Rwanda migrant deal with UK is on! 'Safe' African state hits out at claims the deal is off

Claims Rwanda was cooling on its deportation deal with Britain were quashed today when senior officials insisted a new treaty would make it work. A Rwandan government spokesman vowed to fight “baseless” criticisms of its asylum system and lock in a new migrant treaty with the UK.

Yolande Makolo, the Rwandan government spokesperson, told the Daily Express her country is “safe and welcoming” despite concerns from Human Rights groups. “Rwanda is a safe and welcoming country for asylum seekers and migrants and the criticisms directed at our country are unwarranted,” she said. “Nevertheless we are committed to providing those seeking safety and opportunity a home in Rwanda.”

She also denied the Rwandan Government was considering pulling out of the agreement. “We’re actively working with the UK Government to turn the MOU (memorandum of understanding) into a treaty to reinforce the already existing guarantees on the concerns that have been raised,” she said.

She said the Rwandan Government believes the criticisms directed at the East African country are “unwarranted”. “As baseless as the criticisms are, we will continue to address the bias and misinformation,” she added. “We’re busy working with the UK government to finalise the treaty.

“As this is a partnership, it’s in the interests of both parties to challenge those who seek to criticise this innovative approach, while offering no alternative of their own.”

The show of faith came as Rishi Sunak said he is “finalising” legislation to push through the “vital” asylum plan as his “patience is worn thin” by delays. The Prime Minister met Rwanda’s president Paul Kagame on the sidelines of the Cop28 climate talks in Dubai on Friday.

Mr Sunak stressed he is eager to “finish the job” after the plan to send some asylum seekers on a one-way trip to Rwanda was dealt a blow when the Supreme Court ruled it unlawful.

His plan to save the policy involves the signing of a new treaty with Kigali and the introduction of emergency legislation allowing Parliament to deem the scheme safe, but this has been delayed. The Prime Minister insisted that Mr Kagame remained committed to the deal and it would soon be finalised.

At a press conference in Dubai he said: “We have a deep partnership with Rwanda, which he’s committed to, as am I.” He added: “We’re finalising the arrangements we have with them.

“It was good to check in with him on that and reiterate both of our commitment to making the partnership work. Paul and I have forged a very strong relationship over this issue. He’s keen to work very constructively with us, we’re keen to work very constructively with them.

“This is such a vital issue for the UK so it’s important that we get the details of all of this right.” He said he looked forward to bringing the proposals before Parliament and the British public “soon”.

The Daily Express can also reveal that the Rwandan Government has not asked for more money before it signs the treaty. They are also yet to ask for British taxpayers to cover any additional costs they may incur by reforming their asylum or legal systems, this newspaper understands.

The urgent need to get the Rwandan scheme up and running was brought into sharp focus after dozens of migrants crossed the Channel by small boat today.

Around 28,500 people have made the perilous so far this year, according to official government figures. Last year 45,755 migrants made the crossing, the highest number since figures began to be collected in 2018. Earlier, Mr Sunak he told broadcasters the goal is to “make sure that Parliament can declare unequivocally” that Rwanda is a safe place to operationalise the scheme.

Once affirmed by Parliament, he said, “there should be no more domestic blocks to us putting in place this programme”. “But I’ve also been clear that I won’t allow a foreign court to block flights taking off. “My patience is worn thin, the British people’s patience is worn thin.

“And although we’ve made great progress on this issue – reducing the number of small boat crossings by a third this year, something that everyone thought was impossible when I got this job – we’ve got more to go. “I want to finish the job and that’s why I’ll get the Rwanda scheme up and running.”

The Prime Minister has been urged, including by sacked home secretary Suella Braverman, to adopt tough legislation that includes “notwithstanding” clauses that can prevent judges from applying protections in the Human Rights Act and the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) to asylum cases. But Government lawyers have reportedly warned that instructing the courts to ignore the ECHR risks opening up more avenues for migrants to challenge the legality of deportation flights, on the basis that it would breach Britain’s convention obligations.

The Government’s hope of sending asylum seekers who arrive in the UK illegally to Rwanda is a key plank of Mr Sunak’s pledge to stop small boat crossings of the English Channel. Asked how far he would go on the ECHR, Mr Sunak said: “I am completely confident, everything that we are doing complies with our international obligations.”

Speaking to journalists en-route to Dubai the PM insisted the migrant deportation scheme will save taxpayers billions of pounds. He said the British public have been increasingly frustrated by the spiralling cost of housing migrants in hotels. “We are already, incredibly frustratingly for the British people and the taxpayer, spending billions to house illegal migrants in hotels, especially, and that’s not right, I’ve talked about it repeatedly, we have got to end that,” he warned.

“And we’re not going to end that unless we can have a successful deterrent that stops people from coming here, right? Because that in the long run is the billions that we need to save.” He said getting the Rwanda scheme up and running is crucial to finishing the job.

“In order to get the job done we do need to stand up the Rwanda plan because I want a functioning deterrent,” he said. “We’ve seen that deterrents work, we’ve seen it in Albania. Because we are now returning people back to Albania as a result of the new agreement that we have, as part of the diplomacy and statecraft that we’ve conducted over the past year, you’ve seen the numbers coming from Albania drop by 90 per cent.

“That tells you that deterrents work, so if you can have a functioning deterrent system, people will stop coming. And we need to now replicate that on a bigger scale, that’s why Rwanda’s crucial. “And if we can get that right, it will literally save us billions in the long run, so that is the right focus.”