The Guardian reported on Wednesday that the British home secretary refused to say whether or not Olympic runner and trafficking victim Mo Farah would have been deported under new plans to crack down on asylum-seekers.
An attorney for the government, Suella Braverman, has stated that the plan to detain and deport asylum-seekers crossing the English Channel is legal.
She and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak have outlined a plan to reduce the number of migrants crossing into Europe and discourage asylum seekers from making the perilous journey across the English Channel.
While presenting the strategy, Braverman said it is “more than 50 percent” likely to violate human rights laws.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees expressed “profound concern” after learning of the strategy, calling it a “clear breach of the refugee convention.”
In light of the growing number of asylum applications in the UK, these plans were announced. Currently, 166,000 people are waiting for their cases to be resolved.
In a TV interview, Braverman was asked if Farah would have been deported if the strategy had been in place.
She struggled to answer, saying: “Well, as I said, we are very proud of our world-leading modern slavery regime. We have some of the strongest safeguards against human trafficking in the world, and the Conservative government can be justifiably proud of the measures it has taken to protect victims of modern slavery.
The government’s new strategy, which will be proposed in Parliament, is two-pronged: first, it aims to halt boats crossing the English Channel; second, it will introduce an annual limit on the number of people who will be offered asylum through legal routes.
At a press conference, Sunak said that the new strategy would result in the “within weeks” deportation of illegal immigrants living in Britain.
Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said on the BBC, “I think that they are being irresponsible in the way that they’re doing this,” echoing the sentiments of many in the opposition who have voiced their disapproval of the plan. Over and over, instead of actually addressing the issue at hand, they resort to “gimmicks,” “rhetoric,” and “intensified debate.”
