Mohamed Ahmed Removal Stayed - Orashia Edwards Back in Leeds
Leeds No-Borders Campaigns up date - Great news, Ahmed's flight was cancelled at the last minute on Wednesday evening and Orashia was granted bail yesterday and is back in Leeds, where he belongs, with family and community.

Over the last year people involved in Leeds No Borders have organised monthly socials, film nights, information stalls, fundraisers, anti-racist reading group, campaigns around new immigration bill, letter writing to people in detention & prison, talks, theatre workshops & visits, protests, a football game, signing & detention support v ia phone, distributed anti-raids bust cards, collected donations from students & Leeds festival & visited migrants stuck at the border in Calais.

Leeds No-Borders send their heartfelt thanks to all those who have supported.
http://leedsnoborders.wordpress.com/

West Midlands Landlords first to Face Immigration Act Fines
Immigration Minister James Brokenshire announced measures will be launched in Birmingham, Walsall, Sandwell, Dudley and Wolverhampton before being introduced across the country. From 1 December landlords here will need to take copies of all adult passports or residence permits. Failure to do this could mean a fine of up to £3,000.

Mr Brokenshire said the checks would be "a new line of attack against unscrupulous landlords who exploit people by renting out substandard, overcrowded and unsafe accommodation". He also said the Immigration Act 2014 measures will make it more difficult for immigration offenders "who abuse the system or flout the law" to stay in the country. A Home Office spokesperson said experiences in the West Midlands will be evaluated next spring before a wider rollout. BBC News, 04/09/124

17 Hundred Percent Growth in Immigration Detention Since 1997
In 1997 Campsfield IRC the first UK Immigration detention centre opened with 200 places. As of August 2014 the number of places had grown to 3,690 an increase of 17 hundred percent. On the 30th June this year 3,079 of those places were occupied, another 580 places in HMPs were occupied by persons solely detained under immigration rules, bringing the total of immigration detainees to 3,659.

As Mitie becomes the Home Office's largest provider of immigration detention this month, merging Colnbrook and Harmondsworth into a super-size 'Heathrow Immigration Removal Centre', Corporate Watch takes a look at the company's track record at Campsfield House, the only detention centre it has run before.
Read more: Corporate Watch <> 01/09/14

Early Day Motion 309: Women's Aid Save Our Services Campaign
That this House welcomes the launch of the Women's Aid SOS Campaign: Save Our Services: save refuges, save lives; recognises that specialist domestic violence refuges are life-saving services; acknowledges this national network of services in England is facing a crisis due to funding cuts and poor local commissioning decisions; further welcomes the aim of the SOS Campaign to protect the national network of specialist refuges and commit to exploring a new funding model for these services; acknowledges that a recent YouGov poll shows that 61 per cent of the population think that the Government should do more to preserve the national network of specialist domestic violence refuges for women and children; and calls on hon. Members to support the campaign by meeting with their local specialist refuge, signing the SOS campaign petition and supporting the protection of funding for the national network of life-saving refuges.

Sponsors: Lucas, Caroline/ Brooke, Annette / Abbott, Diane
House of Commons: <>02.09.2014

M.V. and M.T. v. France - Violation of Article 3 if Deported to Russia

The applicants, Mr M.V. and Ms M.T. (no. 17897/09), are Russian nationals who were born in 1983 and 1989
respectively and live in Angers (France).

