissed the latest appeal on Tuesday, with judge Robert Reed saying the deported migrants could be brought back to the U.K. again if a judicial review in July finds the policy unlawful.
"Rwanda will take all reasonable steps in accordance with international human rights standards to make a relocated individual available for return to the United Kingdom should the United Kingdom be legally obliged to facilitate that person's return," Reed said, according to the Reuters news agency. "In the light of that assurance, and for the reasons that I've explained, the court refuses permission to appeal."
The first flights were expected to depart Tuesday, though perhaps with only a handful of people aboard.
"I think that what the criminal gangs are doing, and what those who effectively are abetting the work of the criminal gangs are doing, is undermining people's confidence in the safe and legal system, undermining people's general acceptance of immigration," Johnson said before a meeting of his Cabinet
The prime minister insisted the government would not be cowed by those attacking the strategy and told his cabinet ministers that "we are going to get on and deliver" the plan.
The plan has sparked heated protest in the U.K. The leadership of the Church of England has joined the opposition, and newspaper reports say Prince Charles has also waded into the issue. The heir to the throne privately described the Rwanda policy as "appalling," the Times reported over the weekend, citing an unidentified source.
Filippo Grandi, the U.N. high commissioner for refugees, has also lashed out at the policy, describing it as "all wrong." If the British government is truly interested in protecting lives, it should work with other countries to target the people smugglers and provide safe routes for asylum seekers, not simply shunt migrants to other countries, Grandi said.
While a major precedent is at stake, the number of people immediately affected by the cases has been steadily whittled down as lawyers challenge the merits of each deportation order. British media reported that the number of migrants scheduled to be on a Tuesday night flight is now seven, down from 31 migrants told last week they would be leaving.
Foreign Secretary Liz Truss earlier said that the first deportation flight to Rwanda would take off Tuesday, regardless of how many people were on board.
"I can't say how many people will be on the flight, but the really important thing is that we establish the principle and we start to break the business model of these appalling people traffickers who are trading in misery," Truss told Sky News.
The comments came as 25 Church of England bishops, including Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, wrote an open letter describing the deportation plans as an "immoral policy that shames Britain."
"The shame is our own, because our Christian heritage should inspire us to treat asylum-seekers with compassion, fairness and justice, as we have for centuries," the bishops wrote in the letter to the Times of London.
