Two weeks after the UK’s Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the government’s plan to outsource asylum processing to Rwanda is unlawful, the UN Committee against Torture expressed concerns about Denmark’s plans to externalise asylum processing to Kigali. […]
Rwanda: Covid-19 and Detention
Despite having a much-criticised track record concerning its treatment of refugees, Rwanda has signed deals with both the United Kingdom and Denmark that involve receiving deported asylum seekers and irregular migrants from both the countries for processing and potential permanent relocation. In mid-April, Rwanda and the UK finalised an “economic development partnership” whose centrepiece is […]
Rwanda: Covid-19 and Detention
The United Kingdom is reportedly considering sending asylum seekers to Rwanda as part of an offshore resettlement and processing scheme that would be allowed under the UK government’s proposed new Nationality and Borders Bill. Ghana was also named as a possible destination, although Ghana’s foreign minister quickly disavowed such a possibility, saying that the country […]
Rwanda: Covid-19 and Detention
Refugees and migrants, relocated to Rwanda from Libya and subsequently held in Gashora Emergency Transit Centre outside Kigali, have protested against their lockdown. Rwanda has accepted several hundred persons, evacuated from Libya’s notorious detention facilities. Some have been screened and approved for relocation to countries including Canada and Norway, but the lockdown has suspended their […]
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DETENTION CAPACITY
ALTERNATIVES TO DETENTION
ADDITIONAL ENFORCEMENT DATA
PRISON DATA
POPULATION DATA
LEGAL & REGULATORY FRAMEWORK
GROUNDS FOR DETENTION
LENGTH OF DETENTION
DETENTION INSTITUTIONS
PROCEDURAL STANDARDS & SAFEGUARDS
COSTS & OUTSOURCING
COVID-19 DATA
TRANSPARENCY
MONITORING
NATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS MONITORING BODIES
NATIONAL PREVENTIVE MECHANISMS (OPTIONAL PROTOCOL TO UN CONVENTION AGAINST TORTURE)
NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANISATIONS (NGOs)
GOVERNMENTAL MONITORING BODIES
INTERNATIONAL DETENTION MONITORING
INTERNATIONAL TREATIES & TREATY BODIES
International Treaties Ratified
Ratification Year
Observation Date
CAT, Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
2008
2017
ICRMW, International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families
2008
2017
CTOCTP, Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children
2003
2017
CTOCSP, Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, supplementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime
2006
2017
Ratio of relevant international treaties ratified
Ratio: 14/19
Relevant Recommendations or Observations Issued by Treaty Bodies
Recommendation Year
Observation Date
Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women
27. (e) The lack of information provided by the State party on safeguards in place for the protection from forced prostitution and trafficking of asylum-seeking women and girls removed to Rwanda under the United Kingdom - Rwanda Asylum Partnership Treaty of December 2023 and on capacity building for law enforcement officers on early identification of trafficking victims amongst these asylum seekers. ....
(d) Ensure that women and girls removed to Rwanda under the United Kingdom - Rwanda Asylum Partnership Treaty of December 2023 have effective access to justice to claim international protection, including on grounds of gender-based violence, and are protected from forced prostitution or other forms of trafficking. ...
2024
2024
2024
Committee on Migrant Workers
"§24. (a) ensure that detention of migrants for violations of immigration law is used only as a measure of last resort and in s pecial facilities; and that, inso far as practicable, migrants detained for immigration offences are held separately from ordinary prisoners; and
(b) include in its next periodic report detailed information on the number of migrants detained for immigration offences and on the place, average duration and conditions of their detention."
2012
2012
Human Rights Committee
§ 30. […]The State party should ensure that detention pending deportation is only applied if reasonably necessary and proportionate, after due consideration of less invasive means and for the shortest possible period of time, and that individuals detained for immigration-related reasons are held in facilities specifically designed for that purpose.
