Blair angry as Libyan Qaeda suspects win UK appeal

Two Libyans accused of being linked to al Qaeda won an appeal against their forced removal from Britain in a test case on Friday, prompting an angry response from Prime Minister Tony Blair. The men, identified only as DD and AS, said they would be mistreated because of their religious and political beliefs if they were sent back to Libya.

Britain’s Home Office, which argued the men were a threat to national security, had attempted to deport them under the terms of a 2005 memo of understanding between London and Tripoli which promises that suspects deported to Libya would not face torture, mistreatment or the death penalty.

But the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC) in London ruled the men should be allowed their appeal as “there was a real risk” their human rights could be breached if they returned.

“There is also real risk that the trial of the appellants would amount to a complete denial of a fair trial,” it added.

The British government said it would appeal the ruling.

“In order to be able to give a strong signal that those people cannot get away with what they want to do, we have to be able to deport people and send them back to their own country,” Blair said.

“It’s very hard for someone in my position, who is charged with the responsibility for trying to protect our country’s security, to be told that if there were doubts raised about the political system in the countries from which these people come, I can’t return them to that country when they are a menace and a threat to people in this country.”

The case was the first challenge to the 2005 agreement.

A lawyer for DD said the court’s decision should open the way for other Libyans to be freed.

The Home Office said: “We believe that the assurances given to us by the Libyans do provide effective safeguards for the proper treatment of individuals being returned and do ensure that their rights will be respected.”

Under human rights laws, Britain needs guarantees from countries that deportees will not be mistreated at home.

Britain has signed similar agreements with Jordan and Lebanon that deportees will not be mistreated.

Halya Gowan, deputy director of Amnesty International, Europe and Central Asia, said: “It indicates that the memoranda of understanding the UK authorities have signed with governments of countries known to use torture should be rescinded and no other such documents should be negotiated.”

In February, the SIAC ruled that radical Islamic cleric Abu Qatada could be deported to Jordan despite the likelihood he would face a flawed trial there.

DD and AS were granted bail. The terms are yet to be finalised.

Illegal migrants’ right to work wins support of public in poll

A campaign for an estimated 500,000 illegal workers in Britain to be given the official right to earn a living would have popular support, according to findings in an opinion poll.

The plight of illegal immigrants who are denied any right to work has been called “modern-day slavery”. It is said to be flourishing in Britain while we avert our eyes to the scandal under our noses.

Liam Byrne, the Immigration minister, said mass migration had enriched Britain but left UK society so “unsettled” that the issue could cost Labour the next general election.

But an opinion poll commissioned by Strangers into Citizens – a campaign to give employment rights to illegal immigrants -shows that 66 per cent of people in the UK would accept refused asylum-seekers and those who had overstayed their visas if they worked and paid taxes. The poll was conducted last weekend by ORB with a sample of 1,004 adults across the UK.

This poll makes clear that just talking tough will not be enough to fob off the UK public on immigration,” said Habib Rahman, chief executive of the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants. “They want the political parties to get real and respond in a way that is workable and fair to migrants who are living as members of our society.”

“Strangers into Citizens” is calling for the Government to allow a pathway for long-term illegal workers in this country to earn a living legally. They will hold a rally at Trafalgar Square on Monday 7 May to call for all immigrants who have been in this country for four years to be allowed a work permit for two years. It would become a route to “leave to remain” indefinitely while they work and pay taxes.

The campaign challenges the Home Office policy of stepping up the removal of illegal immigrants, who have either overstayed their visas or been refused asylum.

Austin Ivereigh, the co-ordinator of the campaign, said: “We are not calling for a general ‘amnesty’ but a six-year pathway to citizenship for long-term migrants. It is certainly not issuing a ‘green light for unprecedented migration’.”

