Operation Rwanda: Inside Rishi's crack deportation teams charged with rounding up illegal migrants for transportation to Africa... as beleaguered PM pins hopes on policy after local election shellacking
After year's of furious debate Britain's Rwanda crackdown has finally begun, with Home Office agents this week detaining the first set of illegal migrants.
Armoured Immigration Enforcement officials took part in a series of dramatic dawn raids across the UK to round up asylum seekers who crossed the Channel in small boats.
Groups of men were pictured being handcuffed before being taken to one of seven immigration removal centres, where they will be held until they can be deported to Africa.
Codenamed 'Operation Vector', some 800 immigration agents are involved in the effort, which will see the first flights taking off in nine to 11 weeks, with 2,143 asylum seekers being targeted in the opening salvo of the project.
The landmark policy has been hailed by some as a potential 'Hail Mary' for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak as he seeks to stave off a white-washing at the next General Election - especially after the disastrous local election results.
But it has proved divisive, even within the ranks of the Tory faithful, with insiders admitting Conservative MPs are 'split down the middle', with some on the Right saying the policy doesn't go far enough and could fall foul to fresh legal 'challenges', while others are fearful over the cost of it all.
'Put simply, the PM has to deliver on this and finally get this policy off the ground,' one insider told MailOnline. 'There's genuine concern over whether the flights will take off and whether it will shift the balance enough... people are fed up at how long it's taken.'
Now, MailOnline will reveal just how the operation works, what will happen in the coming weeks and just what sort of hurdles the ambitious project could face.
How Operation Rwanda will work. This graphic shows the seven immigration removal centres where migrants will be held before they're put on a plane bound for the African country, with the first flights earmarked to take place in July
Migrants board a small boat in an attempt to cross the English Channel, on the beach of Gravelines, near Dunkirk, northern France on April 26
Immigration Enforcement agents were seen this week carrying out raids to detain the first Rwanda deportees (pictured)
The first illegal migrants, set to be deported to Rwanda, were rounded up by Immigration Enforcement agents this week, with some being seen led away in handcuffs
How do the raids work and who decides who's getting deported?
The Rwanda plan was first announced by the Government back in April 2022, when Priti Patel was Home Secretary.
The first migrants were meant to be deported on a flight back in June 2022. But it was cancelled minutes before take-off after an intervention by the European Court of Human Rights, in an embarrassing blow for the Tories.
Since then, it has been bogged down by legal challenges amid accusations it would be an 'inhumane' act to deport people to the African country, which has a patchy record when it comes to human rights.
It was eventually given the green light after peers in the House of Lords approved the Government's Rwanda bill earlier this month.
And while all the political turbulence continued to rage, the Home Office was busy building a list of 5,700 illegal migrants earmarked for deportation to Rwanda, whose applications for asylum have been rejected.
In 2023, almost 46,000 migrants sailed across the Channel to arrive illegally in the UK - with the Government now spending £15million a day to house them in hotels
The first deportations to Rwanda were meant to happen in June 2022 on this Boeing 767 at Boscombe Down Air Base. But the flight to Kigali was dramatically grounded before take-off following a legal ruling (pictured is the jet on the runway in 2022)
Earlier, a coach with outriders left Colnbrook, Heathrow Immigration Removal Centre on the day the flight to Rwanda was due to leave before it was cancelled at the 11th hour
More than 7,000 migrants have already crossed the Channel so far this year in small boats, following a record-breaking year in 2023 which saw almost 46,000 making the crossing
They all arrived in Britain illegally between January 2022 and June 2023, with many undertaking the perilous trip across the Channel from France in small boats to reach the UK.
With a new date now set for the next attempt to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda, and the first flights fixed to take off in July, Immigration Enforcement agents have begun the task of rounding up the first deportees.
The man charged with overseeing this mammoth task is Eddy Montgomery, the Home Office director of enforcement
The man charged with overseeing this mammoth task is Eddy Montgomery, the Home Office director of enforcement.
The 54-year-old has spent 30 years in the civil service and has been spearheading Britain's frontline operational response to tackling illegal migration for the past decade.
Speaking of the Rwanda operation, he said: 'Our specialist operational teams are highly trained and fully equipped to carry out the necessary enforcement activity at pace and in the safest way possible.
