Deportation of asylum seekers
17 February 2012
Charity calls on Home Office to reverse deportation
http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/Charity-calls-Home-Office-reverse-deportation/story-15255053-detail/story.html
A CITY housing charity is calling on the Home Office to reverse a decision to deport an asylum seeker.
The Nottingham Arimathea Trust, in Ilkeston Road, Radford, is worried about Hussein Khedri's mental state.
The charity, which was set up in 2007 and provides support to people who have their first claim for asylum rejected, claims Mr Khedri is suicidal.
He will be flown back to Afghanistan on a chartered flight which leaves from a undisclosed location on Monday.
Mr Khedri, who claims to have been tortured and abused in his home country, was detained as he went to report to the immigration service at the Loughborough Reporting Centre on Wednesday
13 February 2012
A failed Gambian asylum-seeker who was living in Greater Manchester will Tuesday be deported to the Gambia where she faces ‘torture and death’
http://www.jollofnews.com/20120213gambian-womans-life-hangs-in-the-balance-as-uk-readies-to-deport-her-to-banjul.html
Sukai Jack, 31, sought asylum in the UK in 2007 after fleeing from the Gambia where she was arrested and detained for delivering letters, which allegedly contained information about a government coup.
She claims she had no knowledge of what was inside the letters and was just doing a job.
While fighting asylum case, Sukai who has two young children in the Gambia, worked as a volunteer for Salford Women’s Centre.
She has had one appeal to remain in Britain turned down by a tribunal but her supporters say she has another pending.
Sukai was picked up last week by officers of the UK Border Agency and taken to Yarl’s Wood Immigration and Removal Centre in Bedfordshire. She is due to be flown back to Banjul at 9am tomorrow
7 February 2012
Tories' asylum attacks
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=27439
When the Tories say that they condemn countries that don’t respect the rights and liberties of gay people, they are hypocrites.
In 2010 the government promised that no one would be deported who would be likely to face persecution for their sexuality. Previously, it had argued that people could be deported—saying they could avoid persecution by hiding their sexuality.
But the government has continued to deport LGBT asylum seekers to countries where being homosexual relationships are illegal and LGBT people suffer violence and discrimination.
Now the attack s on legal aid mean that people fighting and appealing government decisions to deport them are even more vulnerable.
The two largest providers of legal aid for migrants and asylum seekers have gone, leaving LGBT people and others at the mercy of the UK Border Agency.
27 January 2012
Playwright Lydia Besong freed from detention centre
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-16755125
Lydia Besong says she would be persecuted back in Cameroon
A Cameroonian playwright and husband who are under threat of deportation from the UK have been released from a detention centre.
Lydia Besong and her husband Bernard, who live in Bury, Greater Manchester, were granted a judicial review last Friday hours before deportation.
They say they will be tortured and beaten in Cameroon.
High-profile supporters include actor Juliet Stevenson, author Nick Hornby and playwright Alan Ayckbourn.
26 January 2012
Private border staff 'out of control'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9687000/9687008.stm
The UK Border Agency has been criticised for the way it manages the forced removal of failed asylum seekers and illegal immigrants from the UK.
Inappropriate and dangerous use of restraint techniques and abusive racist language are two of the findings of the Home Affairs Select Committee.
The committee report was instigated after the death of Jimmy Mubenga in 2010.
Emma Ginn, co-ordinator of the charity Medical Justice, reflects on their fears inappropriate behaviour towards detainees
22 January 2012
Deportation centre expels just nine per cent of inmates 'thanks to human rights'
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/9029794/Deportation-centre-expels-just-nine-per-cent-of-inmates-thanks-to-human-rights.html
Human rights claims are hobbling the ability of the Home Office to deport illegal immigrant so badly that one of the government's "fast-track centres was able to remove just 39 out of 456 inmates
Morton Hall, a former women's prison in rural Lincolnshire, was reopened as an immigration removal centre last summer after a £6 million refit.
The Home Office partly blamed the centre's modest expulsion rate on legal challenges made under the controversial Human Rights Act.