He said one-off naturalisation programmes had been introduced in Spain, Germany and the US as part of a wider strategy of border enforcement. “It may not stop illegal immigration – that is a matter for border controls – but they do bring thousands out of limbo, recognise realities, clear asylum logjams, bring huge benefits to the state and shrink the underground economy on which people-trafficking and exploitative employers thrive,” said Mr Ivereigh.

Ken Livingstone, the Mayor of London, said: “Migrants contribute hugely to the economic, civic and cultural life of London and the UK. To have a substantial number of them living here without regular status – because of deep-rooted failings in the immigration system – is deeply damaging to London as well as to them.”

The Labour deputy leadership candidate Jon Cruddas said: “We must deal with those who no one wants to talk about – the 500,000 or so who have no status. Regularisation is about providing a solution to the problem everyone knows exist but which everyone runs from.”

Jack Dromey, the deputy general secretary of the Transport and General Workers’ Union, said the economic and moral case for an “earned amnesty” for migrants was overwhelming.”

New points based system to start in the new year

Key elements of PBS include:

• consolidating more than 80 existing work and study routes into five tiers:
  tier 1 – highly skilled, e.g. scientists or entrepreneurs;
  tier 2 – skilled workers with a job offer, e.g. nurses, teachers, engineers;
  tier 3 – low skilled workers filling specific temporary labour shortages, e.g.  construction workers for a particular project
  tier 4 – students; and
  tier 5 – youth mobility and temporary workers, e.g. working holiday makers or musicians coming to play a concert.
• points to be awarded to reflect aptitude, experience, age and also the level of need in any given sector, to allow the UK to respond flexibly to changes in the labour market;
• a system of sponsorship by employers and educational institutions to ensure compliance;
• financial securities for specific categories where there has been evidence of abuse to ensure that migrants return home at the end of their stay; and
• the ending of employment routes to the UK for low-skilled workers from outside the EU except in cases of short-term shortages.

Newsnight – Report on Immigration

Part 1

Part 2

Changes to the National Shortage Occupation List for Work Permits

New Occupations Added to the List

Teachers: with immediate effect, all posts in Scotland covering compulsory schooling will be added to the list.

As a result of this change work permit applications for Teachers in Scotland will no longer be subject to a full resident labour test. Please refer to the Business and Commercial guidance for full details.

Occupations Removed from the List

With effect from 29 May 2007, the following occupations will be removed from the National Shortage List:

• Senior Physiotherapists
• Salaried General Dental Practitioners
• Salaried Assistant Dentists
• Salaried Vocational Dental Practitioners

All work permit applications received by the Border and Immigration Agency on or after 29 May 2007 for these posts will now need to be subject to a full resident labour test.

UK needs “principled” refugee policy- rights groups

“Because of Britain’s involvement in the Iraq conflict, Britain should be playing a leading role in addressing this humanitarian crisis.”Britain must adopt a “more principled, more coherent” refugee policy, especially with respect to Iraq, where up to 50,000 people are fleeing their homes each month, human rights groups said today.

In a statement released a day before a U.N. conference to examine the plight of Iraq’s refugees, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International said Britain, as a key player in the war in Iraq, needed to take a lead on the issue.

“At a time when the international community is calling on Iraq’s neighbours to keep their borders open to asylum seekers, we believe it sends a contradictory signal for your government to be deporting Iraqis to their homelands,”

The organisations said in a joint letter sent to Prime Minister Tony Blair and also signed by Britain’s Refugee Council. The U.N.’s refugee agency, UNHCR, estimates 40,000-50,000 Iraqis are fleeing their homes each month to escape the fighting and sectarian violence that has riven the country.

It will host a conference on the issue in Geneva on April 17-18. Those refugees join around two million who have already escaped the country, most of them heading to Jordan, Syria and Egypt, causing humanitarian problems there. Some countries in the region are now threatening to close their borders to Iraq.

“As well as putting individual lives at risk, this would be a serious threat to the international refugee protection system, as well as the fundamental human right to seek and enjoy asylum from persecution,” the rights groups wrote in the letter.

