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‘Inhumane’: UK Plan To Send Refugees To Rwanda Sparks Criticism

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5 years ago

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Human rights groups slam a $156m trial scheme to offload thousands of refugees to Rwanda.

London, United Kingdom – The British government has been accused of trading people like commodities after it unveiled a controversial plan to send asylum seekers on a one-way ticket 6,000km (3,700 miles) away to Rwanda.

In a speech on Thursday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said anyone who has entered the United Kingdom irregularly since the start of the year “may” be relocated to the country in central-east Africa.

“Our compassion may be infinite but our capacity to help people is not,” he said in Kent, a county in the UK’s southeast and a hotspot for refugees and migrants who cross the English Channel and land on British soil.

Johnson said “thousands of refugees” could be transported during the years under the scheme, which, he argued, would “save countless lives” and clamp down on human smugglers.

Many disagreed, however. Rights groups and refugee organisations swiftly blasted what they called a “cruel”, “inhumane” and “neo-colonial” plan, and questioned both its cost to the British taxpayers and effect on migration.

“It’s truly shocking and inhumane,” said Steve Valdez-Symonds, the refugee and migrant rights programme director at Amnesty International UK.

“The plan is not going to decrease the number of refugees. It will inflict a huge amount of cruelty and fuel more dangerous refugee routes to be set up,” Valdez-Symonds told Al Jazeera.

People traded like ‘commodities’

According to the plan, the British government would screen asylum seekers after arriving and provide their personal information to the Rwandan officials before they are transported to Kigali. The Rwandan government would deal with the asylum process and, if they are successful, asylum seekers will settle in the country.

Some details are still a bit murky but all refugees arriving in the UK in boats will be sent to Rwanda. If their application is successful, they will not be given refugee status in the UK but will be granted asylum by Rwanda. Those unsuccessful could be deported back to their country of origin, or another country where they have a right to reside.

Refugees who flee to the UK from prosecution, civil war and torture have the right to claim refugee status under international agreements. However, they can only claim asylum in the UK on British soil.

Hence, if the proposal is implemented, those fleeing Iraq, Syria, Eritrea or Sudan will most likely be transported to Rwanda even before making an asylum claim – which would eventually lead to a drastic decline in asylum applications.

The proposal will come into an effect after the passage of a law that is currently being considered in Parliament that could criminalise any refugees entering the country without a valid visa. The legislation is expected to pass as Johnson’s party enjoys the parliamentary majority.

But Johnson expects his plan will be challenged in the court as he said there will be a “formidable army of politically motivated lawyers who for years have made it their business to thwart removals” during his speech.

‘Slamming the door’

Globally, only less than 1 percent of refugees around the world have access to safe, direct resettlement through the United Nations.

Bella Sankey, director of Detention Action, an NGO providing support to migrants in detention, said the rest are forced to take their futures into their own hands and cross borders to seek asylum directly.

“When governments try to deter people seeking asylum, those people do not disappear into thin air. They are forced to take longer, more dangerous journeys to try and rebuild their lives,” Sankey told Al Jazeera.

“By slamming the door on people seeking asylum, this government is shirking their responsibilities and adding to the larger crisis,” she said.

The UN’s refugee agency also voiced opposition.

“People fleeing war, conflict and persecution deserve compassion and empathy. They should not be traded like commodities and transferred abroad for processing,” said UNHCR’s Assistant High Commissioner for Protection Gillian Triggs.

The chief executive of Refugee Action, Tim Naor Hilton, accused the government of “offshoring its responsibilities onto Europe’s former colonies instead of doing our fair share to help some of the most vulnerable people on the planet”.

Others, meanwhile, criticised Rwanda’s human rights record.

“There is nothing ‘safe’ or ‘compassionate’ about Boris Johnson’s neo-colonial plan to send refugees to offshore camps in Rwanda, where the government tortures, intimidates and assassinates their political opponents and persecutes marginalised people,” Sankey said.
Rwandan Foreign Minister

Vincent Biruta said Rwanda is going to provide refugees “a dignified life with shelter, with skills for them to be able to socially and economically integrate into our society, or to have those skills for them to be able to integrate into their country of origin when they decide to go back to their countries”.

Record high crossings

The language Johnson used in his speech was quite familiar. Phrases such as “taking back control of British borders” or “single men” from the Middle East and African countries arriving in the UK were key parts of his appeal to pro-Brexit voters during the 2016 campaign, which he co-spearheaded.

However, despite Johnson’s promise to curb the English Channel crossings, the number of people arriving on British shores has increased drastically in recent years.

More than an estimated 28,000 migrants and refugees crossed in small boats from Europe to the UK last year, a more than threefold increase on the figure for 2020.