'It is vital that operational detail is kept to a minimum, to protect colleagues involved and those being detained, as well as ensuring we can deliver this large-scale operation as quickly as possible.'
Officials are targeting 2,143 people who they feel can be easily found and that they will have the best chance at catching, detaining and deporting.
These migrants all attend regular face-to-face meetings at enforcement centres as part of their immigration bail conditions, with officials knowing where they are staying and when they will appear for appointments.
The remaining 3,557 people are thought to more challenging to locate.
Asylum seekers following the rules, will be detained by immigration squads during surprise raids while the immigrants are attending their latest meeting at enforcement centres.
However, those already identified, who fail to turn up, will face sterner action from officers.
Asylum seekers are continuing to cross into the UK. Pictured are some attempting the journey from France last week
Last year, there were 67,337 asylum applications to the UK. Of those, 29,437 came from people who arrived in small boats. The Government claims the Rwanda scheme will act as a deterrent, however it only has the capacity to send 200 people a year to the East African country
What will the raids look like when they happen?
Agents, wearing protective body armour, will raid the homes of migrants and arrest them, before taking them away in vans to be transported away to .
Videos from this week showed such a bust, with a team of about six officials filmed arriving at a terraced house and entering through the front door.
In the footage, a female officer is then seen opening an internal door and announcing: 'Immigration.'
A man dressed in dark-checked trousers and a light-coloured hoodie then walks out of the bay-fronted house and steps into the rear of a detention vehicle. A security grille is then locked behind him.
Home Office agents launched a string of raids to detain migrants this week destined to be deported to Rwanda
One official was seen with a handheld battering ram on one of the raids - although it's thought this was not used
One migrant is pictured in handcuffs being taken out of a property by an enforcement officers, in scenes set to replicated elsewhere in the country over the next several weeks
Migrants detained during the operation were locked in the back of a van and taken to one of seven detention centres
In a second sequence, officers arrive at another terraced house and then leave with a bearded young man dressed in black trousers and a black hoodie.
The man walks out of the white-rendered property with his hands handcuffed in front of him, and is placed in a van.
The faces of both men were obscured in the videos and the locations of the detentions have not been disclosed.
It is not known at this stage how many people have been held in total.
However, scenes like these are expected to be repeated across the UK as the Government seeks to round up the first 2,145 people.
Where do the migrants go after they've been detained?
They will be shipped off to seven Immigration Removal Centres (IRC) spread across the UK.
Migrants can be held at the sites for the entire nine to 11 weeks before their scheduled flights - provided there is a realistic prospect of removal from the UK in a 'reasonable' timescale.
The facilities include the sprawling IRC complex near Heathrow Airport, which is the largest of its kind in Europe.
It comprises two separate adjacent sites formally known as Harmondsworth IRC and Colnbrook IRC, with a capacity to hold almost 1,000 detainees.
The centre was blasted in a report last year by watchdogs from the Independent Monitoring Board (IMB), which overseas prisons and detention hubs.
IMB officials raised fears over detainees being held for 'unacceptably long periods of time with no chance of imminent removal'.
'Five men were held in [Heathrow IRC] for over 180 days each in 2022, with the longest stayer having spent 1,177 days in detention,' the report said.
The other sites earmarked for use include two facilities - Brook House and Tinsley House - near Gatwick Airport, Derwentside IRC in County Durham, Yarl's Wood in Clapham, Bedforshire, and Dungavel House in South Lanarkshire, Scotland.
Detention capacity has been boasted by 2,200 places in preparation for the new arrivals. However, the additional spaces will also be required to hold foreign criminals and other immigration offenders already facing deportation elsewhere.
When will the deportation flights leave?
Flights are earmarked to take off in nine to 11 weeks - with the first anticipated to happen in July.
The Government says it has chartered a number of private commercial jets for the 4,100-mile voyage to the East African county, and that it has an airfield on standby.
However, the Home Office has not revealed where the flights will take off from, or who the commercial carriers are.
But the MoD's Bocombe Down base, in Wiltshire, is expected to be one of the airfield used. The site was previously earmarked to deport the first asylum seekers to Rwanda in June 2022 before the plan was cancelled.