In calling on Britain to adopt a “more generous, more principled, more coherent and more far-sighted” set of policies, they highlighted the case of three Iraqi interpreters who worked for the British army in Basra. After receiving death threats from insurgent groups, and after several of their colleagues were tortured and killed, the interpreters fled to Syria, where they have been trying to meet British consular officials to discuss asylum.

“We have been unable to get interviews to present our cases and our documents and to request assistance or asylum,” the three wrote in a letter sent to Blair from Damascus.

Church leaders condemn UK’s ‘horrifying’ treatment of asylum seekers

Anglican, Methodist and Reformed church leaders in the UK have raised urgent concerns about the impact on asylum seekers and other vulnerable migrants of “rushed plans” to re-organise the Home Office.

Four Church of England bishops, from across the theological spectrum, the general secretary of the United Reformed Church and a former president of the Methodist Conference have made their views plain in a letter to the Times newspaper, published on Saturday (14 April) which draws attention to the UK’s “draconian immigration policy”.

The church leaders warn that the proposed scheme to split the Home Office, championed by bullish Home Secretary John Reid, would increase the risk of bad decisions over refugee applications.

Backing similar claims made by human rights campaigners from both religious and non-religious backgrounds, they point to the much-criticised decision to deport a single woman to Iran, “although it has been demonstrated that to send such a person back to Iran is unsafe”.

The letter makes the point that the centenary of the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade is an opportune moment to reflect on Britain’s treatment of vulnerable and oppressed people today, and the “horrifying infringements of [rights]… happening on our doorstep.”

The signatories are: the Rt Rev Michael Scott-Joynt, Bishop of Winchester; The Rt Rev N. T. (Tom) Wright, Bishop of Durham; the Rt Rev Christopher Hill, Bishop of Guildford; the Rt Rev Dr Peter Selby, Bishop of Worcester and Bishop to HM Prisons; the Rev Dr John Vincent, leader of the Ashram Community and ex-president of the Methodist Conference; and the Rev David Cornick, general secretary of the United Reformed Church.

The full letter reads as follows:

“As Church leaders, we are profoundly concerned about the increasing risk to our nation’s public and political life of the inhumane and imperfectly processed decisions that are likely to result from the rushed reorganisation of the Home Office. We fear that yet more upheaval in the Home Office may result in greater casualties among those suffering from the brutalities of the Government’s increasingly draconian immigration policy.

“On March 24 there was an abortive attempt by the Home Office to deport a single woman to Iran, although it has been demonstrated that to send such a person back to Iran is unsafe. The scars on her face and body bear testimony to a suicide attempt after violence against her. Her disfigurement alone would call for compassion and humanity. Yet she was detained with a view to deportation.

“On March 24 we celebrated the Act to abolish the slave trade; we pledged ourselves to act in the cause of justice and humanity in today’s world. Can we ignore the horrifying infringements of these that are happening on our doorstep?”

Exception to the requirment of English language test

The UK government recently announced that from 1 April 2007 they will require individuals applying for permanent residence to pass the English language and knowledge of the UK tests.

There are some exceptions to the above requirement listed below:

1. Victims of domestic violence are granted settlement so as not to leave them with the choice of no avenue to settlement other than remaining in an abusive and possibly violent relationship. In addition, access to local authority funded support is only available if they are free of immigration conditions.

2. There is recognition that bereaved spouses who entered as dependants may be left in an uncertain position if they have not already taken the test and they are allowed to progress to settlement without taking it.

3. As with naturalisation applications there is an exemption for minors, those who are 65 or older, and on grounds of infirmity at the discretion of the Secretary of State. Because the immigration rules require parents and grandparents to be over the age of 65 to qualify as dependants of family members in the UK they are exempt and so is the group known as other dependant relatives in the immigration rules since they are normally required to be alone and incapable of caring for themselves in order to qualify for entry.

