The Home Office has confirmed it will "move to deport" three migrants convicted of gang rape in Brighton following their sentencing in July.
Abdulla Ahmadi, 26, from Iran, and Egyptian nationals Ibrahim Alshafe, 25, and Karin Al-Danasurt, 20, were found guilty of attacking a woman in the early hours of October 4 last year.
All three arrived in Britain by small boat and had their asylum claims rejected.
The victim, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court: “My skin crawls because of what they did to me.
“They’re evil and they’ve ruined my life.”
Each of the men now faces a deportation order alongside their prison sentences.
The three defendants were all acquainted and living together at asylum seeker accommodation near Horsham at the time of the offence.
Alshafe said he paid £1,500 to smugglers to cross the Channel, having previously been captured by Libyan pirates before travelling through Europe.
All three arrived in Britain by small boat and had their asylum claims rejected
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He told the court he had been seeking a British wife who could grant him citizenship.
Ahmadi said he fled Iran after being discovered by secret police due to his involvement with a Kurdish opposition group, insisting he was “not a sex maniac”.
Both men crossed the Channel together in June last year.
They later met Al-Danasurt while being housed at Cisswood House - a former hotel used by the Home Office to accommodate asylum seekers.
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The Home Office has confirmed it will 'move to deport' the three migrants convicted of gang rape in Brighton
| GETTYBorder Security and Asylum Minister Alex Norris said: “My thoughts are first and foremost with the victim of this appalling crime.
“What she endured is deeply disturbing and I commend her bravery in coming forward.”
He added: “Once sentencing has taken place, we will move to deport them off British soil.”
New rules introduced last year mean foreign nationals placed on the sex offenders register automatically lose asylum protections.
Alex Norris described the 'appalling' crime as 'deeply disturbing'
|PA
Prosecutors said that Al-Danasurt had sought asylum to avoid a murder charge in Egypt
|PA
Government figures show 5,634 foreign offenders were removed from the UK in the year to December 2025 - an 11 per cent increase.
However, one of trio's deportation could face legal challenges.
Prosecutors said that Al-Danasurt had sought asylum to avoid a murder charge in Egypt.
As Egypt retains the death penalty, his removal may be blocked under human rights laws.
Immigration lawyer Gary McIndoe told The Times: “The UK government’s policy is not to remove somebody to face the death penalty.
"[The death penalty] is a ground on which to resist deportation because you’re arguing under the [European Convention on Human Rights] Article 2, right to life, Article 3, which is freedom from inhuman or degrading treatment - and people will argue that prison conditions, for example, in Egypt are so bad as to breach Article 3 rights - and there’s Article 6, the right to a fair trial, which the Egyptian might argue.”
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp called for Britain to “leave the ECHR and deport all illegal immigrants within a week of arrival".
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