Towards the end of 2007 the applicants accommodated Mr M. V.'s uncle, a former Chechen rebel between 2000 and 2006, on several occasions. Following his last stay with them they started being harassed by men close to Kadyrov (current President of the Chechen Republic) who came to their house a number of times, interrogated them regarding Mr M. V.'s uncle, and threatened and maltreated them. Fearing for their safety, the applicants left Russia. After they had left, the Russian authorities started looking for Mr M. V. After arriving in France the applicants applied for asylum on 5 November 2008. As the fingerprints they had provided were unreliable, the Maine-et-Loire prefecture rejected their asylum application, in decisions of 29 January 2009, on grounds of fraud and sent their asylum applications to the French Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons ("the OFPRA") in accordance with the fast-track procedure. On 25 February 2009 the OFPRA gave two decisions rejecting their applications, both of which were subsequently upheld by theNational Asylum Tribunal, on the ground that their explanation was not sufficiently detailed. They made two unsuccessful requests to have their applications reviewed. Two removal orders were also made against the applicants, who unsuccessfully challenged them. On 3 April 2009 the Court, having received a request for an interim measure under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court, indicated to the French Government that the applicants should not be expelled to Russia for the duration of the proceedings before it.

The applicants alleged that the implementation of the decision of the French authorities deporting them to Russia would expose them to the risk of being subjected to treatment contrary to Article 3 (prohibition of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment). Relying on Article 13 (right to an effective remedy) taken in conjunction with Article 3, they submitted that they had not had an effective remedy because their application had been processed under the fast-track procedure.

Violation of Article 3 in the event of the applicants' deportation to Russia
No violation of Article 13 in conjunction with Article 3

Interim measure: (Rule 39 of the Rules of Court) – not to deport the applicants – still in force until
judgment becomes final or until further decision by the Court

Just satisfaction: The Court held that the finding of a violation constituted in itself sufficient just
satisfaction for any non-pecuniary damage sustained by the applicants. It further awarded them
7,500 euros (EUR) jointly in respect of costs and expenses.

Judgement on available in French <>here . . . .

Judgment in Case C-575/12
Third-country nationals may enter the territory of the European Union even if they present a valid passport without a visa and a valid visa inside an invalid passport

Cancellation of a passport does not mean that a uniform visa affixed to that passport is invalidated

Don't Send Ahmed Back to Genocide

Update: Ahmed has been given removal directions again, for Wednesday 3rd September 2014 at 9:30pm.

Mohamed Babeker Osman Ahmed came to the UK from Darfur, Sudan in May 2014, and was detained upon arrival. He's been in detention since then, and has recently received removal directions, despite the fact that he is unsafe in Sudan. As part of the Fulani ethnic minority in Sudan, Ahmed faces persecution if he is to return to Sudan. Here in the UK, Ahmed has formed links with the Fulani community even whilst in detention, and has formed friendships and become part of the community.

In January 2014, after contact with the British Council, Ahmed came to the UK with a Sudanese community group to attend a course in community development. Upon returning to Sudan, Ahmed was arrested, investigated, and punished by the police for his involvement in the Group of the Environment, a Sudanese community group dedicated to building a strong community. The group has since been shut down by the police.

He fled an ongoing war in Darfur and came to the UK to seek safety. Ahmed was politically active in Sudan as a member of groups such as Group of the Environment, and the leader of volunteer organisation Active Citizen. He has faced police repression in Sudan for his political involvement, and would face investigation and likely imprisonment if he is to return to Sudan.

Please sign his petition <http://leedsnoborders.wordpress.com/dont-send-ahmed-back-to-genocide/>here . . . . ,

Major Action: Lobby Qatar Airways, quoting; Mohamed Babeker Osman Ahmed' flight number QR 002-UR 12929.

Qatar Airways (QR)
3rd Floor, Victoria Buildings, Albert Square
1-7 Princess Street, Manchester, M2 4DF
telephone: 0844 846 8380 or 020 7341 6031
fax: 0161 838 5398
email: tell-us@qatarairways.com
loncustomerrelations@uk.qatarairways.com

Email/Faxing Theresa May, Home Secretary  - please quote, Mohamed Babeker Osman Ahmed HO REf: A1854152, due to be forcibly removed from the UK on Wednesday 3rd September 2014)
Ask her to exercise her discretionary powers to stay the removal and release Mohamed and to grant him protection in the UK .