Can migrants appeal their deportation? What are the legal pitfalls?
Detained migrants will be able to seek bail. However, lawyers have claimed Home Secretary James Cleverley would have to provide a removal date in a 'reasonable' timescale at that point to justify their detention.
Failing to do so could spark a fresh set of legal headaches for the Government, with potential court battles to reverse deportation bids.
A key change to the guidance issued to officials on Tuesday has made it clear that it is down to the Home Secretary to determine what a 'reasonable' timescale actually means. It has also made it easier to detain individuals who are deemed vulnerable.
But legal experts believe they will be able to mount court challenges to individual migrants' deportation under the Safety of Rwanda Act - despite the fact the legislation was meant to cut back on potential appeals.
Migrants can bring their case to court and fight against their deportation if they can provide 'compelling evidence relating specifically to the person's particular circumstances' that Rwanda would not be safe for them.
Legal challenges will be based on articles 2 and 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which defends the right to life and guards against torture.
Campaigners say migrants could mount a defence against the deportation on the basis of protecting their physical and mental health.
It's thought asylum seekers with a history of protest would have a strong case, given Rwanda's previous human rights record.
What's the reaction been to the controversial plan?
Human rights campaigners have branded the Rwanda plan 'inhumane' and claim it has led to 'fear, distress and great anxiety' among asylum seekers.
While asylum and immigration experts have called the scheme 'alarming', 'unconstitutional' and warned legislation behind it like the Illegal Migration Act 2023 and the Safety of Rwanda Bill were 'legally and economically unworkable'.
'The system of international asylum is based upon principles of compassion and fairness,' says Dr Raawiyah Rifath, lecturer in law, at the University of Exeter. 'Even if the Illegal Migration Act was workable, it falls very far below this test and the standard one would expect of a liberal democracy.'
While Enver Solomon, chief executive of the Refugee Council, said: 'The Government's move to detain people is causing fear, distress and great anxiety amongst men, women and children who have fled war and persecution to reach safety in the UK.
'Children have been sending messages to our staff terrified that their age-disputed status will put them at risk of removal to Rwanda. We have also seen a worsening in the mental health and wellbeing of people we work with in the asylum system.
'By contradicting the Supreme Court to push ahead with the Rwanda Plan, the Government is laying the foundations for the next asylum crisis. Our analysis has shown that it is likely to lead to an unprecedented system meltdown, leaving tens of thousands of refugees from countries like Afghanistan, Sudan and Syria stranded in permanent limbo and shut out of the asylum system.'
But Rishi Sunak has insisted the Rwanda plan is already proving a 'deterrent' and helping to drive migrants away from entering Britain illegally.
Last week Ireland's deputy prime minister Micheal Martin said the threat of being deported to Rwanda had caused an influx of migrants to cross the border from Northern Ireland into the Republic.
The Hope Hostel in Rwanda (pictured) is one of the locations migrants will be sent to
Rishi Sunak wants to relocate thousands of failed asylum seeker to the third country
On Tuesday, Irish Justice Minister Helen McEntee revealed she was releasing 100 police officers from desktop roles to work on frontline immigration enforcement, in response to a rising number of asylum seekers.
It comes as the Irish Government warned it would seek to return all migrants sneaking into Ireland from the north back to the UK.
But Mr Sunak ruled out accepting them back in Britain, telling MPs in Parliament this week: 'I can confirm that the United Kingdom has no legal obligation to accept returns of illegal migrants from Ireland.'
The Government is already forking out £15million a day to house asylum seekers in hotels, spending £4.3 billion more of taxpayer money than budgeted on asylum support in the last year, it was claimed earlier this year.
Insiders in the Tory party hope the Rwanda deportations could save Mr Sunak from a catastrophic result in the General Election.
But tonight a senior Tory MP told MailOnline the Rwanda scheme could face yet another blow, should the Conservatives lose three key mayoral elections this week.
The results of the first two contests for the role in the East Midlands and the Tory heartland of York & North Yorkshire will be revealed on Friday. Results for the third, where the Conservatives are seeking to dethrone Labour Mayor Sadiq Khan as London's first citizen will be announced on Saturday.
'Tory MPs are less worried about what happens in 12 weeks; they’re far more worried about what happens if we lose all three mayoral elections,' one veteran Tory MP told MailOnline.