2016
2016
Committee on the Rights of the Child
§ 41. The State party: (a) Ensure that all reception centres for asylum-seeking and refugee children are child-friendly and that all unaccompanied and separated children have prompt access to national refugee status determination procedures; (b) Investigate any reports of alleged disappearance of children, in particular adolescent girls, from refugee camps, establish their whereabouts and prosecute those responsible for crimes involved in such disappearance ; (c) Continue to cooperate with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to address the aforementioned issues.
2020
2020
Committee on Migrant Workers
27. The Committee notes that Law No. 57/2018 repealed Law No. 04/2011. It also notes the assurances of the State party that detention of migrants for violations of immigration law is used only as a measure of last resort in special facilities, and that the National Commission for Human Rights monitors and may make unannounced visits to places of detention where migrant workers may be held. However, the Committee is concerned about:
(...)
(c) The lack of statistical data on cases involving the placement of migrant workers and members of their families in administrative custody for reasons related to irregular migration;
(...)
28. The Committee recommends that the State party:
(...)
(c) Include, in its next periodic report, detailed information, disaggregated by age, sex, nationality or origin or both, on the number of migrant workers currently held in administrative detention for immigration offences and on the place, average duration and conditions of their detention;
(...)
2021
2021
> UN Special Procedures
> UN Universal Periodic Review
REGIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS MECHANISMS
Regional Legal Instruments
Year of Ratification (Treaty) / Transposed (Directive) / Adoption (Regulation)
Observation Date
HEALTH CARE PROVISION
HEALTH IMPACTS
COVID-19
Country Updates
Despite having a much-criticised track record concerning its treatment of refugees, Rwanda has signed deals with both the United Kingdom and Denmark that involve receiving deported asylum seekers and irregular migrants from both the countries for processing and potential permanent relocation.
In mid-April, Rwanda and the UK finalised an “economic development partnership” whose centrepiece is the UK proposal to send people attempting to enter the UK irregularly to Rwanda. The deportees would be allowed to remain in Rwanda or return to their home countries. According to the Guardian, it is expected that people removed will initially be taken to a hostel in Kigali for processing.
The highly controversial deal has been harshly criticised by UK church leaders, opposition politicians, and national and international refugee rights advocates. While the UK insists that Rwanda is one of the safest countries in the world, it harshly criticised the country last year for its human rights record.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) harshly criticised the deal, saying that it “does not support the externalisation of asylum states’ obligations. This includes measures taken by states to transfer asylum seekers and refugees to other countries, with insufficient safeguards to protect their rights, or where this leads to the shifting rather than the sharing of responsibilities to protect refugees.”
The UK NGO Detention Action said that people sent to Rwanda could face “indefinite detention under a government notorious for violent persecution of dissent.” The organisation also highlighted that “the UK currently gives asylum to Rwandan refugees fleeing political persecution.” Human Rights Watch recalled that in 2018, Rwandan security forces shot dead at least 12 refugees from the Democratic Republic of Congo when they protested a cut to food rations. Authorities subsequently arrested and prosecuted more than 60 refugees on charges including rebellion and spreading false information with intent to create a hostile international opinion against the Rwandan state.
Previously, in June 2021, Denmark signed a memorandum of understanding on asylum and migration issues with Rwanda. The agreement seeks to strengthen Rwanda’s “Refugee Status Determination” capability and envisages the processing of asylum applications to take place outside of the EU.
Just weeks before the MoU was signed, UNHCR had urged Denmark to avoid externalising their asylum obligations as the practice “frustrates access to international protection, is inconsistent with global solidarity and responsibility sharing, regularly undermines the rights of asylum seekers and refugees and thus violates international obligations of States.”
The MoU mentions Rwanda’s ETM centre in Gashora, which has been sharply criticised for abuses suffered by refugees evacuated from Libya who have been housed there. In April 2020, a Rwandan police commander was accused of sexually assaulting a child refugee at the ETM centre. Rwanda’s police force accused the refugees of lying, saying they were unhappy with coronavirus-related restrictions and that the boy was drunk.