Rt. Hon Theresa May, MP
Secretary of State for the Home Office,
2 Marsham St
London SW1 4DF
Fax: 020 7035 4745

Privateoffice.external@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
pscorrespondence@cabinet-office.x.gsi.gov.uk
"CIT - Treat Official">CITTO@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk>

From: leedsnoborders@riseup.net

Iraq Violence Killed at Least 1,420 in August
At least 1,420 people were killed in Iraq in August as sectarian violence raged in the country's centre and north, the United Nations said on Monday. A further 1,370 Iraqis were wounded and 600,000 people forced to flee as Islamic State militants, who have grabbed large areas of territory since June, pushed into land controlled by Kurdish troops and targeted religious minorities. "Thousands continue to be targeted and killed by ISIL (Islamic State) and associated armed groups simply on account of their ethnic or religious background. The true cost of this human tragedy is staggering," the U.N. representative in Iraq, Nickolay Mladenov, said. The U.N. said the casualty figures could be far higher but it could not get independent verification of reports of hundreds of incidents in areas under Islamic State's control.

Grave Crimes Committed on 'Unimaginable Scale' in Iraq
United Nations officials today urged an immediate end to the acts of violence and abuses committed against civilians in Iraq, particularly against children and people from various ethnic and religious communities, as the Human Rights Council met to discuss the ongoing crisis. ÒThe reports we have received reveal acts of inhumanity on an unimaginable scale,Ó Flavia Pansieri, the Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, said in her opening remarks to the UN Human Rights Council's special session on Iraq. During the session, the Council adopted a resolution requesting the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) to urgently dispatch a mission to Iraq to investigate alleged violations and abuses committed by the so-called Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and associated groups. It also condemned Òin the strongest possible terms systematic violations and abuses of human rights and violations of international humanitarian law resulting from the terrorist acts committed by ISIL and associated groups Òwhich may amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.

UK: Protect Migrant Domestic Workers
The UK government should address, not dismiss, evidence that employers have abused migrant domestic workers in the UK, Human Rights Watch and the UK charity Kalayaan said today. A draft law before parliament is aimed at combating forced labor and other criminal offences but does not address a visa system that contributes to the abuse of migrant domestic workers by their employers.
Read more Human Rights Watch, <> 04/09/14

US: Tobacco Growers Act to Protect Child Workers
The decision by a leading US tobacco growers' organization to oppose hiring children under 16 to work on tobacco farms is an important step toward ending this hazardous labor practice, Human Rights Watch said today. In July 2014, the Council for Burley Tobacco, a Kentucky-based association representing approximately 5,000 tobacco growers in Kentucky, Tennessee, Indiana, and Ohio, approved a resolution adopting the position that "workers under 16 years old should not be employed in tobacco production not only in the US but worldwide."
Read more: Human Rights Watch, <> 04/09/14

Don't Deport Wadih Chourey
Wadih a 44 year old man with Down's syndrome currently living in Twickenham, is threatened by the Home Office with deportation back to Beirut. He came to the United Kingdom in 1997 because his life was in danger from the various gangs operating in Beirut. He was looked after by his parents and is now being looked after by his brother.

MP Vince Cable said the move by the Home Office to have him kicked out was "disgraceful"."This is a man who cannot cook for himself, who cannot operate a washing machine or use a computer. "His welfare is completely dependent on his brothers, who clearly provide a loving and caring home for him yet Home Office lawyers suggest there is nothing compelling or exceptional about the case and assume that Mr Chourey could seamlessly reintegrate into Lebanese life as if he never left."

Colin Marsh, chairman of the local residents' association, said: "Wadih and Camil are very much part of our community and Camil and his brother Joseph are both respected and admired for their love and care of their brother Wadih. The Home Office said: "He has appealed so it would be inappropriate to comment ."
Please sign Wadih's Petiton to Stay <> here . . . .

Bail Hearing: Orashia Edwards Jamaican Bisexual Asylum Seeker

Orashia Edwards, who has lived in Leeds for more than 14 years, claims to be at risk of persecution in Jamaica because of his sexual orientation. He was refused permission to stay in the UK by Home Secretary Theresa May in December last year. Mr Edwards is currently awaiting the outcome of a legal review. The Home Office tried to deport him in January, but his flight was cancelled after protests.

