A Sri Lankan man questioned over bombings that killed 269 people in Sri Lanka is seeking asylum in the UK, the Telegraph reported. 

According to the report, the unnamed asylum seeker, from Sri Lanka, was arrested over allegations that he was involved in the 2019 Easter bombings in the country.

The man, who has been granted anonymity, left Sri Lanka in 2022 after being arrested and released on bail over the attacks, in which suicide bombers targeted luxury hotels and churches.

He arrived in the UK in September 2022 and claimed asylum a month later. He told an immigration tribunal that, since leaving Sri Lanka, police officers had attended his family home and that he “fears persecution” if he returns home. It is understood he denies the allegations.

His asylum claim for his wife and himself was initially rejected by the Home Office, but he won an appeal against the decision at an upper immigration tribunal and his case will now be reheard.

Reforms to asylum system

Last week, Shabana Mahmood, the Home Secretary, announced major reforms to the asylum system, making refugee status temporary and giving ministers powers to return migrants to their home country once it was deemed safe.

Ms Mahmood is also overhauling immigration appeals by replacing judges with adjudicators and limiting illegal migrants and foreign offenders’ ability to exploit human rights laws to fight deportation.

Some 38 foreign tourists were killed in the Easter Sunday bombings in 2019. Among them were Britons Anita Nicholson, 42, and her children, Alexander, 14 and Annabel, 11, who died in an explosion at the Shangri-la Hotel in Colombo.

Lorraine Campbell, an IT director, retired firefighter Bill Harrop and his wife Dr Sally Bradley also died in a blast at the Cinnamon Grand Hotel.

It is believed that the eight suicide bombers were associated with an Islamist militant group named National Thowheeth Jama’ath.

An upper tribunal judgment said: “[The Sri Lankan] had applied for protection on his own behalf and on behalf of his wife. He says that on Jan 5 2022 he was arrested and questioned in connection with the Easter bombings, which took place in Sri Lanka on April 21 2019.

“He says that he was released only on the payment of a substantial bribe and was subject to reporting conditions. He left Sri Lanka for the United Kingdom on Sept 2 2022 and an arrest warrant was issued thereafter on Sept 15 2022.

“He says that the police have attended his family home in Sri Lanka, and he fears persecution if returned to Sri Lanka.”

The upper tribunal heard that his original case had been dismissed by the first-tier tribunal.

The Sri Lankan argued that the first-tier tribunal made mistakes. He said the judge was “biased” and that the “arrest warrant was not issued until after he left Sri Lanka, which the judge failed to appreciate”.

Claire Burns, the deputy upper tribunal judge, found that the previous hearing had made a series of errors, including it being missed that the man had been released on bail following an arrest warrant. Judge Burns denied that any previous judges were “highly prejudiced” in their approach.

The facts of the case will be reheard at the first-tier tribunal at a later date.

Judge Burns concluded: “I find there will need to be a complete rehearing wherein the judge will make findings about the credibility of [his] account and given the nature and extent of the fact finding, the appeal should therefore be remitted to the first-tier tribunal.

“The judge erred in law in his analysis of the documentary evidence as set out above, and so for that reason the decision must be set aside.”

A Home Office spokesman said: “The Government rejected this asylum claim to ensure this suspected terrorist never sets foot on British soil. We stand to robustly defend this decision through the courts.

“Last week, the Home Secretary announced the most sweeping reforms to tackle illegal migration in modern times which will make Britain a less attractive destination for illegal migrants and will make it easier to remove and deport them. As part of this, we are reforming human rights laws and replacing the broken appeals system.” (The Telegraph)

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A group of Sri Lankan asylum seekers who became stranded on the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) of Diego Garcia have arrived in the UK after a three-year legal fight led by a Leigh Day Solicitors human rights team. 

They were greeted by the lawyers whose painstaking battle to have the asylum seekers’ plight recognised was successful. 

An offer from the Home Office to finally transfer the group to the UK was the culmination of three years’ work to have the group of more than 60 asylum seekers freed from Diego Garcia where it was argued they were detained unlawfully. 

The group arrived on flights from Diego Garcia and Rwanda on 2 and 3 December 2024. 

The group had been stranded on the island of Diego Garcia since October 2021, when they arrived after their boat got into trouble in the Indian Ocean and they were rescued by a British Navy vessel. The group had been fleeing persecution in Sri Lanka and claimed asylum on their arrival. 

On Diego Garcia they were accommodated in a tented compound as a temporary measure which quickly became an intolerable situation to which the BIOT Commissioner and UK government offered no solution. 

For the first six weeks they had no means of communication with the outside world. 

The asylum seekers, including 16 children, lived under guard in rat infested tents in a situation that former BIOT Commissioner Paul Candler eventually described to UK government ministers as “dangerous and unsustainable”. In 2024 one of the Commissioner’s medical team on Diego Garcia described the camp as “in complete crisis”. 

Leigh Day took up the asylum seekers’ case in early 2022 after human rights team partner Tessa Gregory was alerted by the Asia Pacific Refugee Rights Network to the plight of 89 Sri Lankan adults and children who had been detained for five months on a military base more than 1,500 miles from the mainland in the middle of the Indian Ocean.  

The Leigh Day team fought to highlight the group’s plight and to have the UK government take action. 

