Britain begins detaining migrants to be relocated to Rwanda

May 1 (UPI) -- Britain's Home Office said Wednesday it has launched the first efforts to detain migrants for relocation to Rwanda.

The goal is to deliver flights to Rwanda within 9-11 weeks, as promised by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, in an effort to deter migrant boat crossings into Britain.

"Operational teams within the Home Office have been working at pace to safely and swiftly detain individuals in scope for relocation to Rwanda, with more activity due to be carried out in the coming weeks," the Home Office said.

Detention capacity for these operations has been increased to 2,200 spaces and 200 new caseworkers have been trained with 500 "highly trained escorts" to carry out the detentions, according to the British government.

The British government said in a Wednesday statement that Rwanda has a strong track record of successfully resettling more than 135,000 refugees and "stands ready to accept thousands more who cannot stay" in Britain.

"Our Rwanda Partnership is a pioneering response to the global challenge of illegal migration, and we have worked tirelessly to introduce new, robust legislation to deliver it," Home Secretary James Cleverly said.

"This is a complex piece of work, but we remain absolutely committed to operationalizing the policy, to stop the boats and break the business model of people smuggling gangs."

The Labor Party has said it would end the Rwanda policy if it wins the next election.

Despite the party's declared intentions, Labour Party deputy national campaign coordinator Ellie Reeves would not say the party would release migrants detained under the policy.

"We want to get people back to their own countries if their claims have failed which is why we would set up those return agreements and also recruit a thousand case workers," Reeves told the BBC.

Refugee Council chief executive Enver Solomon said the government should not rely on detention but instead should process asylum claims efficiently and fairly.

"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 U.K.," he said.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak vowed in April the Rwandan migrant deportations would happen swiftly once Parliament passed legislation legalizing the deportations.

He said that the deportation detention roundups would have happened sooner if the Labor Party had not delayed the bill in an effort to block the resettlement flights.

Meanwhile, Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said on Sunday that he is asking his government to form a plan to return asylum seekers to Britain.

He said a newly implemented British plan to return migrants to Rwanda resulted in 80% of recent asylum seekers in Ireland coming across the land border with Northern Ireland, which Britain has denied.