Diane Taylor, The Guardian, Friday 25 November 2011
A human rights charity has alleged that the government is sending asylum seekers back to torture in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
A report by Justice First outlines the cases of 17 adults and nine children forcibly removed from the UK between 2007 and 2011. The report’s author, Catherine Ramos, travelled to Congo and recorded video testimonies of some of the interviewees, who are all now in hiding after their escape or release from detention in the Congolese capital, Kinshasa.
Returning people to countries where they face persecution contravenes the Geneva convention and other human rights legislation.
Among the allegations in the report:
• Two adults disappeared shortly after arriving in Congo; nine were arrested and imprisoned.
• Thirteen experienced various forms of persecution including rape and torture; two of the women were raped and two of the men were sexually abused.
• Six people were badly beaten and two subjected to electric shock treatment.
• Six of the children aged between 16 months and nine years were imprisoned and three held apart from their mothers.
• Four people paid a ransom to buy their freedom from detention; two paid a bribe to the Congolese authorities before they left the UK in the hope of avoiding arrest on arriving back in Congo.
• Most of those forcibly removed from the UK were active in political opposition movements.
Before they were forcibly removed, all of the asylum seekers were given assurances by the UK Border Agency that they would not be in danger in Congo.
The report, Unsafe Return, documents cases gathered from a variety of organisations working with asylum seekers in the north-east, Southampton, Winchester, Hull and West Yorkshire.
Ramos notes that UKBA’s operational guidance note on Congo has not been updated since 2008 and the country of origin information has not been updated since 2009. The government relies on this information when deciding whether or not to forcibly remove people to Congo.
The report highlights the UK’s failure to monitor the fate of people forcibly returned to conflict zones such as Congo where cases of torture are well documented.
A Congolese immigration officer interviewed in Congo for the report on condition of anonymity described how people with “political problems” were taken to a notorious detention centre called Tolerance Zero. “The returnee can have no excuse. There will be no pity shown. People are caught and can be killed in Tolerance Zero,” the officer said.
