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Tamil Sri Lankan asylum seekers who have been held for more than three years on the Island of Diego Garcia in the Chagos Archipelago, which is currently under colonial rule by the British Indian Island Territory Administration, will be offered the opportunity to transfer to the UK.
LEIGH DAY reports that it is understood that a statement will be made within 48 hours by Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announcing that the group of sixty-one individuals, including sixteen children, will be brought to safety in the UK.
Discussions about transferring the group were announced in a letter from Government lawyers presented in the High Court on November 4, 2024. It followed a trial of the asylum seekers’ claims of unlawful detention and habeas corpus (the right not to be unlawfully imprisoned) on Diego Garcia in September.
Taken there by Royal Navy personnel after being rescued at sea, the group have been held on the US military base island of Diego Garcia since October 2021. They are living in a fenced and guarded compound, and their situation has become so abhorrent that there have been recurring attempts at suicide and self-harm by twenty members of the group.
In June, BIOT Commissioner Paul Candler described the situation in the camp to UK government ministers as “dangerous and unsustainable” and concluded that by remaining on Diego Garcia, children in particular are suffering from “immediate and ongoing harm”. One of the Commissioner’s medical team, Diego Garcia, described the camp as “in complete crisis”.
Mr Candler wrote to the then and present foreign secretaries, David Cameron and David Lammy, respectively, urging urgent action to remove the asylum seekers from Diego Garcia. But no action was taken, and the Commissioner resigned his post.
Yesterday, judgement was due after Ms Justice Margaret Obi, Acting Justice of the BIOT Supreme Court, held a judicial review hearing of the asylum seekers’ claims of unlawful detention and habeas corpus.
However, government lawyers presented a letter to the court stating that their clients would grant migrants with no criminal conditions, outstanding charges, or investigations the opportunity to be transferred to the UK. The transfer would, however, be subject to entry clearance applications being submitted.
Leigh Day and Duncan Lewis represented the asylum seekers. Based in London, it was the first time the lawyers met their clients in person since they started acting for them three years ago.
Leigh Day’s solicitor, Tom Short, accepted the “Home Secretary’s belated decision to offer them safety in the UK” on behalf of their clients.
He said, “Today’s decision is an enormous relief to our clients, and we urge the Home Secretary to close the camp and bring our clients here without any further delay so that they can begin their recovery.”
