Bristol Evening Post, UK
October 13, 2009 Tuesday

Deportation fight family win injunction

Julie Hardingj.harding

An Armenian mother and her three children have won a court injunction
to stop them being deported while their case is looked at again.

But Anna Vardanyan, 33, and her children Mariam, 16, Norik, 12, and
Gayana, eight, are being forced to stay at the Yarl’s Wood immigration
removal centre in Bedfordshire instead of returning to St George where
they have lived for seven years.

Mariam has contracted salmonella food poisoning since being taken to
the centre on Friday and is seriously ill in hospital.

Now friends of Mariam and Norik, who both go to the City Academy in
Russell Town Avenue, Lawrence Hill, have launched a petition and have
written to Government ministers in an effort to persuade the Home
Office to let the family return to their home at least until their
appeal is heard.

The Vardanyans were taken away by 10 police officers and immigration
officials at 6am and were due to be deported on Friday evening but at
5.55pm their solicitor rang supporters, who had demonstrated outside
Trinity Road police station, to say that an injunction had been
granted.

Patrick McInally, 14, of Carlisle Road, Greenbank, who organised the
petition said: "The point is these are children and they have abducted
by the state.

"They do not deserve to be treated like that. They haven’t been
arrested and they haven’t done anything wrong."

More than 300 of the school’s pupils have signed the petition so far
which they intend to take to number 10 Downing Street, the home of the
Prime Minister. The children have also written to Children’s
Commission Sir Albert Aynsley-Green calling for the Vardanyans to be
freed.

In December Asiya Hassan, also 14, of Stapleton Road, Easton, joined
Norik in addressing politicians and councillors at a conference at the
school on the plight of children in detention centres.

Asiya (c) said: "It’s wrong to put children in there who are
completely innocent. The law says you are innocent until proven
guilty.

"Norik was one of the main speakers at our conference. He had been in
a detention centre before so knows what horrible places they are."

Mariama (c) Jalloh, 16, of Kingswood, is Mariam’s best friend. She
said: "I have known Mariam for three years now. We are really close.
She should not be in a detention centre."

Mariama herself faced deportation to war-torn Liberia two years ago.
She and her sister Binta, ten, went on hunger strike, so desperate
were they not to return to the country where their father was murdered
and their mother tortured.

The UK Border Agency says the Vardanyans were living in the country
illegally after their claim for asylum was turned down and appeals
failed.

Paulette North, a teacher at the City Academy and a member of Bristol
Defend The Asylum Seekers Campaign said: "Mariam is now very ill after
contracting salmonella food poisoning. We are so frightened for the
health and safety of this family.

"Detention centres are no places for children. The family have strong
ties to Bristol. They should be allowed to return while the judicial
review into their case is heard and that could take months.

A spokeswoman for the UK Border Agency said last week that the
decision not to grant asylum was scrutinised by an independent
immigration judge who upheld that decision.

However the Vardanyan’s solicitor has applied for a judicial review of
the case which will be heard in the High Court.