Ireland plans to send asylum seekers back to UK
under emergency law
Taoiseach wants to reduce arrivals through Northern
Ireland amid concern that Sunak’s Rwanda plan is driving people to Ireland
Rory
Carroll and Aletha Adu
Sun 28 Apr
2024 14.57 BST
Ireland and
Britain are on a collision course over asylum seekers, with Dublin vowing to
send arrivals to Ireland back to the UK and London insisting it will not accept
any.
A
diplomatic row erupted on Sunday after the taoiseach, Simon Harris, asked the
justice minister, Helen McEntee, to bring proposals to cabinet next week to
allow the return of inadmissible international protection applicants to the UK,
amid concern that Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda plan was rerouting asylum seekers from
Britain.
“This
country will not in any way, shape or form provide a loophole for anybody
else’s migration challenges,” Harris said on Sunday. “Other countries can
decide how they wish to advance migration. From an Irish perspective, we intend
to have a firm rules-based system where rules are in place, where rules are in
force, where rules are seen to be enforced.”
The planned
legislation follows a claim by Sunak that the Conservative party’s deterrence
was working, and after it emerged that 80% of recent asylum seekers to Ireland
came via the land border with Northern Ireland.
A UK
government source said it would not accept any asylum seekers from Ireland
without a wider deal with Brussels. “We won’t accept any asylum returns from
the EU via Ireland until the EU accepts that we can send them back to France.
We are fully focused on operationalising our Rwanda scheme and will continue
working with the French to stop the boats from crossing the channel.”
Ireland had
previously designated the UK a “safe third country” to which asylum seekers
could be returned but last month the Irish high court ruled that this breached
EU law, impeding further returns.
McEntee
said she would shore up Ireland’s controls and discuss the return of refugees
with James Cleverly and other British officials during a visit to London on
Monday.
“That’s why
I’m introducing fast processing, that’s why I’ll have emergency legislation at
cabinet this week to make sure that we can effectively return people to the UK
and that’s why I’ll be meeting with the home secretary to raise these issues on
Monday,” she told RTÉ.
In an
interview with Sky News on Sunday, Sunak said the Rwanda legislation signed
into law last week was already having an impact because people were worried
about coming to the UK.
“Illegal
migration is a global challenge, which is why you’re seeing multiple countries
talk about doing third-country partnerships, looking at novel ways to solve
this problem, and I believe will follow where the UK has led.”
Last week,
a protest in County Wicklow over proposed refugee accommodation led to violent
clashes with police who used shields and sprays and arrested six people. Police
said rocks and other missiles were thrown and they recovered an axe.
There have
been protests and arson attacks on proposed refugee accommodation centres and
demonstrations outside ministers’ homes, fuelling anxiety over far-right
agitation.
At a speech
in County Monaghan the taoiseach said warning signs around the abuse of public
figures should be taken seriously. “We have had too many warnings and we need
to take them seriously before the unthinkable happens.”
Ireland has
taken in more than 100,000 refugees, about three-quarters from Ukraine. There
is an acute housing crisis that has driven up rents and homelessness and
fuelled anti-immigrant sentiment. A riot last November
wrecked parts of central Dublin.
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