Not Rwanda, Not Anywhere
In spring 2024, the UK government started rounding up people and detaining them to deport them to Rwanda. This is part of the disgraceful deal that the UK struck with Rwanda to permanently expel people from the UK to the central African country. The first Rwanda deportation flight was grounded in 2022 after protests, direct action and legal intervention. But the government's cruelty continues, and they have even said they want to expand this horrific deal with other countries.
The Rwanda plan is only the most recent example of violence by the UK state against people who come to this country. The UK has a vast and violent detention regime, which is expanding with hotels and other accommodation being turned into immigration prisons. Recently, this includes converting a military site in Manston, Kent, into an internment camp and the Bibby Stockholm barge into a floating ‘death trap’.
The impact of these policies on people cannot be understated: from the perilous journeys made ever more dangerous by the closure of safe routes, to the physical violence of detention and forced deportation, to the mental anguish suffered by those detained with uncertainty or left destitute with the threat of expulsion to a place they have never known hanging over their heads.
The only way we can fight against this violence and injustice is by coming together. We stopped the first deportation flight to Rwanda before, and the UK Supreme Court has ruled the plan unlawful. Despite this, the government is pushing through, again planning deportations that they claim will start in summer 2024.
In the meantime, they also passed horrific new laws including the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, Illegal Migration Act 2023, and the outrageous and misleadingly titled ‘Safety of Rwanda’ Act 2024, as well as desperate attempts to clamp down on dissent and our right to protest through the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and Public Order Act 2023.