Their Diego Garcia casework involved applications for judicial review to address the circumstances faced by the group on the island, obtain legal aid and to hold to account the governor of BIOT. 

In 2022, Leigh Day wrote to the Foreign Secretary, the Home Secretary and the BIOT Commissioner stressing that holding the group “in legal limbo on a military base with extremely limited communication to the outside world is plainly unacceptable”. The group were eventually provided with access to an iPad so that they could communicate with the outside world, particularly with their lawyers. 

Subsequent correspondence pointed out that the group’s situation was worse than if they were prisoners and urgently sought action after some of the group, despairing, resorted to hunger strike in May 2022. The Government belatedly set up a process to decide the group’s asylum claims in June 2022, which lawyers argued was procedurally unfair. 

In the months that followed their arrival, some of the refugees including an 18-month-old baby left Diego Garcia by boat and subsequently landed in the French territory of La Reunion following lengthy journeys on the high seas. Lawyers had grave concerns about the legality of BIOT/UK actions in facilitating dangerous onward journeys by boat. They said BIOT was bound by obligations in Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS). 

Some of the group were transferred to Rwanda in March 2023 for emergency medical attention after attempts to take their own life. A number of them remained in Rwanda until their transfer to the UK this week. 

In May 2023 the BIOT Court ruled that the Government had, since their arrival on October 2021, unlawfully denied the group access to legal aid support. 

In September 2023 the Government withdrew a decision to forcibly return members of the group to Sri Lanka days before they were due to defend a process beset by procedural unfairness in the BIOT Supreme Court. 

In April 2024 the legal teams were able to convince the courts that the UK Children Act applied in BIOT, meaning the Commissioner had to provide support to safeguard the children on the island from the risk of significant harm. 

In June 2024 BIOT Commissioner Paul Candler wrote to Foreign Secretary David Cameron and then wrote to Foreign Secretary David Lammy in July urging action to remove the asylum seekers. No action was taken, and the Commissioner resigned his post. 

Eventually, in September 2024 a judicial review hearing was held on Diego Garcia, arguing that the group was being detained unlawfully. The hearing had initially been due to take place in July 2024, but the Court was blocked from arriving on Diego Garcia by the US Government. 

Before judgment was given and prior to a UK judicial review that was due to be heard in December, government lawyers confirmed in November 2024 that the Government intended to transfer all of the group to the UK. (Leigh Day)

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Dozens of Sri Lankans stranded on the remote Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia for more than three years are to be airlifted to the UK after the government dropped its opposition to their case, the high court has heard.

According to British Media, the Guardian, the 64 people, including 16 children, have been stranded on the island since October 2021, when a fishing boat they were using to flee persecution in Sri Lanka got into difficulties.

The commissioner on the British Indian Ocean Territory argued that they could be lawfully returned to Sri Lanka, but the refugees fought the decision in the courts.

On Monday, the high court heard that the UK government had dropped its opposition to the group’s case and that they would be permitted to travel to the UK.

The majority of the group are still on the island but eight have been sent to Rwanda for medical treatment unavailable on Diego Garcia. Those in Rwanda are to be brought to the UK as well.

The only exceptions the UK government has made relate to three Sri Lankans who have criminal convictions. Their fate is unclear.

In a letter from the government legal department disclosed in the high court, officials confirmed that the government would bring the vast majority of people on the island to the UK, subject to entry clearance applications being submitted, biometrics being enrolled and no adverse information arising out of these checks.

An offer was recently made to some of the Sri Lankans on the island to send them to Romania for six months, with a view to them later moving to the UK. Monday’s offer cancels the earlier one.

A report by the UN earlier this year following an inspection of the conditions the Sri Lankans of Tamil origin experienced on the island concluded they had been unlawfully detained and should be urgently relocated after experiencing violence, abuse and arbitrary detention.

Most of the Sri Lankans arrived on the island on 3 October 2021. They were rescued and taken there after a boat they were travelling in, hoping to reach Canada to claim asylum, got into difficulty.

The UN inspectors heard allegations of sexual harassment and abuse against women and children by other asylum seekers, and identified high levels of mental distress and significant risk of suicide and attempted suicide.

The UK agreed to hand over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius last month, ending years of bitter dispute over the territory. Nevertheless, Diego Garcia, which is the largest of the islands in the archipelago and home to a UK-US military base, will remain under UK control.

The government spokesperson said any future arrivals to Diego Garcia before a deal was finalised would be sent to the island of St Helena. (Newswire/ The Guardian)

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A family of seven from Sri Lanka landed in Dhanushkodi in the Ramanathapuram district in India on Monday morning seeking asylum to escape the economic crisis in the island nation, it was reported.

According to Indian media, Times of India, after investigation, they were lodged in the Mandapam refugee camp.

After being informed, the Mandapam Coastal Security Group (marine) police went to Arichalmunai in Dhanushkodi and brought the seven Sri Lankans to the station.

The refugees were Nagaraja, 43, his wife Vaninthini, 38, and their five children from Jaffna district. 

The family has paid a hefty sum to illegal ferry operators to reach Dhanushkodi from Talaimannar. After the interrogation, the family was taken to the refugee camp at Mandapam. 

With them, the number of Sri Lankan nationals arriving in the country seeking asylum touched 282 since March 2022 following the severe economic crisis in the island nation. (NewsWire)

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