When Damian Green, the immigration minister, opened the centre in June last year, he said that a "tough system of enforcement and removal is one of the cornerstones our reformed asylum system".
Figures obtained from the Home Office by Priti Patel, a Conservative backbencher, last week showed that 39 out of 456 inmates had been deported directly from Morton Hall between mid-May and the end of September last year.
17 January 2012
Authors and activists condemn decision to deport Cameroonian playwright
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/jan/17/authors-activists-deport-cameroonian-playwright?newsfeed=true
Home secretary urged not to deport Lydia Besong and her husband, who fear they will be persecuted in Cameroon
Bestselling authors and leading human rights figures have joined forces to condemn the UK Border Agency's decision to deport a Cameroonian playwright and her husband.
The former children's laureate Michael Morpurgo, Helena Kennedy, Monica Ali, Hanif Kureishi, Nick Hornby and Alan Ayckbourn, have written to the home secretary, Theresa May, to urge her not to deport Lydia Besong and her husband, Bernard Batey.
Kennedy, a leading QC, described the agency's decision to deport the couple as "hideous" and "insensitive", and called for an overhaul of the way women are treated in the asylum system.
3 January 2012
Britain deports Sri Lankan asylum seekers
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/jan2012/asyl-j03.shtml
Disregarding the safety of the deportees and warnings by human rights groups, the British Conservative government on December 15 deported back to Sri Lanka 55 Sri Lankan refugees whose requests for asylum it had rejected.
They had sought asylum status in Britain, to save themselves from the notorious Sri Lankan intelligence services—known for kidnapping and murdering suspects and also for torturing them during captivity in secret camps.
The group was made up mostly of the Tamil minority but included some from the Sinhala and Muslim communities. This is the third such large-scale deportation carried out by the British government since last June. They had been detained in various detention camps for several months
23 December 2011
Court limits right of EU states to send asylum seekers to state of first entry
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2011/1222/1224309380301.html
AN ASYLUM seeker may not be sent back to the first EU member state he landed in from outside the EU if he risks being subjected to inhuman treatment there, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) has ruled.
This means asylum seekers in Ireland who landed first in Greece from outside the EU cannot be sent back there.
Under the “Dublin II” regulation, the state in which the asylum seeker first arrived was considered responsible for dealing with their asylum application, and in practice this meant Ireland could send asylum seekers back to states along the EU’s eastern and southern borders that were most commonly the first in which they arrived.
Earlier this year the ECJ ruled that Belgium was wrong to send an asylum seeker back to Greece where he had already suffered mistreatment in the asylum process, as Greece could not guarantee his human rights would not be infringed.
22 December 2011
EU Asylum Seekers Win Concession
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204552304577112671642291352.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
BRUSSELS—Europe's top court ruled Wednesday that the U.K. and other European governments should not return asylum seekers who entered the EU through Greece to that country, saying they cannot be exposed to "inhuman or degrading" conditions.
The ruling is the latest to find major fault with Greece's treatment of asylum seekers. Greece accounts for around 90% of illegal migration into the 27-nation bloc, according to EU statistics. The EU estimated around 104,000 illegal border crossings in 2010. Only a fraction of those are asylum seekers.
15 December 2011
Deported Tamils 'face torture' on return to Sri Lanka
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/15/deported-tamils-torture-sri-lanka?newsfeed=true
UK Border Agency to continue with forced-removals flight despite human rights organisation warning of mistreatment.
Up to 50 passengers heading to Sri Lanka on a UK Border Agency forced-removals flight risk being tortured on their return, human rights organisations have warned.
The flight, which will depart on Thursday afternoon from an as yet undisclosed British airport, is expected to go ahead despite new evidence of recent alleged mistreatment by Sri Lankan security services.
The UK Border Agency has carried out two large-scale deportations to Sri Lanka since June, the last of which left from Luton airport in September, despite the concerns of several rights groups – including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch – who believe that deported Tamils may be at risk of arbitrary arrest and mistreatment.
