This month, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's government joined an ignominious collective in announcing a refugee deal with Rwanda, seedily entitled the .
In no small measure, the agreement between London and Kigali emulates the 鈥淧acific Solution鈥, a venal response formulated by the Australian government to deter asylum seekers arriving by boat and create a two-tiered approach to assessing asylum claims. The centrepiece of the 2001 policy was the transfer of such arrivals to Pacific outposts in Papua New Guinea鈥檚 Manus Island and Nauru, where they would have no guarantee of being settled in Australia. Despite being by the Kevin Rudd Labor government at the end of 2007, the policy was reinstated by a politically-panicked Labor PM Julia Gillard in 2012 under the .
The victory of the conservative Liberal-National Party Coalition in the 2013 Australian elections led to its most cruel manifestation. Operation Sovereign Borders, as the policy came to be known, cast a shroud of military secrecy over intercepting boats and initiating towaways. The crude, if simple slogan popularised by PM Tony Abbott鈥檚 government, was 鈥淪top the Boats鈥.聽 Such sadistic policies were justified as honourable ones: Preventing drownings at sea; and disrupting the 鈥減eople-smuggler model鈥. In truth, the approach merely redirected the pathways of arrival while doing little by way of discouraging the smugglers.
More measures followed: the creation of a specifically dedicated border force kitted out for violence; the criminalising whistleblowers for revealing squalid, torturous camp conditions featuring self-harm, suicide and sexual abuse.
Inspired by such a punitive example despite its gross failings and astronomical cost (the Australian policy saw a come to $3.4 million), the Johnson government has been parroting the same themes in what the British Home Office , misleadingly, a 鈥渨orld first partnership鈥 to combat the 鈥済lobal migration crisis鈥. The partnership seeks to 鈥渁ddress鈥 the 鈥渟hared international challenge of illegal migration and break the business model of smuggling gangs鈥. Not once does it refer to the right to asylum, which exists irrespective of the mode of travel or arrival.
Johnson also the theme of targeting those 鈥渧ile people-smugglers鈥 who have turned the ocean into a 鈥渨atery graveyard鈥, failing to mention that such individuals serve to also advance the right of seeking asylum. More on point was his remark that compassion might be 鈥渋nfinite but our capacity to help people is not鈥.
If one is to believe the Home Office, sending individuals to Rwanda or, as it puts it, 鈥渕igrants who make dangerous or illegal journeys鈥 is a measure of some generosity. Successful applicants 鈥渨ill then be supported to build a new and prosperous life in one of the fastest-growing economies, recognised globally for its record on welcoming and integrating migrants鈥.
Rwanda is certainly going to benefit with a generous bribe of 拢120 million, slated for 鈥渆conomic development and growth鈥, while it will also receive funding for 鈥渁sylum operations, accommodation and integration similar to the costs incurred in Britain for these services鈥.
The country will also take some pride in sidestepping its own less-than-savoury human rights record, which of extrajudicial killings, torture, unlawful or arbitrary detention, suspicious deaths in custody and an aggressive approach to dissidents. In 2018, Rwanda security forces were at least 12 refugees from the Democratic Republic of Congo. They had been protesting a cut to their food rations. Various survivors were then arrested and prosecuted ranging from rebellion to 鈥渟preading false information with intent to create a hostile international opinion against the Rwandan state鈥.
The British-Rwandan partnership also perpetuates old libels in discrediting Channel-crossers as economic migrants who somehow forfeit their right to fair assessment. Emilie McDonnell of Human Rights Watch UK dispels this myth, noting Home Office data and information gathered via freedom of information laws revealing who travel by boat are likely to remain in Britain after claiming asylum.聽 The Refugee Council, of Channel crossings and asylum outcomes between January 2020 and June 2021, noted that 91% of those making the journey came from 10 countries where human rights abuses are acknowledged as extensive.
Refugees and asylum seekers are the stuff of political value, rising and falling like stocks depending on the government of the day. For Johnson, the agreement with Rwanda is also a chance to preoccupy the newspaper columns and an irate blogosphere with another talking point. 鈥淪ending refugees to Rwanda,鈥 The Mirror, 鈥渋s the political equivalent of a distraction burglary, only less subtle and infinitely more criminal鈥.
The event supposedly warranting such a distraction is serious enough. Johnson, along with his wife Carrie and Chancellor Rishi Sunak, were all found to have breached government COVID-19 emergency laws and fined by the police. In the history books, this is already being written up as the 鈥減arty-gate affair鈥, which featured a number of social events conducted by staff as the rest of the country endured severe lockdown restrictions. Those same history books will also note that the prime minister and chancellor in facing police-mandated penalties.
Johnson鈥檚 own blotting took place on June 19, 2020, when he held a birthday gathering in the Cabinet Room of 10 Downing Street. 鈥淚n all frankness, at that time,鈥 , 鈥渋t did not occur to me that this might have been a breach of the rules鈥. With such a perspective on legality and breaches, the Rwanda deal seems a logical fit, heedless of human rights, a violation of dignity, a potential risk to life and a violation of international refugee law.
[Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.聽He currently lectures at RMIT University.聽Email: bkampmark@gmail.com]