The Standard View: The Rwanda asylum plan is flawed and troubling

Some who have entered the UK illegally will be flown to Rwanda (Dominic Lipinski/PA)
PA Wire
WEST END FINAL

Get our award-winning daily news email featuring exclusive stories, opinion and expert analysis

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

We don’t yet know whether today’s flight to Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, will take off with even one passenger on board. But the policy of sending asylum seekers 4,000 miles away to central Africa raises difficult questions for all of us.

What does it say about Britain as a country, about who we are and how we want the world to view us? It is no coincidence that so many people, from religious leaders to the Prince of Wales, who must travel to Kigali for the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting next week, have come out against this policy.

It bears repeating - this is not a policy of offshoring, where people’s claims for asylum will be carefully considered. It is instead taking people against their will to a place they have likely never been, have not chosen not go to, run by an autocratic regime where, according to Human Rights Watch, “arbitrary detention, ill-treatment, and torture in official and unofficial detention facilities is commonplace”.

We need to have a mature debate about immigration and asylum. To grapple with the very real issues around push-and-pull factors and the brutality of the people smugglers, rather than tokenistic policies.

The Rwanda asylum plan fails on these terms.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in