How one migrant shows us everything wrong with our immigration system

This article was first published in The Telegraph.

Five years after a boatload of Sri Lankan Tamils landed illegally on Diego Garcia, the last one has been removed from the island. The island is home to sensitive military installations, yet our asylum laws meant that over the years it became a magnet to asylum seekers, who were crammed into a fenced-off camp there, described by some as an “open prison”.

Given the Chagos Islands’ status as a British overseas territory, accepting them risked turning the island into a back-door for illegal migration to Britain. Yet returning them was made impossible by our highly liberal asylum laws. In the end, it took the threat of Iranian missiles to end the farcical saga.

The story began in 2021, when a boat carrying 64 Tamils was intercepted by the Royal Navy. They claimed to be making for Canada but, in trouble, were escorted to Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. In the months that followed, another six boats landed on the remote island, with the number of asylum seekers growing to 349. Due to the strategically vital UK-US base there, the territory is supposed to be closed to outsiders, yet asylum laws meant that hundreds of migrants had to be housed on the island.

The British Indian Ocean Territory authorities found themselves in a tricky position. Officially the Refugee Convention and the European Convention on Human Rights do not apply there, as they were never extended to cover the islands. However, they had to accept the principle of non-refoulement – which is to say that they couldn’t send them back – was a principle of international law. Yet the joint UK-US base on the island meant that it was supposed to be closed to outsiders.

They began by trying to process the asylum claims, with Home Office asylum interviewers “seconded” to the authorities and the cases reviewed by independent reviewers, who were mainly retired judges and barristers. However, a legal challenge by lawyers in London against the process led to it being withdrawn, all negative decisions revoked, and the whole thing having to begin again. For three long years the migrants were stuck there, in a camp costing British taxpayers over £108,000 a day.

The asylum seekers were housed in military tents on a site nicknamed “Thunder Cove”. They leaked and soon ended up infested with rats. There were sexual assaults and harassment, as well as hunger strikes, suicide attempts and self-harm. Some asylum seekers had to be sent to Rwanda for medical treatment. Others chose voluntary return. The total cost rose into the tens of millions, with the Foreign Office warning it could rise to £50m a year. Attempts to restrict the asylum seekers from leaving the camp, to prevent them wandering into the base, have been ruled illegal, meaning that compensation is likely to be paid.

Following the general election in 2024, 39 of the asylum seekers were granted humanitarian visas to come to Britain, although this did not constitute permanent settlement or recognition of their refugee claims. When this was announced in the camp, most of the single men who were not granted these visas began to self-harm, some in front of children. There were also two suicide attempts. This blackmail worked, with the visas extended to cover 61 of the 64 remaining migrants. Those excluded were the three who had criminal convictions.

Two of those are serving custodial sentences. The other is “KP”, who is a convicted criminal, but whose custodial sentence is over. He was tortured, sexually assaulted, and abused by the Sri Lankan army in 2007, so cannot be returned there. While on Diego Garcia he was convicted of arson for setting fire to his own tent, and four offences of sexual assault against a woman. The then home secretary had argued therefore that letting him come to Britain would be contrary to the government’s policy on reducing violence against women and girls. The Foreign Office, in response, asked 23 different countries to take him, but was turned down by all of them.

He was also one of those who attempted suicide and had mental health problems. This led to him being provided with a whole staff of medical, mental health, and security professionals to look after him. When Iran recently launched missiles against Diego Garcia, a charter flight was booked to bring him to Britain, as it was judged that it was no longer safe to keep him on the island. A last-minute agreement with the Maldives means that he will be sent there, thus necessitating another charter flight, but it only says they have to look after him for 30 days.

This saga exposes the fundamental problem of modern asylum laws. Without the ability to remove most illegal arrivals swiftly, countries can be bullied into accepting people who may not be genuine. In the meantime, they incur high costs to process and house them. Among the asylum seekers are criminals who pose a danger to others.

Does anyone think that burdening British taxpayers with the financial and social cost of men like KP, for years or even a lifetime, is just? Tackling this requires having a willing third-party country who can take them, as was tried with the Rwanda Plan, or being willing to abandon some of the key planks of international law, which have long since failed to serve their intended purpose.