An asylum seeker who fled the war in Sudan and now faces being sent to Rwanda has told Sky News that he would rather die than board a plane.
“Why have we been put in jail? What’s wrong with coming? We’re the victim,” a voice says at the end of the phone.
I am outside the Colnbrook Detention Center near Heathrow Airport, talking to a Sudanese asylum seeker who recently arrived in the UK illegally after crossing the Channel with a small boat.
The man – whom we refer to as Bilal to protect his identity – is among the first asylum seekers who have now received letters warning them that they could be sent to Rwanda.
Politics is very controversial, but for the first time we hear the raw emotion in the voice of someone who has been affected by it.
“If they want to take me from here to Rwanda, I will commit suicide,” says Bilal forcefully.
“Rwanda is not a safe country: how can the UK government send us?”
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Bilal says he wants people to know that he and others are under arrest.
“This is [a] miserable life. Patim. No one wants to help us get out of this place, ”he says.
Read more: Asylum seekers “willing to hide” to avoid Rwandan planRwanda’s “guest house” where UK plans to send migrants from Canal
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2:03 “I fled two wars in six months”
A desperate story of survival
Bilal says he fled Sudan in 2016 to flee military service and war.
He says that while trying to reach the United Kingdom, he was arrested by the Libyan militia and tortured.
She says the ship that crossed the Mediterranean was lost at sea, and that she was one of 15 people out of 131 who survived when they were rescued.
Bilal is one of 100 people looking for a better life who according to charities arrived in the UK after May 9 and are now being held in at least one of the four detention centers.
Bilal is struggling not to be sent to Rwanda, but his lawyer has a bleak assessment for those who have failed to get legal help to launch a challenge on time.
Qays Sediqi says: “I don’t know what will happen to the many other people who do not have a legal representative, who do not receive advice and are only left in the dark.”
I ask him if he thinks it is inevitable that people will be sent to Rwanda.
“That’s what it looks like, unfortunately. That’s the reality: we’re going to do our best.”
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2:08 May and Patel clash over Rwanda’s asylum plan
“I can’t point to Rwanda on a map”
Mr Sediqi represents two more people detained in Colnbrook, including an Iranian Kurd whom we refer to as Abdul.
The government announced plans to send asylum seekers to Rwanda in April.
When Abdul made the trip across the Canal in a small boat in May, he said he had no idea he was in danger of being sent to Africa.
He says, “After all I’ve been through, coming to the UK, all the suffering and devastation, then being sent to a different country that I don’t know, that I can’t point out on a map, that would be very inhumane. “.
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The government agreed to allow Rwanda to accept an unlimited number of asylum seekers and, if successful, to offer them a new life.
The Interior Ministry says it wants to disrupt the trade in smugglers who send small boats across the Canal.
About 9,000 people have made the trip so far this year.
Anyone who feels emotionally distressed or suicidal can call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK. In the U.S., call the Samaritan branch in your area or call 1 (800) 273-TALK