By Tony O’Reilly-
The Albanian prime minister has asked the UK government to stop using his country’s citizens as scapegoats for failed immigration policies after critical comments by Suella Braverman about Albanian asylum seekers.
Edi Rama wrote that the UK was falsely targeting Albanians “as the cause of Britain’s crime and border problems”. In a series of tweets, he called for the UK to “fight the crime gangs of all nationalities and stop discriminating [against] Albanians”.
The UK government, which is trying to improve relations with Albania while simultaneously returning thousands of people who have recently arrived on small boats. Robert Jenrick, the immigration minister, is due to visit Tirana within weeks to discuss the return of some asylum seekers.
It follows a series of comments by UK ministers and officials claiming that Albanians were behind a recent flurry of arrivals by small boats across the Channel and that many of them were involved in or the victims of organised crime.
Rama, a centre-left member of the Socialist grouping and prime minister since 2013, wrote: “Targeting Albanians (as some shamefully did when fighting for Brexit) as the cause of Britain’s crime and border problems makes for easy rhetoric but ignores hard fact. Repeating the same things and expecting different results is insane (ask Einstein!).
Rama said the UK’s rhetoric could end up “punishing the innocent” and that when Germany had problems with irregular arrivals from across the border, it “tightened its own systems”.
He wrote: “We have a duty to fight crime at home and are doing so resolutely, as cooperating closely with others too. Ready to work closer with UK but facts are crucial. So is mutual respect.”
“70% of the 140,000 Albanians who have moved to the UK were living in Italy and Greece. 1,200 of them are business people. Albanians in the UK work hard and pay tax. UK should fight the crime gangs of all nationalities and stop discriminating [against] Albanians to excuse policy failures.”
Albanians now make up the biggest group of those crossing the Channel in small boats, following a big increase in arrivals in the past two years.
Home Secretary Suella Braverman said many of them were “abusing our modern slavery laws”.
UK ministers have said they want to “fast-track” Albanian arrivals so their asylum claims are assessed more quickly.
Last week, MPs were told 12,000 Albanians had arrived in the UK after crossing the Channel so far this year, compared to 50 in 2020.
Home Secretary, Suella Braverman upset many Albanians by making claims about their citizens in parliament on Monday. “If Labour were in charge they would be allowing all the Albanian criminals to come to this country, they would be allowing all the small boats to come to the UK, they would open our borders and totally undermine the trust of the British people in controlling our sovereignty,” she told MPs.
The home secretary criticised Albanian asylum claimants at the Conservative party conference last month in which she criticised the legitimacy of many asylum claims., “many of them claim to be trafficked as modern slaves … the truth is that many of them are not modern slaves She said ”many of their claims of being trafficked are lies.”