Pilot verweigert Abschiebung
The deportation of a young Afghan man refused asylum by the Government has been dramatically stayed after the pilot of the plane he was supposed to be removed on refused to take off. (....)
Ms Chapman, who is chair of the Kent Anti-Racism Network, said campaigners “genuinely thought they had failed” when the flight eventually took off 45 minutes late.
But later that evening she received a message from a British woman who had been hosting Mr Bigzad in Margate saying he was back in a UK detention centre.
Kavel Rafferty said she had given up all hope for the asylum seeker, who has been staying with her for four months, when she received a phone call from the Brook House immigration removal centre near Gatwick.
“The last message I’d had from him was so sad – it just said ‘they’ve come to take me’ and then the phone was switched off,” she added.
“But then he rang that night and told me ‘the pilot said no’. He was happy and relieved and shocked – it was a lot to go through in one day.
“We don’t know the name of the pilot but there are so many people who would like to thank him.”