The wife of a British man detained by police in Stockholm on Tuesday has urged Andy Burnham, the UK Prime Minister, to intervene in what she describes as a Brexit catastrophe affecting many British citizens in Sweden. Charles, who prefers not to be fully identified, and his Swedish wife, Lily, were summoned to the police station at 10 AM on Tuesday. There, Charles was informed he would be held at a detention center and deported within the next two weeks.
Plea for Help
Lily, a lawyer, was instructed to return home to retrieve Charles's passport, despite her protests regarding an ongoing court process appealing the deportation order.
““I feel shame,” said Lily, who requested that their family’s surname not be published. “To me, Britain represents freedom for human beings, and then to see this British man in detention just because he wants to be with his wife and live in his house, this is not right.”
“What kind of country are we living in? Is this civilization? They don’t care about human rights. This is a European country, but it looks like Sweden is like somewhere like Afghanistan,” she added.
Lily met Charles in the UK after starting her law degree in London in 2010. She returned to Sweden in 2015, with Charles joining her in 2017, three years before Brexit. After applying to remain in the country before the Brexit application deadline, Charles's application was rejected in 2022, leading the couple to fight against deportation with “six or seven” appeals, according to Lily.
Ongoing Struggles
“The Migration Agency has hunted us for five years,” Lily stated. This past summer, the couple received a text instructing them to appear at their local police station on September 1.
“They told us they needed to talk and we should show up at 10 AM. They didn’t say anything about deportation or to bring passports,” she explained. After three hours, Lily was informed that Charles would be taken to the detention center for deportation.