10 December 2011
UK to return refused Tamil asylum seekers to Sri Lanka
http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=34692
Despite ongoing concerns over risks of torture in Sri Lanka, including to Tamils returning to Sri Lanka, the UK government continues to remove refused Sri Lankan asylum seekers, with a charter flight planned for 15 December, a UK-based activist group, Freedom from Torture (FfT) said. The group has recently launched a public action calling on the UK government to take urgent steps to ensure that they are not returning anyone to a serious risk of torture in Sri Lanka following its publication of forensically-documented evidence of ongoing torture in Sri Lanka.
8 December 2011
Home Office told to bring asylum family back to UK – but they may be deported again
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/8943742/Home-Office-told-to-bring-asylum-family-back-to-UK-but-they-may-again.html
A judge has ordered the Home Office to bring back a family of asylum seekers it removed nearly six The family of five Sri Lankans were removed in 2006 but the High Court ruled they were unlawfully detained during the process and demanded they be brought back.
The court made the judgment even though it accepted it was uncertain once they had been returned and dealt with appropriately that they would be allowed to stay in the UK.
As well as the cost of returning the family, who are currently living in Germany, the Home Office was also ordered to pay £37,000 in compensation. years ago – even though they may then be deported a second time.
25 November 2011
Refused asylum seekers 'face torture' in Democratic Republic of the Congo
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/nov/25/refused-asylum-seekers-torture-congo?INTCMP=SRCH
Human rights charity reports allegations of rape, beatings and electric shock treatment on people forcibly removed from UK
A report by Justice First outlines the cases of 17 adults and nine children forcibly removed from the UK between 2007 and 2011. The report's author, Catherine Ramos, travelled to Congo and recorded video testimonies of some of the interviewees, who are all now in hiding after their escape or release from detention in the Congolese capital, Kinshasa.
Refused asylum seekers 'face torture' in Democratic Republic of the Congo
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/nov/25/refused-asylum-seekers-torture-congo?newsfeed=true
Human rights charity reports allegations of rape, beatings and electric shock treatment on people forcibly removed from UK
A human rights charity has alleged that the government is sending asylum seekers back to torture in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
A report by Justice First outlines the cases of 17 adults and nine children forcibly removed from the UK between 2007 and 2011. The report's author, Catherine Ramos, travelled to Congo and recorded video testimonies of some of the interviewees, who are all now in hiding after their escape or release from detention in the Congolese capital, Kinshasa.
Warwick University vigil tonight for gay Nigerian asylum seeker threatened with deportation.
http://www.coventrytelegraph.net/news/coventry-news/2011/11/25/warwick-university-vigil-tonight-for-gay-nigerian-asylum-seeker-threatened-with-deportation-92746-29841894/
A VIGIL is being held in Coventry tonight for a gay Nigerian asylum seeker threatened with deportation.
Hope Nwachukwu, 34, faces being whipped and jailed for up to 14 years in his home country because of his sexuality.
Students at Warwick University are today staging a talk at 5pm and a candlelit vigil on the piazza outside the student union at 7pm to highlight his case.
18 October 2011
Deportations to put pressure on Mugabe?
http://www.thezimbabwean.co.uk/news/zimbabwe/53802/deportations-to-put-pressure-on.html?utm_source=thezim&utm_medium=homepage&utm_campaign=listarticle&utm_content=textlink
A new attempt is to be made on Thursday to deport Vigil supporter Shamiso Kofi despite the violent failure of the first attempt earlier this month. There is speculation that the UK and South Africa are making a concerted attempt to deport Zimbabweans to put pressure on the Mugabe regime
12 October 2011
Sadly, Jimmy Mubenga's death has not changed deportation practices
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/oct/12/jimmy-mubenga-death-deportation?newsfeed=true
On the anniversary of Mubenga's death in deportation, we call on the government to end these needless abuses
Medical Justice will join the family of Jimmy Mubenga and others at a vigil on Friday at noon outside the Crown Prosecution Service to mark a year since his death during a deportation attempt.
Independent doctors volunteering with Medical Justice regularly visit immigration detainees who have sustained injuries during attempts to deport them.
