The crisis of illegal immigration in the UK, and the imbalance in Brexit

The UK government launches legislation on migrants crossing the ChannelGT

The controversial new law to stop illegal immigration to the UK introduced by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in Parliament on Tuesday reflects one of the major problems facing the UK. This new law will enable the Ministry of Interior to deport those who enter the country clandestinely to their countries or to Rwanda, An African country 6,500 kilometers away has an agreement to transport asylum seekers. Deportation to Rwanda is still ongoing in the courts. In addition, you will be denied entry to the United Kingdom forever, as is the case in Australia and the United States. When the law is approved in Parliament, in which the Conservatives have a majority, it will be applied retroactively from the day it was introduced.

The origin of this crisis is Brexit despite the fact that the government does not recognize it and attributes it to the international migration crisis. But the truth is Since leaving the European Union, illegal immigration has multiplied exponentially Because the bilateral agreement between the EU and the UK that allowed undocumented people to be deported to France, Italy and the countries they left from has stopped working. To get an idea of ​​the scale of the problem, before Brexit, 800 illegal immigrants entered and last year 45,000 reached. This year their number is expected to exceed 80,000.

All these illegals enter the United Kingdom by boat through the English Channel which joins France and England and that would be the equivalent of the small boats in Gibraltar. Many of them die on the way in the days of rough seas because the boats are increasingly overloaded with people. Most of these migrants seek political asylum. They throw the passport overboard to avoid identification, complicating deportations and remaining in the country. Once on British soil, they are taken to a center in Manston and, from there, to hotels, where they await the outcome of their asylum application process, which can drag on for years.

now, There are 175,000 people waiting for asylum in hotels Which, according to Sunak, costs taxpayers 6 million pounds (6.7 million euros) per day. Many of these illegal immigrants flee from conflict zones such as Syria, Iraq or Eritrea. But a third of the 45,000 are Albanians who were brought into the country by people-smuggling gangs. These mafias are taking advantage of the massive legal vacuum created by Brexit. The bill was introduced to Parliament by British Home Secretary Soella Braverman, who represents the more hardline, Brexit-minded Tory faction.

humanitarian corridors

Braverman acknowledged that this law goes beyond international law, that is, it can violate international law and they are talking to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. He also said that with this law, They want to send a strong and unequivocal message to all those considering crossing the channel that this is a hostile destination, discourage them and dismantle the mafias. Their reasons for coming to the UK are because there is more lenient legislation here than in France, for example, and because there are better job options. Yvette Cooper, head of the internal division of the Labor Opposition, criticized the plan as futile because there was nowhere to send the undocumented outside of Rwanda. And Braverman recalled that the crackdown on lawbreakers in recent years initiated by Boris Johnson was for nothing.. Braverman was the general counsel to the Johnson administration prior to her appointment as chief of the interior.

The bill includes a revision of the modern slavery law that Albanian immigrants cling to in order to gain asylum, though border officials say that when they stop them they recognize they are economic migrants. They want to raise the threshold that people must meet in order to be considered slaves. They believe Albanians are abusing the law even though Albania is a NATO partner, having signed the Human Rights Convention and opting to join the European Union. Humanitarian organizations, for their part, blame the government for putting all migrants in the same bag. They ask him to create safe humanitarian corridors for migrants fleeing conflict zones as he did with Hong Kongers, Afghans or Ukrainians.

A mini-France-British summit is scheduled for Friday in Paris between Macron and Sonak To deal with the cooperation between the two countries, which has increased in recent months, since Sunak came to power. But this cooperation focuses on increasing surveillance patrols on the French coast. Since Brexit, the two countries have been passing each other’s laws separately, in an uncoordinated fashion. Macron has already said he will not allow illegal immigrants to be sent back to France who cross the border into England from his territory if this is not contemplated by a bilateral agreement between the UK and the EU.