LONDON: The UK interior minister has defended a parliamentary aide who called the government plan to deport illegal migrants to Rwanda “crap,” in a leaked audio revealed by the BBC Sunday.
A controversial law by the Conservative government allowing irregular migrants arriving in the UK to be deported to Rwanda was finally passed in April, after months of parliamentary wrangling.
But in the recording James Sunderland, a parliamentary aide and Conservative party candidate, was heard saying: “the policy is crap, ok? It’s crap.”
“But it’s not about the policy. It’s about the effect of the policy,” he went on to say, speaking at a Youth Conservatives conference in April.
“There is no doubt at all that when those first flights take off it will send such a shockwave across the Channel,” Sunderland clarified.
Home Secretary James Cleverly said he was “surprised,” when asked about the audio, before saying Sunderland was making a “counterintuitive statement to grab the attention.”
Cleverly told Sky News on Sunday that his aide Sunderland “is completely supportive of the deterrent effect.”
Sunderland told the BBC he was “disappointed” to have been recorded at a private event, and said although the policy is “not the be all and end all,” it is “part of a wider response.”
No flights deporting asylum seekers have actually taken off yet for the African country, due to lengthy legal challenges and with parliament dissolved ahead of a looming general election on July 4.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has said the policy would only come into effect after the election, if he was re-elected.
The opposition Labour party — which looks poised to replace the Conservatives — has promised to scrap the Rwanda plan.
The government cleared a law allowing some asylum seekers to be deported in April, circumventing a Supreme Court ruling that said sending migrants to Rwanda in this way would be illegal because it “would expose them to a real risk of ill-treatment.”
Supporters of the Rwanda policy say it will deter tens of thousands of annual cross-Channel arrivals by small boats, and insist the policy is already having an impact.
More than 12,000 irregular migrants have crossed the Channel to Britain on small boats this year, according to government data.
Aide to UK minister calls Rwanda migrant plan ‘crap’ in leaked audio
https://arab.news/9kgac
Aide to UK minister calls Rwanda migrant plan ‘crap’ in leaked audio
Zelensky says Russia using Belarus territory to circumvent Ukrainian defenses
- While President Lukashenko has vowed to commit no troops to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, he allowed Russia to use Belarusian territory to launch its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine
KYIV: President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Friday that Russia was using ordinary apartment blocks on the territory of its ally Belarus to attack Ukrainian targets and circumvent Kyiv’s defenses.
The Kremlin used Belarusian territory to launch its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine and Belarus remains a steadfast ally, though longstanding President Alexander Lukashenko has vowed to commit no troops to the conflict.
“We note that the Russians are trying to bypass our defensive interceptor positions through the territory of neighboring Belarus. This is risky for Belarus,” Zelensky wrote on Telegram after a military staff meeting.
“It is unfortunate that Belarus is surrendering its sovereignty in favor of Russia’s aggressive ambitions.”
Zelensky said Ukrainian intelligence had observed that Belarus was deploying equipment to carry out its attacks “in Belarusian settlements near the border, including on residential buildings.
“Antennae and other equipment are located on the roofs of ordinary five-story apartment buildings, which help guide ‘Shaheds’ (Russian drones) to targets in our western regions. This is an absolute disregard for human lives, and it is important that Minsk stops playing with this.”
The Russian and Belarusian defense ministries did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Zelensky said the staff meeting also discussed ways of financing interceptor drones, which officials in Kyiv see as the best economically viable means of tackling Russian drone attacks, which have grown in intensity in recent months.
The president said the Ukrainian military’s general staff had been charged with working out changes to strategy in fending off air attacks “to defend infrastructure and frontline positions.”
Lukashenko this month said Russia’s Oreshnik ballistic missile system, described by Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin as impossible to intercept, had been deployed to Belarus and entered active combat duty.
An assessment by two US researchers, reported by Reuters on Friday, said Moscow was likely stationing the nuclear-capable hypersonic Oreshnik at a former air base in eastern Belarus, a development that could bolster Russia’s ability to deliver missiles across Europe.