In November last year, 27 people died while trying to reach the UK when their boat sank in the worst disaster to occur on the Channel.

According to a recent poll conducted by Ipsos Mori, 60 percent of the British public is dissatisfied with the government’s migration policy.

Valdez-Symonds said Johnson was “more interested in headlines and political advantage than the impact of the plan for the refugees”.

The deal, which Home Secretary Priti Patel signed during a visit to Kigali on Thursday, came as more Ukrainian refugees keep arriving in the UK through various visa programmes that the government has rolled out in the wake of Russia’s invasion in February.

So far, more than 55,000 visas have been issued to refugees fleeing the war in Ukraine and 16,400 of them arrived in the UK as of Monday. 

Zoe Gardner, policy and advocacy manager at the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, highlighted the contrast between the proposed policy and the attitude towards Ukrainian refugees.

“Most of us want people fleeing danger to be treated with dignity and respect – the UK public’s response to Ukraine has made that clear,” Gardner told Al Jazeera.

“But instead of welcoming those who need protection,” she said, the deal will be “deporting Black and brown people who have fled desperate circumstances thousands of miles away”.

Setting a trend

The UK is not the only country that has sought to outsource its asylum applications. Australia, which the British officials often mention as a source of inspiration for their plan, has been keeping asylum seekers arriving by boat in offshore detention centres in the Pacific islands.

The policy has been heavily criticised for causing “immeasurable suffering” for dozens of asylum seekers who faced severe abuse and inhumane treatment in substandard conditions and end up dying by suicide.

Israel also struck secret deals in 2013 with Rwanda and Uganda to transfer asylum seekers from Sudan and Eritrea. The arrangement fell through when the refugees – who had their documents taken away and were offered no protection – escaped Rwanda to embark on a dangerous journey to Europe, a study by the University of Oxford revealed in 2018.

Denmark’s parliament also passed a law in June last year that would allow it to relocate asylum seekers to third countries outside Europe, despite widespread criticism by the European Union, United Nations and rights groups.

Johnson said the deal will become “a new international standard” in handling migration.

But Amnesty’s Valdez-Symonds warned: “The plan could set a dangerous trend for other Western countries to adopt their offshore asylum schemes.”

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Israel’s War On Gaza: List of Key Events, Day 101

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3 years ago

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15th January 2024

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Israel's war on Gaza: List of key events, day 101 | Israel War on Gaza News | Al Jazeera

Dozens of Palestinians killed in overnight Israeli strikes in central and south Gaza as Red Sea tensions rise.

Here’s how things stand on Monday, January 15, 2024:

Latest updates and human impact

  • Israeli attacks continue unabated overnight killing and wounding dozens of civilians in central and southern Gaza. At least 22 people were killed and a large number injured as a result of Israeli forces targeting al-Thalatheni Street in the central Gaza Strip.
  • Yemen’s Houthi rebels fired an antiship cruise missile toward an American destroyer in the Red Sea, which was shot down by a US fighter jet, announced US Central Command (CENTCOM) on X.
  • This was the first US-acknowledged Houthi attack since the US strikes on Yemen on Friday.
  • Hamas released a 37-second video showing three Israeli captives held in Gaza on Sunday, saying they would reveal the fate of the captives on Monday and urging the Israeli government to stop the offensive.
  • The Israeli military says it has shifted to a new phase of the war focused on the southern end of Gaza, where almost 2 million internally displaced Palestinians are running out of safe spaces to shelter.
  • The Gaza Ministry of Health has said almost 24,000 people have been killed in the Israeli offensive. More than 60,000 people have been wounded in 100 days of war.

Diplomacy

  • Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that his country will pursue its war against Hamas until victory and will not be stopped by anyone, including the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
  • The White House said on Sunday that “it’s the right time” for Israel to scale back its military offensive in the Gaza Strip.
  • Egypt’s State Information Service (SIS) said in a statement on Sunday that one of the biggest obstacles to the timely delivery of sufficient aid to Gaza was Israeli inspection of the aid. The statement came after Israel blamed Cairo for the delay in aid delivery to Gaza during its defence at the ICJ.
  • US Secretary of State Antony Blinken posted on X on Monday, calling for the release of the remaining captives held in Gaza on the 100th day since they were taken by Hamas. He did not mention the Palestinian casualties.
  • Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong, who described herself as a “friend of Israel” to the press, will travel to Jordan, Israel, the occupied Palestinian Territories and the United Arab Emirates this week, her office said on Monday.

