23 August 2020: Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah Alhabib arrived in UK in June after crossing Channel in boat
A man who fled war-torn Yemen, made a difficult journey to Europe and two months ago survived a Channel crossing in a flimsy boat has been found dead in a Manchester hotel room.
Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah Alhabib 41, was found dead on 6 August in a room where he had been placed by the Home Office after arriving in Dover on 11 June seeking asylum.
The cause of his death has not yet been confirmed and is under investigation.
Alhabib travelled on the small boat with 15 other people from Yemen, Syria and Iran. After they were picked up by the Border Force, Home Office officials detained a group of them at Yarl’s Wood immigration removal centre in Bedfordshire for three days before moving them to the hotel in Manchester.
[…] “Now that Abdullah is dead, we are worried that the same thing will happen to us,” he said. “We all asked the doctor to check our hearts and our blood pressure. The Home Office has already taken six Yemeni asylum seekers from this hotel and put them in detention in Brook House immigration removal centre near Gatwick ahead of the charter flight next week. We cannot sleep. We are waiting for a knock on the door and for the Home Office to come and take the rest of us. We feel we are on death row.”
Read more here: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/aug/23/yemeni-asylum-seeker-found-dead-in-manchester-hotel-room
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Serco has the contract for housing people in the asylum system in the north-west: https://www.serco.com/uk/sector-expertise/immigration/community-accommodation-and-support
and for Yarlswood: http://www.yarlswood.co.uk/