Following an intense battle between the United Kingdom's House of Lords and House of Commons, the British Parliament approved the "Safety of Rwanda" bill on Monday night, April 23; paving the way for asylum seekers who had arrived illegally in the UK to be deported to the East African country.
Backed by a new treaty between London and Kigali, which provides for the payment of substantial sums to Rwanda in return for receiving the asylum seekers, the bill aimed to respond to the findings of the UK's Supreme Court, which in November ruled that the initial project was unlawful.
Its many critics have judged the bill to be in breach of international law, impossible to implement, immoral, complicated, and excessively costly. Several appeals have been lodged with legal authorities.
The "partnership" with Kigali, first made official in April 2022, when Conservative former prime minister Boris Johnson was in office, aims at deporting foreign nationals who arrive via "illegal, dangerous, and unnecessary journeys" and transited through "safe countries" after January 1, 2022, regardless of where they come from, sending them to Rwanda.
The consideration of asylum applications is entrusted to Kigali. If approved, applicants will be allowed to stay in Rwanda. If not, they can apply to settle there on other grounds, or apply for asylum in another "safe third country." Whatever the outcome of this process, applicants will have no possibility of returning to the UK. It is a complete delegation of the UK's responsibility for processing such applications.
Johnson's Conservative government, which was behind the initiative, felt it was necessary to find new ways of stemming the rise in asylum applications and undocumented arrivals. The scheme aimed to deter foreigners from risking their lives by crossing the English Channel to seek asylum in the UK.
More than 45,000 people made the crossing in 2022, an unprecedented number. The figure fell back to 30,000 the following year, but a further 20% increase has been recorded since the start of 2024; with more than 6,200 arrivals, according to an Agence France-Presse tally. According to a parliamentary report, more than 67,000 asylum applications were filed in 2023.
The fight against illegal immigration was a central part of the Brexit debate in 2016 and, like his Conservative predecessors, Rishi Sunak, the current prime minister, made it one of his priorities when he arrived in Downing Street in October 2022. The Tories are counting on the bill to reverse the electoral power dynamic ahead of the UK's general election, which could be held in the fall. The opposition Labour party currently has a 20-point lead in voting intentions.
Under the terms of the agreement signed with Kigali in April 2022, the first flight was due to take off for Rwanda in June 2022, but the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ordered it to be canceled at the very last minute. On Monday, Sunak promised to start sending asylum seekers to Rwanda in 10 to 12 weeks, which would be in July.
According to the BBC, 52,000 asylum seekers could be concerned. The prime minister, meanwhile, did not give a figure, but promised that there would be "multiple flights a month, through the summer and beyond." Planes have already been reserved and flights scheduled, he added. Five hundred people will be tasked with escorting the deportees to the planes.
In mid-November 2023, the British Supreme Court ruled that the bill was illegal. The country's highest court ruled that foreigners sent to Rwanda risked being deported back to their countries of origin, where their safety could not be guaranteed. This would constitute a breach of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, of which the UK is a signatory.
Determined to see the project through, the UK government presented a new draft that defines Rwanda as a "safe country" and, under a new bilateral treaty signed in December, prevents foreigners deported there from being sent back to their country of origin. The bill also prevents the courts from taking legal action on certain human rights provisions in British law, and allows the government to ignore the ECHR's orders.
The right-wing faction of the Conservative party had wanted the government to completely back out of several international treaties, including the European Convention on Human Rights, in order to prevent legal challenges. The House of Lords, where the Conservatives do not have a majority, delayed the final adoption of the bill by repeatedly sending it back to the House of Commons with amendments; which were in turn systematically rejected by MPs. The Lords, who are not elected, eventually yielded to the will of the House of Commons, which is elected by universal suffrage, and decided not to amend the text any further, therefore enabling it to be adopted.
With the new version of the text, which recognizes Rwanda as a "safe" country in terms of asylum, the government intends to limit appeals to the courts. Nevertheless, it expects a large number of legal challenges, which could be deemed admissible on individual grounds such as a person's health situation or sexual orientation.
Sunak has stated that he is ready. According to him, 150 judges and 25 courtrooms have been identified to examine these emergency appeals.
In its November 2023 decision, the British Supreme Court expressed several concerns about the Rwandan authorities' respect for human rights and their treatment of refugees. The judges, who unanimously ruled against the bill, also pointed out that in 2021 the British government criticized Kigali for "extrajudicial killings, deaths in custody, enforced disappearances and torture." They also explained that in 2018, Rwandan police had opened fire on protesting refugees, killing at least 12 people.
"Since Rwanda has ratified many international human rights conventions, including UNCAT [UN Convention against Torture] and the ICCPR [International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights], this raises serious questions as to its compliance with its international obligations," they added.
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has also repeatedly expressed its concern about Rwanda's respect for the right to asylum.
Although no deportations have yet taken place, the UK has already paid £220 million (€256 million) to Rwanda. London has also agreed to allocate a further £150 million to Kigali over the next three years; and another £120 million once the first 300 asylum seekers have been sent there, according to the UK's National Audit Office. A further £20,000 per deportee and £150,874 to cover the cost of processing each case are to be added to this total.
The British text has provoked fierce criticism, not least from the United Nations, whose high commissioner for human rights, Volker Türk, judged that it "directly undercut basic human rights principles." On Monday, three UN Special Rapporteurs – on trafficking in persons; the human rights of migrants, and torture – warned airlines and aviation authorities facilitating the flights concerned that they "could be complicit in violating internationally protected human rights and court orders."
For its part, the Council of Europe has urged London to reconsider its plan. "I have serious human rights concerns about the United Kingdom's Rwanda Bill. Its adoption by the UK Parliament raises major issues about the rights of asylum seekers and the rule of law," wrote Michael O'Flaherty, the council's commissioner for human rights, in a statement posted to X.
Several human rights organizations, such as Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch, have also expressed their outrage.
Translation of an original article published in French on lemonde.fr; the publisher may only be liable for the French version.