UK Plan for Tougher Asylum-Seeker Rules Draws Criticism

FILE - In this Thursday, Jan. 21, 2021 file photo Britain's Home Secretary Priti Patel speaks during a media briefing on the COVID-19 pandemic in Downing Street, London.  (AP Photo/Matt Dunham, Pool, File)
FILE - In this Thursday, Jan. 21, 2021 file photo Britain's Home Secretary Priti Patel speaks during a media briefing on the COVID-19 pandemic in Downing Street, London. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham, Pool, File)
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UK Plan for Tougher Asylum-Seeker Rules Draws Criticism

FILE - In this Thursday, Jan. 21, 2021 file photo Britain's Home Secretary Priti Patel speaks during a media briefing on the COVID-19 pandemic in Downing Street, London.  (AP Photo/Matt Dunham, Pool, File)
FILE - In this Thursday, Jan. 21, 2021 file photo Britain's Home Secretary Priti Patel speaks during a media briefing on the COVID-19 pandemic in Downing Street, London. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham, Pool, File)

The British government said Wednesday it will toughen immigration rules to make it harder for people who arrive by unauthorized routes such as small boats and truck stowaways to be given asylum.

Home Secretary Priti Patel said asylum-seekers who come to Britain through organized, sponsored routes, will have their refugee claims considered promptly and will be given support to settle. Those who sneak into the country will only be given temporary permission to stay, will receive limited benefits and will be “regularly reassessed for removal from the UK.”

Patel said the system would be “fair but firm.”

“People are dying at sea, in lorries and in shipping containers,” she said. “To stop the deaths we must stop the trade in people that cause them.”

Refugee groups and immigration lawyers say the plan unfairly discriminates against refugees based on the way they got to the UK.

“The proposals effectively create an unfair two-tiered system, whereby someone’s case and the support they receive is judged on how they entered the country and not on their need for protection,” said Mike Adamson, chief executive of the British Red Cross. “This is inhuman.”

But Patel said the changes are needed to stop illegal people-smuggling rings, and will make the system fairer because it won’t give an advantage to those who can pay for their passage.

“What is inhuman is allowing people to be smuggled through illegal migration, and that is what we want to stop,” she told the BBC. “We will create safe and legal routes to enable people to come to the United Kingdom in a safe way.”

Successive British governments have grappled with the issue of migrants using northern France as a launching point to reach Britain, either by stowing away in trucks or on ferries, or in small boats organized by people smugglers. In 2020, about 8,500 people arrived in Britain by crossing the Channel in small boats, and several died trying to make the journey.

Others have died while being smuggled by truck, including 39 Vietnamese migrants found dead in a refrigerated container in 2019 in the English town of Grays, east of London.

The British and French governments have worked for years to stop the people-smuggling journeys, without much success, according to The Associated Press.

The new UK measures — which have not yet been made into legislation and approved by Parliament — also include longer sentences for people-smugglers and tougher checks to catch adults claiming to be children. The government also promised to speed up asylum decisions and quickly remove those who fail — promises British governments have made and failed to keep for years.

Critics of the government say bureaucratic backlogs left many asylum-seekers waiting years for decisions on their status. The coronavirus pandemic has bogged down the system even further.

The UK government says 35,099 people made asylum applications in Britain in the year to March 2020. That’s about a third of the number of applicants in Germany and less than half the total for Spain and France.

Britain’s position is also complicated by Brexit. Since leaving the European Union, the UK no longer has a deal with its European neighbors to return people who have snuck across the Channel.



Russia and Ukraine to Hold First Peace Talks in Seven Weeks 

A security personnel stands guard in front of the Ciragan Palace before the third meeting between Russian and Ukrainian delegations for peace talks in Istanbul, Türkiye, 23 July 2025. (EPA)
A security personnel stands guard in front of the Ciragan Palace before the third meeting between Russian and Ukrainian delegations for peace talks in Istanbul, Türkiye, 23 July 2025. (EPA)
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Russia and Ukraine to Hold First Peace Talks in Seven Weeks 

A security personnel stands guard in front of the Ciragan Palace before the third meeting between Russian and Ukrainian delegations for peace talks in Istanbul, Türkiye, 23 July 2025. (EPA)
A security personnel stands guard in front of the Ciragan Palace before the third meeting between Russian and Ukrainian delegations for peace talks in Istanbul, Türkiye, 23 July 2025. (EPA)

Russian negotiators flew to Türkiye to hold peace talks with Ukraine on Wednesday, the Kremlin said, before what will be the first direct discussions between the warring sides in more than seven weeks. 

Russia played down expectations of any breakthrough at the meeting, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said this week should focus in part on preparing a summit between himself and President Vladimir Putin. 

"Naturally, no one expects an easy road. Naturally, this will be a very difficult conversation. The projects (of the two sides) are diametrically opposed," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. 

Previous talks in Istanbul on May 16 and June 2 led to the exchange of thousands of prisoners of war and the remains of dead soldiers. But those meetings lasted less than three hours in total and made no breakthrough towards a ceasefire or a settlement to end almost three and a half years of war. 

US President Donald Trump last week threatened heavy new sanctions on Russia and countries that buy its exports unless a peace deal was reached within 50 days. 

But three sources close to the Kremlin told Reuters that Putin, unfazed by Trump's ultimatum, would keep on fighting in Ukraine until the West engaged on his terms for peace, and that his territorial demands may widen as Russian forces advance. 

On Wednesday, Russia said its forces had captured the settlement of Varachyne in Ukraine's Sumy region, where Putin has ordered his troops to create a buffer zone after Ukraine mounted a shock incursion into Russia last year and held onto a chunk of its territory for months. Reuters could not independently confirm the battlefield report. 

In recent weeks, Russian forces have launched some of their heaviest air attacks of the war, focusing especially on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv. 

Ukraine has hit back with attacks of its own, and last month inflicted serious damage on Russia's nuclear-capable strategic bomber fleet by smuggling drones close to air bases deep inside the country. 

CONFLICTING DEMANDS 

Zelenskiy said earlier this week that the agenda for talks was clear: the return of prisoners of war and of children abducted by Russia, and the preparation of a meeting between himself and Putin. 

Putin turned down a previous challenge from Zelenskiy to meet him in person and has said he does not see him as a legitimate leader because Ukraine, which is under martial law, did not hold new elections when Zelenskiy's five-year mandate expired last year. Russia also denies abducting children. 

The Kremlin said this week it was unrealistic to expect "miracles" from the talks. 

At the last meeting on June 2, Russia handed Ukraine a memorandum setting out its key demands, including: full withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from four regions of the country that Russia has claimed as its own; limits on the size of Ukraine's military; enhanced rights for Russian-speakers in Ukraine; and acceptance by Kyiv of neutral status, outside NATO or any other alliance. 

Ukraine sees those terms as tantamount to surrender, and Zelenskiy described the Russian stance as an ultimatum. 

Ukraine wants an immediate ceasefire, reparations, international security guarantees and no restrictions on its military strength.