It is unclear whether the Danish government has sent anyone to Rwanda yet. According to Infomigrants, while the memorandum of understanding is not legally binding, signed in late April, it sets the framework for future negotiations and cooperation between both countries.
As of 2020, there were 139,491 refugees and 465 asylum seekers in Rwanda, mainly from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Burundi. The government began vaccinating refugees against COVID-19 in March 2021, including more than 200 refugees residing in the Emergency Transit Mechanism (ETM) Centre in Gashora.
Rwanda initially set up the ETM in mid-2019 for the purpose of housing refugees and migrants evacuated from Libya by UNHCR and the African Union. As of March 2021, there were 303 refugees and asylum seekers staying at the ETM centre. In November 2021, Rwanda, the African Union, and UNHCR signed an Addendum to the Memorandum of Understanding of the Emergency Transit Mechanism centre to continue evacuating third country nationals from Libya. The extension of the agreement ensured the continuation of the operation at the ETM centre until 31 December 2021 and expanded its capacity from 500 to 700 places.
The United Kingdom is reportedly considering sending asylum seekers to Rwanda as part of an offshore resettlement and processing scheme that would be allowed under the UK government’s proposed new Nationality and Borders Bill. Ghana was also named as a possible destination, although Ghana’s foreign minister quickly disavowed such a possibility, saying that the country had not “engaged with the UK on any such plan and does not intend to consider any such operation in the future.”
It would not be the first time that Rwanda played such a role. The country was previously involved in receiving deportees from Israel under a “voluntary departure” scheme between 2014 and 2017. Around 4,000 people were deported under that scheme to Rwanda and Uganda and almost all are thought to have left the country almost immediately, many attempting to return to Europe. Testimonies collected by the International Refugee Rights Initiative found that following their arrival in Rwanda from Israel, “people were being smuggled out of the country by land to Kampala within days.” Testimonies also highlighted that people were “not given an opportunity to apply for asylum, and even if they wish to stay in Rwanda, their refugee claims cannot be assessed as the national refugee status determination committee has not yet been established.”
Since the start of the pandemic, Rwanda has registered 125,568 COVID-19 cases and 1,411 related deaths. It is unclear whether the country ceased or restricted deportations during the COVID-19 pandemic. Nonetheless, on 14 April 2021, two Ugandan nationals were arrested and declared “prohibited immigrants” for staying irregularly in the country. Four days later, they were abandoned at the Katuna border post with a deportation note: “Take note that you are declared a prohibited immigrant in Rwanda within the meaning of Articles 12 and 15 of Law 57/2018 of 13/08/2018 on Immigration and Emigration in Rwanda.”
According to UNHCR data, there were 139,491 refugees and 465 asylum seekers in the country in 2020 and 122,806 refugees and 228 asylum seekers in mid-2021. Rwanda included refugees and asylum seekers in their priority list within the country’s national vaccination plan. In March 2021, the country began providing vaccinations to refugees and prison populations as these groups reside in crowded settings. The UNHCR, which has urged all countries to include forcibly displaced and stateless people in their national vaccination programmes, praised the Rwandan government’s efforts. Ahmed Baba Fall, UNHCR representative in Rwanda said: “Ensuring that refugees are included in the vaccine programme is key to ending the COVID-19 pandemic. Their inclusion in the national vaccination rollout is another mark of the Government of Rwanda’s generosity and humanitarian commitment towards the cause of refugees and asylum seekers.”
Refugees and migrants, relocated to Rwanda from Libya and subsequently held in Gashora Emergency Transit Centre outside Kigali, have protested against their lockdown. Rwanda has accepted several hundred persons, evacuated from Libya’s notorious detention facilities. Some have been screened and approved for relocation to countries including Canada and Norway, but the lockdown has suspended their onward travel, leaving them stuck in the transit centre indefinitely. UNHCR reportedly issued a statement urging calm and emphasised that Rwandan laws have ordered the various restrictions in place.
