outside UNHCR refugee agency

Great Britain could break international law with a new asylum law

(Files) In this file photo taken on November 24, 2021, migrants are helped ashore from an RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution) lifeboat on a beach in Dungeness, southeast England, after being rescued as they crossed the English Channel.  - On March 7, 2023, the British Conservative government is expected to introduce a new bill to detain and deport asylum seekers who enter the country illegally via small boats, according to media reports.  (Photo by Ben Stansall/AFP) (Files) In this file photo taken on November 24, 2021, migrants are helped ashore from an RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution) lifeboat on a beach in Dungeness, southeast England, after being rescued as they crossed the English Channel.  - On March 7, 2023, the British Conservative government is expected to introduce a new bill to detain and deport asylum seekers who enter the country illegally via small boats, according to media reports.  (Photo by Ben Stansall/AFP)

Boats carrying people who do not already have a residence permit for the country land on British coasts again and again

What: AFP

The Conservative British government plans to tighten its asylum law. Then anyone who enters the island without permission is stopped and deported. The UN refugee agency is now worried this could set a global precedent.

DrThe United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees criticizes the planned British asylum law as a breach of international law. “It contravenes the UK’s obligations under the International Refugee Convention,” UNHCR’s representative to the UK, Vicki Tennant, told the broadcaster on Sunday. Sky News. “We are very concerned that this will set a global precedent and (…) effectively erase the right to asylum in the UK for almost all refugees.” Tennant stressed that the focus must be on the asylum system so that applications can be submitted. It can be processed quickly.

Parliament in London will again debate the Asylum Act on Monday. It stipulates that all persons entering the UK unwelcome, regardless of their background, will be detained for up to a month. They are then deported back to their home country or – if that would be too dangerous – to Rwanda or another country. They should be denied the right to seek asylum.

Under former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Great Britain signed a controversial agreement with East African Rwanda to transfer asylum seekers there. This should discourage people from crossing the English Channel.

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The British Coast Guard brings migrants who want to cross the English Channel to Dover

For years, London has been trying to prevent illegal and often dangerous entry across the English Channel. The growing number of undesirables crossing the English Channel into the country is a thorn in the side of the Conservative British government in particular. She had declared that she would “take back control of her borders” after Brexit, and now she is under pressure from the right wing of the Tory party.

Due to Brexit, Great Britain no longer has any readmission agreements with EU countries. Critics accuse the government of exaggerating the problem to appease conservative voters. Far fewer asylum applications are submitted in Great Britain than, for example, in Germany.

Implementation of the agreement with Rwanda has so far failed. A trip with migrants to the East African country that was scheduled for June 2022 was canceled at short notice following a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights. In December, the London High Court ruled that deportations to Rwanda were legal – but the project is still the subject of appeal.

deportation despite objections

So the British government has already announced that it intends to deport unwanted immigrants to Rwanda and other countries even if the European Court of Human Rights prohibits it at short notice. The Telegraph reported that a provision in a recently introduced law allows for injunctive orders under Article 39 of the European Court of Human Rights to be ignored.

The conservative government is currently trying to lift the obstacles to implementation in negotiations with the court in Strasbourg. Under “Rule 39,” the judges blocked the first deportation flight to Rwanda in East Africa in 2022.

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