The United Kingdom has deported 43 individuals, comprising failed asylum seekers and foreign offenders to Nigeria and Ghana.
This was revealed in a joint statement released on Friday by the UK Home Office and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
While the statement confirmed the deportation, it did not specify the exact date the flight took place.
“Those removed had no right to be in the UK and included 15 failed asylum seekers and 11 foreign national offenders who had served their sentences. Seven people returned voluntarily,” the statement read.
However, the document did not disclose the nationalities of all those deported or how many individuals were sent to each country.
Since assuming office last year, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has authorized two charter flights that returned a total of 87 individuals to Nigeria and Ghana.
In a related incident last October, 44 asylum seekers from both countries were removed from the UK in what was described as the largest deportation on a single flight from the nation.
This shift toward deportations to West Africa follows the collapse of the UK’s controversial migration agreement with Rwanda.
The 2022 deal aimed to transfer some asylum seekers entering the UK illegally to the East African country for processing and potential resettlement.
However, the policy faced significant legal pushback and was ultimately declared unlawful by the UK Supreme Court in 2023.
In the wake of that ruling, Nigeria reportedly entered into a bilateral agreement with the UK to accept repatriated illegal migrants.
Following the most recent deportation exercise, British Minister for Border Security and Asylum, Angela Eagle, extended her gratitude to both the Nigerian and Ghanaian governments for their cooperation in facilitating the removals.
According to the joint statement, the operation reflects “the strength of cooperation between the UK, Nigeria, and Ghana on this critical issue.”
The UK government also highlighted that more than 24,000 individuals have been removed in total, a figure marking an 11 percent rise compared to the same timeframe the previous year.
