LONDON: Refugees fleeing the violence in Sudan who arrive in Britain via small boats will face deportation, The Independent reported the home secretary as saying.
Suella Braverman warned that the government’s Illegal Migration Bill permits the detainment and deportation of those crossing the English Channel from mainland Europe using small vessels.
“There is no good reason for anybody to get into a small boat and cross the Channel in search of a life in the UK,” she said.
Despite Britain having launched urgent sanctuary schemes for refugees from Afghanistan and Ukraine in the past two years, the government has no plans to establish a similar program for Sudan.
But the situation in the North African country risks descending into a “catastrophic conflagration” and spilling over into the wider region, the UN secretary-general warned this week.
Since 2020, amid worsening conditions in Sudan, almost 4,000 Sudanese have crossed into Britain using small boats. Sudan is the eighth-highest country of origin among small-boat arrivals.
The number of Sudanese people arriving via this method will likely increase in the coming period, UK Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick warned this week.
He said people fleeing the conflict should avoid traveling to Britain and instead “seek sanctuary in the first safe country they reach.”
Braverman told Sky News that the UN High Commissioner for Refugees “is present in the region, and they are the right mechanism by which people should apply if they want to seek asylum in the UK.”
MPs have urged her to set up safe and legal asylum routes for Sudanese people. But the chaos in the capital Khartoum means it is unlikely that would-be asylum applicants could fly out of the country to Britain.