West Bank raids and violence

  • Israeli forces arrested 25 students staging a sit-in in protest against high tuition fees at An-Najah University in Nablus. Al Jazeera’s Hamdah Salhut reported that the protesting students received a text message from Israeli forces telling them to “surrender now”.
  • Israeli forces have reportedly raided the family home of Nael al-Barghouti, the longest-serving Palestinian prisoner, in the village of Kobar, in Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank.
  • The Israeli army said on Friday that it killed three Palestinian men who infiltrated a West Bank settlement and fired upon soldiers.
  • The Israeli military killed two Palestinians after accusing them of ramming their car through a checkpoint near Hebron.
  • Local sources reported that Israeli forces bulldozed two Palestinian-owned houses during a Sunday midnight raid in the city of Qalqilya, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.
  • Armed Israeli settlers broke into the village of Burin, south of Nablus, and attacked Palestinian residents’ houses and properties after midnight on Sunday, Wafa reported.
  • “Violent raids and arrests have become part of the fabric of daily life in the occupied West Bank,” Al Jazeera’s Mohammed Jamjoom, reporting from Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, said. At least 347 Palestinians have been killed and thousands have been arrested since October 7.

 

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES
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Hamas Says Will Kill Hostages if Israeli Attacks On Gaza Civilians Continue

Published

3 years ago

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10th October 2023

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Flames and smoke billow during Israeli attacks against Gaza on October 9, 2023

Human Rights Watch terms Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant’s call for a ‘complete siege’ on Gaza a ‘war crime’.

The Hamas movement has threatened to kill an Israeli hostage every time Israel bombs a Palestinian home without warning as Israel mobilised some 300,000 reservists and imposed a total blockade of the Gaza Strip, denying the enclave’s millions of residents access to food, water and fuel.

The warning from Hamas came on Monday as the death toll from the armed group’s surprise weekend attack climbed to 900 in Israel and revenge attacks by Israeli forces on the besieged Gaza Strip killed more than 700 people and left some 3,700 others wounded.

Residential apartment blocks, hospitals, schools and a mosque have been among the sites attacked by Israeli fighter jets, artillery and drones, according to media reports and witnesses.

Hamas spokesperson Abu Ubaida issued the threat to kill Israelis from the dozens held captive by the armed group. He said an Israeli hostage would be killed for every Israeli bombing of a civilian house without warning.

Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said more than 100 people were taken captive by Hamas during the deadly cross-border incursion over the weekend.

As Israeli forces conducted intense retaliatory attacks on Gaza on Monday, Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant drew international condemnation by announcing a total blockade of the densely populated and besieged enclave, which is home to 2.3 million people.

Gallant said Israel would impose a “complete siege” on Gaza. “No electricity, no food, no water, no gas – it’s all closed.”

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was “deeply distressed” by the siege announcement and warned that Gaza’s already dire humanitarian situation will now “only deteriorate exponentially”.

A mourner carries the body of Palestinian boy Saad Lubbad, who health officials said was killed in Israeli strikes, during his funeral in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, October 9, 2023. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa
A mourner carries the body of Palestinian boy Saad Lubbad, who health officials said was killed in an Israeli attack, during his funeral in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, on October 9, 2023 [Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/Reuters]

Guterres also said some 137,000 people were taking shelter with the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) at schools across Gaza.

UNRWA said on Tuesday that almost 190,000 people have been displaced in Gaza amid the Israeli attacks and the figure is expected to grow further as the violence intensifies.

Nearly half a million people have also not received food rations this week in Gaza as UN food distribution centres have been forced to remain closed amid the Israeli onslaught, UNRWA said.

Human Rights Watch said Israel’s total blockade on the necessities of life for everyday people in Gaza was a war crime.

“Defense Minister Gallant’s statements are abhorrent,” Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

“Depriving the population in an occupied territory of food and electricity is collective punishment, which is a war crime, as is using starvation as a weapon of war. The International Criminal Court should take note of this call to commit a war crime,” he said.

Shakir also condemned the threat by Hamas to kill hostages, warning that such action was also a war crime.

“All hostages should be safely released to their families,” he said.

On the diplomatic front, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan called on Hamas and Israel to immediately end violence and protect civilians, the Egyptian presidency said.

Erdogan urged Israel against “indiscriminately” attacking civilians and delivered measured criticism of Hamas, urging both sides to respect the “ethics” of war.

The United Kingdom, French, German, Italian and US governments issued a joint statement on Monday recognising the “legitimate aspirations” of the Palestinian people and supporting equal measures of justice and freedom for Israelis and Palestinians alike.

INTERACTIVE_DEATH_TOLL_INJURED_ISRAEL_PALESTINE_OCT10_2023_0415
They said they would remain “united and coordinated” to ensure Israel can defend itself.

But the prospect that fighting could spread also alarmed the region and the world.

Lebanese armed group Hezbollah fired rockets into northern Israel in response to at least three of its members being killed in Israeli shelling of Lebanon.