In 2008 we published our report, Outsourcing Abuse, on nearly 300 allegations of assault during deportation. Injuries included a punctured lung, a dislocated knee and a broken finger, 42 deportees complaining of having their breathing restricted and some suffering neck injuries from having their head pushed forward between their knees.
8 October 2011
Zimbabwe Vigil's 9th Anniversary
http://www.zimbabwejournalists.com/story.php?art_id=7542&cat=2
The Vigil is glad to tell you that Vigil supporter Shamiso Kofi was not deported to Zimbabwe as planned on Tuesday night. After a harrowing experience, Shamiso was taken off the Kenyan Airways flight from Heathrow with her three escorts and returned to Yarl’s Wood detention centre.
Shamiso has given us full details of what happened but, for her sake, we are withholding further information at the moment while she takes legal advice. There are some serious issues involved. When we last spoke to her she was due to see a doctor
6th October 2011
Asylum seeker freed from detention unit
http://www.burytimes.co.uk/news/9291405.Asylum_seeker_freed_from_detention_unit/
An asylum seeker has returned to his Bury home after almost being deported to Cameroon.
Bernard Batey, of Kestrel Drive, was released on Friday from Colnbrook immigration removal centre, in Middlesex, where he had been held for nearly four weeks.
He was detained by officers from UK Border Agency after losing his fight to remain in the UK.
But a judge granted an injunction stopping his deportation just 24 hours before the flight and he is continuing his legal battle for asylum, along with his wife, Lydia Besong.
3 October 2011
Police investigate alleged assault on Nigerian mother on deportation flight
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/oct/03/police-investigate-nigerian-mother-deportation
Escorts allegedly attacked failed asylum seeker in front of her young children on plane bound for Italy.
The alleged incident occurred just two weeks after the launch of the government's new family-friendly removal policy. The family are one of the first to be detained under the new arrangements.
27 September 2011
A charity calls on UK to halt deportation flight to Sri Lanka
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/27/torture-charity-call-sri-lanka-deportation
A charity calls on UK to halt deportation flight to Sri Lanka
Tamils at risk of being detained and tortured as result of UK Border Agency action, claims Freedom from Torture.
Britain is being urged to halt plans to deport a planeload of Tamils to Sri Lanka on Wednesday amid fears they will be at risk of being detained and tortured on arrival.
Up to 50 failed asylum seekers are due to be forcibly removed from the country aboard an aircraft chartered by the UK Border Agency.
The plan has alarmed a number of NGOs, including a medical charity that treats victims of torture, which fears the British government cannot be sure that those deported will be safe in Sri Lanka.
29 September 2011
Eleven foreign terrorists on the streets and not deported
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/8795131/Eleven-foreign-terrorists-on-the-streets-and-not-deported.html
Eleven foreign terrorists on the streets and not deported
At least eleven foreign-born terrorists who should have been deported from Britain after finishing prison terms are still walking the streets.
They include offenders who helped the July 21 bomb plotters a fortnight after the 7/7 atrocity.
Seven are fighting deportation on human rights grounds, meaning they may never leave. Last night government officials refused to identify them or say what has happened to the other four.
16 September 2011
Asylum seekers in hunger strike at immigration centre
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-14946764
Failed asylum seekers at a Lincolnshire immigration centre say they have begun a hunger strike.
Police said they were monitoring the situation at the former women's prison, Morton Hall near Lincoln.
The UK Border Agency said a sit-down protest, involving around 18 Afghan nationals, started at about 09:00 BST.
Protester Mohammad Nadi Mengal said the men had gone on hunger strike because they did not want to be sent back to Afghanistan
9 September 2011
Artists rally around Cameroonian playwright facing deportation
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/09/actors-rally-cameroonian-playwright-deportation
Lydia Besong asylum claim rejected before raid, campaigners including Juliet Stevenson claim in criticism of UK Border Agency
The forced deportation of a Cameroonian playwright and her husband, scheduled for Saturday, is "disturbing, shocking and unjust", the actor Juliet Stevenson has said. The actor joined campaigners including writers Joan Bakewell and Andrea Levy in condemning the UK Border Agency (UKBA), which they say has disregarded its own procedures
6 September 2011
Security officers accused of racially abusing asylum seekers
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/security-officers-accused-of-racially-abusing-asylum-seekers-2349790.html
Private security officers removing failed asylum seekers and foreign national prisioners were witnessed by Government inspectors talking about detainees in "a shamefully unprofessional and derogatory" manner, a report reveals today.
