Foreign Secretary asks Home Secretary to give Sri Lankan asylum seekers stranded on Diego Garcia safe haven in UK

Foreign Secretary David Lammy wrote to Home Secretary Yvette Cooper on 16 July to raise the matter after the BIOT Commissioner told him there was an ongoing, immediate and growing risk of harm to migrant children among the group of more than 60 asylum seekers detained on the island.

Lawyers representing the group called for the government to take immediate action and put an end to the suffering of the group, some of whom have made suicide attempts in recent weeks.

At a directions and bail hearing on Tuesday 23 July for members of the group represented by Leigh Day, Duncan Lewis and Wilson Solicitors, the Court heard that the BIOT Commissioner accepts that the needs of children in the group cannot be sufficiently met in BIOT. Asylum seekers have told their lawyers that they cannot endure life on Diego Garcia anymore. Their daily protests had previously gone unheard and, losing all hope, many have resorted to self-harm. 

Many individuals had put their hopes in a decision of the BIOT Supreme Court to hear an unlawful detention claim on Diego Garcia in July. Those hopes were destroyed after the hearing was vacated when the US made an extraordinary intervention and said it would refuse to provide the Judge and the parties with logistical support, including water, if they travelled to the island. Two Leigh Day clients have made serious attempts to kill themselves in recent days in response to the cancellation of that hearing. They remain in a critical condition.

The 100m x 140m compound where the migrants have been detained since they arrived on Diego Garcia in October 2021, is in crisis, lawyers representing the group told Ms Justice Obi who heard the applications for urgent bail and directions today.

On Tuesday she ordered that the judicial review hearing should be reconvened on Diego Garcia in September. But in submissions, the court heard that Paul Candler, BIOT Commissioner, wrote to then Foreign Secretary David Cameron on 26 June recommending that he write to the Home Secretary to ask that 39 migrants be transferred to the UK. Mr Candler met Mr Cameron on 2 July, two days before the UK General Election, to discuss his proposal.

Mr Candler then met the new Foreign Secretary David Lammy on 12 July to brief him on the situation facing the individuals stranded in BIOT. Mr Lammy then agreed to write to Ms Cooper to request that she consider transferring 39 of the most vulnerable individuals to the UK.

The asylum seekers, including 16 children, have been detained in inhumane conditions for more than 1,000 days. They arrived on Diego Garcia on 3 October 2021 after they were rescued by two Royal Naval ships when their vessel fell into trouble in the Indian Ocean and allege they have been unlawfully detained since by the BIOT Commissioner. 

The claimants cannot be returned to Sri Lanka because all individuals have outstanding claims for international protection, apart from one, who the Commissioner accepts cannot be returned to Sri Lanka as it would constitute refoulement, in breach of international law. The other members of the group argue that their forcible return to Sri Lanka would breach the principle of non-refoulement.

The BIOT Appropriation Order published earlier this year sets out that the previous UK government gave approval for the BIOT Commissioner to spend £39.6million in financial year 2024/25 in relation to the migrants detained on Diego Garcia.

Six of the claimants are represented by Tom Short, Tessa Gregory and Claire Powell with Josh Munt of Leigh Day, and by counsel Ben Jaffey KC and Natasha Simonsen of Blackstone Chambers.

Five of the claimants are represented by Toufique Hossain, Simon Robinson, Gina Skandari, Sulaiha Ali, wtih Ben Nelson, Guy Atoun, Kristen Allison, Jodie Spencer, and Sugani Suganathan of Duncan Lewis, and by counsel Chris Buttler KC and Jack Boswell of Matrix Chambers.

One of the claimants is represented by Adam Straw of Wilsons Solicitors, and by counsel Helen Law of Matrix Chambers.

Leigh Day solicitor Tom Short said:

"For almost three years our clients, among whom are 16 children, have been detained by the BIOT Commissioner in a fenced encampment of rat-infested tents guarded by G4S.  Today the Commissioner has belatedly accepted the obvious: that this situation cannot go on any longer. 

“In the face of multiple suicide attempts and grave offences against children it is incumbent on the UK Government to take decisive action to ensure our clients are relocated immediately.  For years our clients have been deprived of the most modest of freedoms and the most basic of amenities all at great cost to the UK taxpayer and it is imperative that this desperate situation is brought to an end without any further delay.”