Leeds No Borders, who campaign on behalf of LGBT asylum seekers, said Mr Edwards is scheduled for a bail hearing in Bradford on Thursday at 10am. Mr Edwards has been detained in Colnbrook Immigration Removal Centre for the past month. He has a young daughter living in the UK along with the rest of his family.

Campaigners have frequently documented alleged cases of officials deporting LGBT asylum seekers back to countries where they face homophobic persecution. The claims have always been denied by the Home Office. Violent homophobia and transphobia remains a key problem in Jamaican society.
Pink News, <> 03/09/14

UKHO Immigration Statistics, April to June 2014

Published 28 August 2014: All data below relate to the year ending June 2014 and all comparisons are with the year ending June 2013, unless indicated otherwise.

Removals and Voluntary Departures
There were 12% fewer (-1,744) enforced removals from the UK in the year ending June 2014 (12,415), the lowest figure since the series began in 2004.

However there was a much larger, 3,940 increase (+12%) in total voluntary departures, to 37,216. Over the same period the number of passengers refused entry at port and who subsequently departed increased by 3% (+424) to 14,671.

In the year ending June 2014, there were 4,279 enforced removals of people who had sought asylum at some stage, down 15% from the previous year (5,058). This figure is 64% lower than the peak in 2004 (11,743) when this data series began. In the year ending June 2014, 66% of total enforced removals were non-asylum cases (8,136), down 11% from the previous year (9,101) and down 19% from the peak of 10,070 in 2008.

The highest number of enforced removals in the year ending June 2014 were for nationals of Pakistan (1,747; 14% of the total). The second highest were for nationals of India (1,148; 9% of the total).

In the year ending June 2014, provisional data show that 4,905 foreign national offenders (FNOs) were removed, an increase of 1% from the previous year (4,870).

Detention
The number of people entering detention fell 2% to 29,124. There was a decline, continuing a long term trend, in the proportion of detainees being removed, from 59% in the year ending June 2013 to 56% in the year ending June 2014. There was an increase in the proportion of detainees granted temporary admission or release from 34% to 36% over the same period.

As at the end of June 2014, 3,079 people were in detention, 2% fewer than 12 months earlier (3,142).

In the second quarter of 2014 (April to June), 19 children entered detention in immigration removal centres, short-term holding facilities and pre-departure accommodation, which, together with the figures for the first quarters of 2011 and 2014, is the lowest in the series. Of the 20 children leaving detention in the second quarter of 2014, 16 were removed from the UK, 3 were granted temporary admission or release and one was released into the care of the local authority.

Permission to stay permanently (settlement)
There were 24% fewer (-36,434) grants of permission to stay permanently (settlement), falling to 117,737, accounted for by falls in work-related (-12,495), family-related (-19,261) and asylum-related grants (-7,167), slightly offset by an increase in grants for other reasons (+2,489).

Asylum
There were 23,479 asylum applications (main applicants), similar to the previous 12 months (23,523), but low relative to the peak in 2002 (84,132). The largest numbers of applications were from Pakistani (3,081), Eritrean (2,115), Iranian (2,041) and Syrian (1,716) nationals.

The number of initial decisions on asylum applications has decreased by 26%, to 13,861 in the year ending June 2014. Of these decisions, 37% (5,066) were grants of asylum, a form of temporary protection or other type of grant.

At the end of June 2014, 21,104 of the applications for asylum received since April 2006 from main applicants were pending a decision (initial decision, appeal or further review). This was 45% more than at the end of June 2013 (14,589). The number of decisions outstanding increased during this period due to a decrease in staffing levels following a restructure initiated by the UK Border Agency. The Home Office has recruited over 170 decision makers since January to address this and is continuing to do so.

The HM Courts and Tribunals Service received 6,610 asylum appeals from main applicants in the year ending June 2014, a fall of 24% compared with the previous 12 months (8,754).

