"UK: Airlines and aviation authorities should not facilitate unlawful removals to Rwanda, UN experts say", 22 April 2022

UN experts* today expressed concern about the role of airlines and aviation authorities in facilitating unlawful removals to Rwanda...

“Even if the UK-Rwanda agreement and the ‘Safety of Rwanda’ Bill are approved, airlines and aviation regulators could be complicit in violating internationally protected human rights and court orders by facilitating removals to Rwanda,” the experts said.

They stressed that removing asylum-seekers to Rwanda or any other country where they would be at risk of refoulement would violate the right to be free from torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.

In November 2023, the UK Supreme Court ruled that removals to Rwanda would violate Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights...

“As the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights underline, aviation regulators, international organisations and business actors are required to respect human rights,” they said.

The corporate responsibility to respect human rights set out in UN Guiding Principle 13 prohibits companies from contributing to human rights abuses, and UN Guiding Principle 23 requires businesses to comply with all applicable laws, respect internationally recognised human rights, and treat the risk of contributing to gross human rights abuses as a compliance issue wherever they operate.

The UN experts have been in contact with the UK Government, as well as national, European and international aviation regulators, including the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and international actors, including the International Air Transport Association (IATA) and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) to express their concerns and remind them of their responsibilities...