British Parliament approves legislation to deport illegal immigrants to Rwanda; Flights to start soon: PM | the world

King Charles III is expected to give royal assent this week and the plan will become law. The text was processed between the House of Commons and the British House of Lords and approved in the first minutes this Tuesday.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said there were plans to send people to Rwanda in 10 or 12 weeks. Sunak said the government has already chartered commercial planes and trained about 500 airmen to fly migrants to Rwanda.

Asylum applications are determined by the Rwandan government and, if accepted, people receive refugee status in Rwanda, not the United Kingdom.

Rwanda will receive a total of 370 million pounds (about R$2.3 billion) from the British government over a five-year period to receive these immigrants.

Illegal immigrants

For the government, one of the effects of deportation to Rwanda is to reduce the flow of people entering the UK illegally.

The Associated Press compared that to the number of small boats that reached the coast of the United Kingdom in three minutes.

• In 2018, there were 299.
• Four years later, in 2022, there were 45,774.
• Last year the number of boats was 29,437.

According to the AP, there are criminal gangs that specialize in ferrying people to UK shores on small boats that depart from continental Europe.

People who disagree with the plan say the idea of ​​deporting people to a country they have no ties to and don't want to go to is inhumane.

Lucy Gregg, director of Freedom from Torture, called on the government to “start treating refugees with dignity and stop trying to send them to an uncertain future in Rwanda”.

Critics say Rwanda has no history of respecting human rights, and that migrants are at risk of being sent back to their home countries.

The new law says that some human rights protection provisions in the UK do not apply to the scheme.

The country's courts ruled the move illegal in June last year. Not contradicting this decision, the text approved by Parliament this Tuesday determines that British judges must consider Rwanda as a safe place for migrants before they are put on planes.

According to the “New York Times”, these deportation attempts must be justified even with the consent of the law. According to the newspaper, the government could send some planes with migrants to Rwanda before the country's general elections, which should take place in the second half of the year, but the cost of these measures would be very high. .