At the end of June 2014, 26,720 asylum seekers were being supported while their asylum claim was finally determined (under Section 95). The number of failed asylum seekers and their dependants receiving support (under Section 4) was 4,862. These were up 25% and 9% respectively compared with the previous year.

Source UKHO Statistics found <>here . . . .

Asylum & Immigration (Treatment of Claimants etc.) Act 2004

- introduced criminal penalties for individuals who fail to cooperate with attempts to obtain travel documents to facilitate their removal from the UK.  

BID’s Travel Document Project has been obtaining data on the number of criminal prosecutions and convictions under Section 35 of the Asylum & Immigration (Treatment of Claimants etc.) Act 2004 through a series of FOI requests, and we have just received the numbers for 2013 from the MoJ.   

From January 1st 2013 to December 31 2013, 4 people were proceeded against and two were found guilty.  

The number of criminal prosecutions and convictions under s35 spanning the entire period since the Act came into force on 22 September 2004, can be found in the table below:

Defendants proceeded against at magistrates' courts and found guilty at all courts offences under Section 35 of the Asylum and Immigration

Zahoor v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2014] EWHC 2751 (Admin) (08 August 2014)

Summary

This judgment is concerns the judicial review of a decision of the SSHD to refuse an application for further Leave to Remain on the grounds that the claimant had made his in-country application without having Leave to Remain because he had submitted a previous application which had been invalid due to the non-payment of the application fee.

The application for a judicial review of that decision was allowed. The judgment reaches the following conclusions of law:

(1) The correct test to be applied by the SSHD in 2011 was whether the application fee had been accompanied by the specified fee which meant, in this context, whether the billing data supplied with the application was such as would enable the SSHD to receive the entire fee in question without further recourse having to be made by the SSHD to the payer. That matter might be the subject of evidence in order to establish whether that requirement had been fulfilled.

(2) The evidential burden of proving what billing data had been provided on the form and whether that billing data had been correctly used in processing the fee was with the SSHD. The SSHD had failed to establish these matters and the claimant succeeded in showing that the application was valid. In consequence, the claimant's LTR had been extended under section 3C of the Immigration Act 1971 following his application and it remained extended after the SSHD's decision that the application was invalid.

(3) The claimant's further application for LTR made after the SSHD's invalidity decision was on analysis an application to vary an existing application for LTR. The claimant was entitled to vary his application by virtue of section 3C(5) of the Immigration Act 1971 and his extended LTR remained in being until his further application had been decided.

(4) The SSHD's decision that the application was invalid was taken on the wrong basis, namely on the basis that the fee had not been paid and not on the correct basis that the application had to be accompanied by the specified fee, namely by billing data that would yield the application fee.

(5) The claimant was entitled to prove that the specified fee had accompanied the application because the SSHD's decision was not determinative of that question, because the application remained for decision after that decision and because his extended LTR survived that decision. He was also entitled to prove that he had made a valid application as part of a subsequent application or in proceedings arising out of that application and without having challenged or had set aside the first decision.

(6) The FtT's jurisdiction decision that the claimant's appeal against the decision that he had made an invalid application was not an immigration decision and that the FtT had no jurisdiction to hear it was wrong in law.

The result of the judgment was that the decision granting the claimant LTR under appendix FM of the IRs instead of under paragraph 284 of the IRs was set aside and the SSHD was ordered to reconsider the decision on the basis that the SSHD should decide the applicant's application by reference to paragraph 284 and its discretionary powers and on the further basis the decision as to the nature and length of the LTR should be considered by reference to the unfairness of the claimant's treatment with regard to the application. Consideration should be given to the grant of immediate ILR.

BE (Application Fee: Effect of Non-payment) [2008] UKAIT 00089, Kapil Basnet v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2012] UKUT 00113 (IAC) and Naveed (student - fairness) [2012] UKUT 14 (IAC) approved and followed.

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2014/2751.html