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Asylum seekers: Enhanced enforcement on Border straying into ‘dangerous territory’, lawyers warn

Lawyer notes commitment from UK and Ireland to no checks because ‘issue of a hard border is completely untenable’

The row over asylum seekers crossing from Northern Ireland into the Republic has raised concerns among the North’s legal profession. Photograph: Niall Carson/PA Wire

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Seanín Graham
Thu May 2 2024 - 06:00

The row over asylum seekers crossing from Northern Ireland into the Republic has raised concerns among the North’s legal profession, with one immigration lawyer warning that enhanced enforcement is “dangerous territory”.

Sinéad Marmion of Phoenix Law in Belfast specialises in asylum and immigration cases and said it “wouldn’t be fair or equitable” if checks were done at the Border as it could lead to “racial profiling”.

On Tuesday, the Government said 100 gardaí would be made available for frontline immigration enforcement duties, although it insisted they would not be “assigned to physically police the border with Northern Ireland”.

“With any suggestions of enforcements or ‘pushbacks’, you’re getting into really dangerous territory where the Irish Government would be turning its back on well-established international refugee convention law and EU law also,” said Ms Marmion.

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She said similar pushbacks had taken place in Viktor Orban’s Hungary. “I think that would be a very extreme measure. People could be stopped and asked for their immigration papers at any point — that can be done anyway but the purpose of the open border is, as we all know, been fought for over a long period of time.”

Ms Marmion is one of a handful of immigration lawyers in the North with expertise in asylum cases and said claims about an 80 per cent spike in asylum seekers crossing the Border from the North following the passing of the UK’s Safety of Rwanda Act had left her “fuming”.

“It would be impossible to quantify for so many reasons,” she said.

“From my experience and anecdotally, I don’t think it’s true.”

Instead, she has witnessed the reverse trend, with the “high majority” of her clients travelling from the Republic to Northern Ireland to claim asylum.

“I’ve had around 1,000 cases over the past five years and over 90 per cent come from the Republic of Ireland into the UK via the Border; that’s a well-established route in my experience. In terms of clients, they’re more concerned if they’re going to be sent to Rwanda. They don’t say to me, ‘if this doesn’t work, I’m going to head south’. That has literally never happened. People come here for a particular reason and try to stay.”

Northern Ireland is under the same regime as the rest of the UK concerning immigration law; this means that migrants coming to Northern Ireland from Britain do not go through any extra checks or barriers.

“UK immigration law applies is a blanket law in terms of people staying in Northern Ireland after coming from Britain,” said Belfast immigration lawyer Úna Boyd.

“But if we’re talking about asylum seekers, they’re generally not permitted to move while their asylum claim is being considered — that’s simply because of support services and interacting with the UK Home Office.

“So if you’ve claimed asylum, for example in Scotland, you would be expected to remain in Scotland unless the Home Office moves you. Once granted your refugee status, you have essentially a visa and you can live in the UK, in any part of it.”

Ms Boyd said it was important to emphasise that Northern Ireland and the Republic have “two entirely different immigration regimes”.

“There’s often an assumption that if you have a visa to work in Northern Ireland, that you must have rights to cross the border, even as a visitor but that is not the case necessarily.”

She added, however, that people are allowed to enter a country “irregularly to claim asylum”.

“That’s provided for in the refugee convention ... the natural thing is people fleeing war and persecution very often have to go through irregular routes to get to a place of safety. That’s very often misunderstood; people think you can walk into an embassy and say I’d like to go to the UK as an asylum seeker but you have to get to the UK or Ireland to claim asylum. So I think it’s a bit of a legal falsehood to say that you could turn back people who are claiming asylum at the Border.”

Ms Boyd also highlighted the “very clear commitment” from the UK and Ireland to “no checks whatsoever” on the Border because “the issue of a hard border is completely untenable”.

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