OVER 40 PEOPLE were today deported to Georgia after a deportation order, with the chartered flight costing over \u20ac225,000, excluding VAT.<\/p>\n
Justice minister Jim O\u2019Callaghan this evening confirmed the completion of the deportation order to Georgia.<\/p>\n
A Justice Department spokesperson said deportation orders were enforced against 43 Georgian nationals, 33 of whom were adult males and seven of whom were adult women.<\/p>\n
Among the returnees was one family group, of which three were children.<\/p>\n
The flight departed Dublin Airport at 1.50pm today, and landed in Tbilisi, Georgia at 6.40 (Irish time).\u00a0<\/p>\n
Speaking after the operation, O\u2019Callaghan said: \u201cDeportations play an essential role in ensuring our immigration system is not undermined and that people follow the pathways already in place for legal migration.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are also an important mechanism to provide the public with confidence that our systems are rules-based and robust.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is the sixth charter deportation operation so far this year and O\u2019Callaghan thanked garda\u00ed for their \u201ccontinued work in conducting these complex and sensitive operations\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI also want to acknowledge that the vast majority of Georgian nationals are legally resident in the State and positively contribute to Irish society,\u201d said O\u2019Callaghan.<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cThe government has a voluntary return programme available for people who have no legal status, or who have had their international protection application withdrawn or refused.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the preferred option, and people can only avail of this prior to the issuance of a deportation order.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, minister of State for migration Colm Brophy remarked that \u201cdeportation operations are complex for all those involved but an important and necessary part of our immigration and asylum procedures\u201d.<\/p>\n
The returnees were accompanied on the flight by garda members, medical staff, an interpreter, as well as an independent human rights observer.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for the department said that further charter deportation operations will be conducted over the rest of the year.<\/p>\n
The department also confirmed that the cost of chartering the aircraft was \u20ac225,575 (ex VAT) for a return flight.<\/p>\n
Deportation orders are legal orders to leave the country and can be issued for a number of reasons.<\/p>\n
For example, a person may have come to Ireland on a valid visa but no longer has permission to be in the country, in which case they have no legal right to remain.<\/p>\n
An individual may also be deported if they\u2019ve committed a serious criminal offence,\u00a0particularly something that involves extreme violence or drugs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OVER 40 PEOPLE were today deported to Georgia after a deportation order, with the chartered flight costing over…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":630982,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9691,242296,6786,61,60,30379,43],"class_list":["post-630981","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-department-of-justice","tag-deportation-order","tag-georgia","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-jim-o","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=630981"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630981\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/630982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=630981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=630981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=630981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}