Staff working for the chief inspector of prisons, Nick Hardwick, saw employees of the private security firm G4S using "offensive and sometimes racist language" on a flight to Nigeria.
Handcuffs and other restraint techniques were sometimes used inappropriately. Staff working for G4S were overheard referring to detainees as "gippos", "pikeys" and "typical Asians".
19 August 2011
Ugandan asylum seeker wins reprieve
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2011/08/19/ugandan-asylum-seeker-wins-reprieve/
A Ugandan asylum seeker who says he will face homophobic persecution if returned home has been permitted to make a fresh appeal. Robert Segwanyi, 33, was due to be deported from the UK at 8pm last night after a judge decided that his case was not credible.
But just an hour before the flight was due to leave, his lawyer was informed by the Home Office that the removal had been deferred.
16 August 2011
Campaign launched seeking reversal of UK immigration decision
http://www.visabureau.com/uk/news/16-08-11/campaign-launched-seeking-reversal-of-uk-immigration-decision.aspx
An online campaign has been launched encouraging the Home Office in the UK to reconsider its decision to deport Sheffield-based Justice Charles, an asylum seeker who is facing deportation from the country.
An online campaign has been launched over the UKBA's decision to deport an asylum seeker.
Justice Charles, 35, arrived in the UK from Sierra Leone in 2002 without a UK visa, seeking asylum. Prior to this, the campaign claims he was attacked by rebels while working with the UN delivering food aid to the country during the civil war, which was declared over in 2002.
The campaign goes on to claim that former rebels continued to threaten Mr. Charles, resulting in him fleeing to the UK. Since 2005, Mr. Charles has been in a relationship with a British woman, and the couple married in 2008.
Mr. Charles was arrested last Thursday while attending a pre-arranged appointment with the UK Border Agency. His wife has since accused Border Agency officials of claiming that the couple’s marriage is a ‘sham’ although the Border Agency deny this to be the case. Mr. Charles is said to have been suicidal following the decision made against his continued residence in the UK, and a further decision to decline his appeal to challenge the ruling.
16 August 2011
Supporters launch petition for Ugandan asylum seeker
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2011/08/16/supporters-launch-petition-for-ugandan-asylum-seeker/
Supporter of Ugandan asylum seeker have launched a petition to call for him to be allowed to remain in the UK.
Those who have met 33-year-old Robert Segwanyi say he is “obviously gay”, despite a judge’s ruling that there is no evidence of this. Uganda has strict laws against homosexuality and Mr Segwanyi says he was tortured and jailed for being gay.
He is expected to be deported on Thursday.
15 August 2011
A CAMPAIGN has been launched to help a Sheffield woman’s husband continue living in the country.
http://www.thestar.co.uk/news/campaign_group_in_fight_for_justice_1_3680435
Asylum seeker Justice Charles, who has lived in Sheffield since 2002, has had his application to remain in the UK turned down and is being held in a detention centre pending deportation.
He was arrested when he turned up for an appointment at the UK Border Agency offices in Sheffield on Thursday.
Justice, aged 35, was told of his fate in May and attempted suicide.
His wife, Ruby Senior, aged 46, claims Border Agency officials have accused the couple of having a ‘sham marriage’, which they deny.
6 August 2011
http://search.independent.co.uk/topic/christmas-island-asylum-seekers
Christmas Island asylum seekers
also Independent Matrix Anger at plans to deport 18 refuigee boat children
18 boat children in refugee ‘swap’
Julia Gillard’s Labour government is preparing to deport up to 18 children to Malaysia, 13 of them unaccompanied. They were among 55 migrants who landed on Christmas Island on Thursday in the first boatload to arrive since Australia agreed a refugee “swaMalaysia
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