Sex assault on asylum-seeking mother and baby

An Algerian asylum seeker was stoned and sexually assaulted as she walked along a cycle path in Glasgow with her one-year-old baby. Police are hunting for a group of four males and have asked that three of them come forward and identify the attacker.The man, described as white and aged between 20 and 25, kicked the woman and pulled off her headscarf before exposing himself and sexually assaulting the victim, who has not been identified. He then tried to sexually assault the child.

 

The woman, who is 33 years old, managed to break free from her attacker and fled with her baby, leaving her headscarf, pram and baby bottle behind on the path. Police are examining CCTV footage for evidence.The attack took place on April 3 but the woman was so traumatised she did not contact police until Wednesday. She described her attacker as very tall and thin with very short hair and wearing white and blue tracksuit trousers.The officer in charge, Detective Inspector Andy McWilliam, said: “This was a particularly harrowing ordeal for the woman and her son. It may be the other members of the group are as disgusted with the sexual element of this attack on a defenceless woman and her one-year-old baby. They may be in a position to assist the police in identifying the individual responsible. I am also keen to locate the whereabouts of the pram, headscarf and bottle.”

The assault took place in Yoker, a socially deprived part of Glasgow which is now home to a large community of asylum seekers. It has been praised for the way it has tried to integrate those seeking refuge there and has been at the heart of the campaign to stop asylum seekers being deported. Groups of local residents have met at dawn to prevent the arrival of vans with teams intent on removing asylum seekers. The victim lives in the area.

This was a very sick thing done by some very twisted individuals. The fact that he ripped off her headscarf made this not just an attack on her but an attack on her faith. The police have described it as a racially motivated attack and they rarely do that. The area that it happened in is quite a cohesive area.

Home Office ‘collaborating with Sudan over refugees’

Human rights campaigners claim the Home Office is collaborating with the Sudanese government to question asylum-seekers fleeing the violence in Darfur.

The charities allege that the UK has passed information about individuals to the Sudanese embassy despite claims that they face persecution if they are returned to their homeland.

A coalition of pressure groups will today write to John Reid, the Home Secretary, attacking the Home Office for allowing Sudanese officials to interview people when they report to immigration offices. The Home Office insisted that it never passed information on asylum applications or criminal records to foreign governments. Officials said they did involve other countries to establish the nationality of people whose asylum applications had been rejected and people in Britain illegally so they could be given travel documents to allow them to return home.

Sadiq Abakar, 29, who fled Darfur for Britain in 1999, said he was asked questions about his background and tribe by a Sudanese official when he attended an appointment at the Home Office last month.

He said he was asked to go into a side room, where a Sudanese embassy official questioned him in Arabic about his tribal background. He said: “It’s like somebody taking you to see your killer. Since then, I have not felt safe. It’s just not right at all. It is really, really scary.”

Campaigners said asylum-seekers in Leeds were also questioned by Sudanese officials at an immigration reporting centre.

Michael Moore, the Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman, said: “This absolutely beggars belief, the sheer insensitivity displayed is scandalous. The Government is fast developing a reputation for its shabby treatment of asylum-seekers from the most troubled parts of the world.”

The letter to Mr Reid, signed by organisations including Human Rights Watch , the Aegis Trust and the Refugee Council, says: “Not only is this close working relationship disturbing, given the role of the Sudanese government and its security agencies in the persecution of Darfuris; it is also in serious breach of confidentiality and raises questions as to whether this is compatible with the Human Rights Act.”

Louise Roland-Gosselin, director of the charity Waging Peace, which drafted the letter, said: “Given the Sudanese government’s known complicity in the ongoing genocide in Darfur, it is deeply concerning that the UK is attempting to send people from Darfur back to Sudan. It has a legal obligation under international law to protect Darfuri asylum- seekers from persecution.”

A Home Office spokesman said: “It is standard practice to seek the assistance of other governments to establish the nationality of immigration offenders during the re-documentation process, if an individual is unable to provide their own travel document. However, the British government does not disclose information on an individual’s criminal or asylum history to other governments.”