Israel said one of its deputy commanders was also killed in an earlier cross-border raid from Lebanon.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

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Western Leaders Accused of Hypocrisy Over Response To Palestine, Ukraine

Published

3 years ago

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10th October 2023

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US President Joe Biden holds a bilateral meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the sidelines of the 78th United Nations General Assembly in New York City, the US, September 20, 2023

Social media users, including journalists and observers, are calling out what they call a ‘double standard’.

After Saturday’s surprise attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Israel, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy took to the social media platform X to offer “condolences go out to everyone who lost relatives or close ones in the terrorist attack”.

He also stated, “Israel’s right to self-defence is unquestionable.”

Many world leaders, including US President Joe Biden and UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, shared similar sentiments.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen stated, “Israel has the right to defend itself – today and in the days to come. The European Union stands with Israel.”

Accusations of Western ‘double standards’

Some social media users have criticised these statements, saying they highlight a double standard.

Ukraine’s right to defend itself is praised by most international leaders while Russia’s invasion is condemned, but commentators said the same cannot be said about Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.

Aaron Bastani, a leftist British journalist, said on X that there’s a “clear double standard in endorsing terrorism against civilian targets in Ukraine … and condemning it by Palestinians”.

Many users said Western diplomats and media support the Ukrainians who defend their land, but label the Palestinians fighting against Israel as “terrorists”.

https://twitter.com/KhaledBeydoun/status/1710787817415082349?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1710787817415082349%7Ctwgr%5E6acf829869e993177f32aa38aa48c02f38cb7f61%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.aljazeera.com%2Fnews%2F2023%2F10%2F9%2Fwestern-leaders-accused-of-hypocrisy-over-response-to-palestine-ukraine

An illustration of a woman’s face, in which one eye is closed beside a Palestinian flag, and one eye open beside a Ukrainian flag, has been regularly shared as a symbol of the West’s alleged double standards in how the two conflicts are viewed.

https://twitter.com/OnlinePalEng/status/1710994682883273172?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1710994682883273172%7Ctwgr%5E6acf829869e993177f32aa38aa48c02f38cb7f61%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.aljazeera.com%2Fnews%2F2023%2F10%2F9%2Fwestern-leaders-accused-of-hypocrisy-over-response-to-palestine-ukraine

Clips also emerged on social media from a CNN interview with Mustafa Barghouti, the general secretary of the Palestinian National Initiative, in which he posed the rhetorical question, “Why does the United States support Ukraine in fighting occupation – while here they support the occupier, who continues to occupy us?”

It is not the first time Western nations have been accused of double standards in their stance on the Ukraine war.

Earlier in the year, Amnesty International published a report highlighting the West’s “double standards” on global human rights.

Agnes Callamard, Amnesty’s secretary-general, told Al Jazeera at the time that the occupation of Palestinian territory was a “particularly important one”.

“Without making any comparison between Russia’s aggression and Israel … it is clear the Palestinian people are under a regime of oppression – a regime of occupation and a regime of apartheid,” Callamard told Al Jazeera.

Over the last three days, X users recirculated earlier statements calling out what they called Western hypocrisy, sharing video by the Irish lawmaker Richard Boyd Barrett from March 2022 in which he berated the Irish government’s double standards regarding Ukraine and Palestine:

“You’re happy to use the most strong and robust language to describe the crimes against humanity of [Russian President] Vladimir Putin, but you will not use the same strength of language when it comes to describing Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians.”

Barrett on Sunday again called out what he described as “shocking double standards of Western leaders supporting Ukraine resistance but condemning Palestinian[s].”

Meanwhile, others warned against comparing conflicts.

https://twitter.com/denfordauthor/status/1710993737738768607?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1710993737738768607%7Ctwgr%5E6acf829869e993177f32aa38aa48c02f38cb7f61%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.aljazeera.com%2Fnews%2F2023%2F10%2F9%2Fwestern-leaders-accused-of-hypocrisy-over-response-to-palestine-ukraine

And some cautioned that Hamas and the Palestinians should not be seen as one and the same.

Ukrainian footballer Oleksandr Zinchenko, who plays for Arsenal, posted on Instagram, stating he “stands with Israel”.

Zinchenko has been a vocal supporter of his home country in its ongoing defence against Russia, and he participated in a Game4Ukraine charity match in London earlier this year to raise money for Ukraine.

After online backlash, with some questioning an alleged double standard in his support of Israel, the footballer removed the post and switched his social media account to private.

Several people claimed that Zinchenko’s football club, in not responding to his comments, was guilty of hypocrisy after they had distanced themselves from former player Mesut Ozil’s comments in 2019 over alleged human rights abuses against Uighur Muslims in China.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA
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