'If we lose all all three mayoralties there could be a confidence vote next week and everyone knows it. Rishi could be in real trouble.
'This could have a serious impact on Rwanda.'
Where will migrants go once they arrive in Rwanda?
BY IWAN STONE
A plant-lined Rwandan hostel complete with a football pitch and basketball court will greet illegal migrants when they land from the UK.
The refurbished Hope Hostel, in the African country's capital Kigali, is one of the places migrants are set to be deported to.
Photos of Hope Hostel present a plush hotel reached by a road lined with towering palm trees and closely pruned, bright green turf.
The refurbished Hope Hostel, in the African country's capital Kilgali, is one of the places migrants are set to be deported to after the Rwanda bill
Photos of Hope Hostel present a plush hotel reached by a road lined with towering palm trees and closely pruned, bright green turf
Migrants can expect high-quality facilities after leaving the UK - with a floodlit football pitch allowing for an energetic escape at all hours
They can even stretch their limbs in other kitted-out arenas - with one multi-purpose pitch allowing for volleyball and basketball amongst other persuits.
Meals will be prepared in the hostel's main kitchen but provisions are also being made for those who want to prepare their own meals
The management at the four-story Hope Hostel says the facility is ready and can accommodate 100 people at full capacity
Based in the vibrant upscale neighborhood of Kagugu, it is situated close to many expats and several international schools.
The management at the four-story Hope Hostel says the facility is ready and can accommodate 100 people at full capacity. The government says it will serve as a transit center and that more accommodations would be made available as needed.
After they arrive from Britain, the migrants will be shown to their rooms to rest, after which they will be offered food and given some orientation points about Kigali and Rwanda, said hostel manager Ismael Bakina.
Tents will be set up within the hostel's compound for processing their documentation and for various briefings. The site is equipped with security cameras, visible across the compound.
Meals will be prepared in the hostel's main kitchen but provisions are also being made for those who want to prepare their own meals, he said. The migrants will be free to walk outside the hostel and even visit the nearby Kigali city center.
'We will have different translators, according to (their) languages,' Bakina added, saying they include English and Arabic.
Inside, photos show a bright and warm block of rooms where corridors are lined with healthy and colourful plants, with neatly kept pathways and open spaces.
Looking through the windows, visitors are greeted with a sea of green, with vibrant vegetation lining the complex.
The government says the hostel will serve as a transit center and that more accommodations would be made available as needed
Images also show space for large-scale talks, with tables and chairs set out for a panel and audience
A further medical bay shows a blue-cushioned bed in an airconditioned room
The site is equipped with security cameras, visible across the compound
Inside the rooms - some of which house two double beds - luxurious mattresses are fitted with neatly tucked-in white sheets and bedside tables.
And migrants can expect high-quality facilities after leaving the UK - with a floodlit football pitch allowing for an energetic escape at all hours.
They can even stretch their limbs in other kitted-out arenas - with one multi-purpose pitch allowing for volleyball and basketball amongst other pursuits.
There is also a red-carpeted prayer room. For those who want to light up, 'there is even a smoking room,' Bakina explained.
Images also show space for large-scale talks, with tables and chairs set out for a panel and audience.
A further medical bay shows a blue-cushioned bed in an airconditioned room.
Further rooms with desks, roller chairs and even computers allow visitors access to work spaces.
The hostel once housed college students whose parents died in the 1994 genocide, when an estimated 800,000 Tutsi were killed by extremist Hutu in massacres that lasted more than 100 days.
Rooms with desks, roller chairs and even computers allow visitors access to work spaces
Computers are available for migrants wanting to scour the net
Inside the rooms - some of which house two double beds - luxurious matresses are fitted with neatly tucked-in white sheets and bedside tables
The hostel once housed college students whose parents died in the 1994 genocide
Rwanda government's deputy spokesperson Alain Mukuralinda said that authorities here have been planning for the migrants' arrival for two years
The government has said the migrants will have their papers processed within the first three months. Pictured: Bathrooms in the hostel
While in Rwanda, migrants who obtain legal status - presumably for Britain - will also be processed, authorities have said, though it's unclear what that means exactly. Pictured: Showers in the hostel
