“The combined effects of this bill, which seeks to shield government actions from ordinary legal scrutiny, directly contradicts fundamental principles of human rights,” United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Dürk said in a statement.
Conservative British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has made the plan a cornerstone of his policy to combat illegal immigration and hopes to implement it before this year's scheduled general election. In mid-January he described it as an “urgent national priority”.
The bill was drawn up in response to the British Supreme Court ruling that sending migrants to Rwanda was illegal because the country could not be considered safe for them.
The bill, backed by a new deal between London and Kigali, defines Rwanda as a safe third country, preventing migrants from being sent back to their home countries.
But the most controversial UK bill has been criticized by the head of the Anglican Church and the United Nations.
Last week, a British parliamentary committee found the plan “fundamentally inconsistent” with the country's human rights obligations.
The commission is particularly concerned with “the courts' perception of Rwanda as a 'safe' country and the limitation of access to the courts to appeal judgments”.
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights criticized the fact that the bill “significantly reduces the ability of courts to review expulsion decisions” and called for a review of the bill in light of the concerns raised by the commission.
“I urge the British government to take all necessary steps to ensure full compliance with the UK's international legal obligations and to protect its proud history of effective and independent judicial review,” Turk said.
The bill has divided the European People's Party (Christian Democrats) and European Democrats, with some MEPs criticizing the text and others calling for it to be toughened. The latter tried, unsuccessfully, to change the text before it was accepted by the delegates.
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