Rwanda asylum seekers will use people smugglers for deadly trip back to UK, says country’s opposition leader

 

Rwanda's opposition leader Victoire Ingabire, seen here outside Nyarugenge prison after being released on September 15, 2018, believes asylum seekers sent from the UK to Rwanda will leave and try to reach Europe again (Photo: Cyril Ndegeya /AFP via Getty Images)

 

Rwanda asylum seekers will use people smugglers for deadly trip back to UK, says country’s opposition leader

 

Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza has accused Rwanda’s government of not respecting human rights and of running a ‘dictatorial regime’

 

By Joe Duggan

June 14, 2022 3:00 pm(Updated 10:31 pm)

https://inews.co.uk/news/rwanda-asylum-seekers-people-smugglers-back-uk-1685927

 

Asylum seekers sent from the UK to Rwanda will flee the African country and risk death by using people-smuggling gangs to reach Europe again, the country’s opposition leader has said.

 

Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza branded the government of Rwanda a “dictatorial regime” which “doesn’t care” about asylum seekers being sent from Britain.

 

She accused the UK Government of breaching the UN’s 1951 Refugee Convention over its Rwanda policy and said she was “surprised” to learn about the Home Office scheme, which is costing UK taxpayers £120m over five years.

 

“The Government of Rwanda knows that these refugees will not stay in Rwanda,” Ms Ingabire told i. “This is why they accepted this deal.”

 

Ms Ingabire, 53, a leading critic of President Paul Kagame, spent eight years in prison after being convicted in 2010 of genocide denial following her return to Rwanda from exile to take part in presidential elections.

 

“This is a dictatorial regime,” she said. “All the power is in the hands of President Kagame. The justice, the judges are not free, we have a parliament that can’t do anything or make any decisions.”

 

When asked about the threat of asylum seekers turning to people smugglers to leave Rwanda after they are deported there, Ms Ingabire pointed to the estimated 4,000 asylum seekers deported from Israel to Rwanda and Uganda under a secret deal from 2014 to 2017 as proof that most who arrive from the UK will also leave.

 

The majority escaped almost immediately, with many attempting to return to Europe via people-smuggling routes.

 

“Where are the refugees that Israel sent to Rwanda? They are no longer in Rwanda,” she said. “They left and went back in Europe.

 

“That will happen again with these refugees that the UK will send to Rwanda. They will not be in prison – they have a right to go where they want.

 

“That means they will not stay in Rwanda and the Government of Rwanda knows that.”

 

In 2018, an Oxford University study found that Eritrean and Sudanese migrants sent by Israel to Rwanda and Uganda made a “dangerous journey” through South Sudan, Sudan and Libya en route to Europe.

 

During the journey, they were subjected to human trafficking, incarceration, the threat of forcible deportation to Eritrea, harsh conditions of starvation, violence and slavery in torture camps in Libya.

 

After that, they then faced a dangerous crossing of the Mediterranean Sea from Libya to Europe.

 

Ms Ingabire, a member of the Hutu ethnic group, was handed a 15-year jail sentence after questioning why Rwanda’s official memorial to the 1994 genocide did not include any Hutus.

 

Five of her eight years in jail were spent in solitary confinement before her release under a presidential pardon in 2018. She is unable to leave the country, with the Government barring her from visiting her husband and children in the Netherlands.

 

The leader of the opposition Dalfa-Umurinzi party believes her conviction was politically motivated.

 

“Everybody knows Rwanda is known to be a country where democracy and human rights are not respected,” she said.

 

“The British Government know it, they know Rwanda’s government does not respect human rights and they decided to send refugees to a country like Rwanda.

 

“The Geneva Convention says you can’t send refugees to a country when you know their liberty could be in danger.”

 

She said that four members of the opposition have been killed and four disappeared in recent years, with the Rwandan government unable to provide answers.

 

“In two years, four members from the political party have disappeared and four others were killed,” she said.

 

“Until today, the Rwanda government cannot explain who killed these people. The problem is only members of the opposition were killed. Nobody from the ruling party was killed or disappeared, only members of the opposition.”

 

Disappearance of Dom Phillips and Bruno Araújo Pereira is 'tip of the iceberg' of Amazon crime

Disappearance of Dom Phillips and Bruno Araújo Pereira is 'tip of the iceberg' of Amazon crime

14 June, 2022

She believes that asylum seekers “don’t have a future in Rwanda” and questioned what will happen at the end of the UK Government’s five-year trial scheme.

 

“I am wondering what will happen after five years if the British Government will no longer pay the Rwanda government,” she said.

 

“The British government now pays for where they stay. If the British Government stops giving this money what will happen with them?

 

“Many young people in Rwanda don’t have a job. This doesn’t mean that the government has jobs to offer these refugees. Rwanda is a poor country.”

 

A UK Government spokesperson said: “Rwanda is a safe country and has previously been recognised for providing a safe haven for refugees – we will not be deterred in delivering our plans to fix the broken asylum system which will ultimately save lives.”

 

i has contacted the Government of Rwanda for comment.