Shiromini Satkunarajah, a student at Bangor University, faces deportation only months before attaining her full degree, due to a rejected visa.
The young student was arrested and detained, along with mother Roshani, and both are set to be deported to Sri Lanka despite having no family in the country.
Shiromini was informed by the Home Office that her application for a full student visa had been denied, and was transferred to Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre near Bedford.
The Home Office have since informed the 20-year-old that she will be sent back to her home country of Sri Lanka.
Ms Satkunarajah moved to the UK at age 12, when her parents fled the civil war in their home country.
She was originally a dependant on her father’s student visa in the UK. She was later granted leave to complete her secondary school education after her father died in 2011.
Despite appealing multiple times, her application for leave to finish her education has now been denied.
A family member expressed: “Shiromini is very emotional but she’s managed to stay strong as she wants to finish her degree more than anything.
“She’s struggled to get where she is. Her mum has suffered from mental health problems after her dad died in 2011.
“As a 13-year-old she had to look after her mum and all of the legal issues as Roshani can’t speak English.
“She’s on track to get a First despite all of the pressures she’s had to deal with but now she can’t finish her degree and its just heartbreaking. All of her hard work is going to be for nothing.”
Earlier Shiromini told: “I didn’t expect them to not send the decision to my home. To get the decision after being arrested was a shock.
“I have no family in Sri Lanka. My mother has two siblings in Canada and one in Germany.
“For me, the UK is where I spent my life since I was 12, and I have an emotional attachment to this country.
“For them to say they are putting me in cells is very sad.”
Iestyn Pierce, Bangor’s head of electrical engineering, described Shiromini as “exceptionally able and diligent”.
“I have no doubt that Shiromini would achieve first-class honours,” he adds.
MP Hywel Williams criticised the “unduly severe” decision, adding: “Her imminent deportation is not only unjust and unfair but will deprive Wales and indeed the UK economy of the contribution she will make.
“Sri Lanka is still a very dangerous place and Shiromini has had no real ties with the country since she was a child.
A Change.org petition has circulated calling on Home Secretary Amber Rudd to grant Shiromini leave to remain in the country has accumulated over 16,000 signatures.
A spokesperson for the Free University of Sheffield, who have been campaigning for Ms Satkunarajah to remain in the UK, said: “The deportation of Shiromini is emblematic of the cruelty of the Home office more widely.
“Previous interventions in deportations have had success with contacting flight companies to ask them to use moral discretion and halt the flight: in this case, contact Manchester Airport and Qatar Airways.”
Sanaz Raji from Unis Resist Border Controls said: “Although Shiromini is an exceptional student with a bright future ahead, we advocate for all students, regardless of their academic aptitude. No one should be denied the right to an education.”
We have seen far too many international students woefully mistreated both by universities who use us as ‘cash cows’ to financially prop up their institutions, while the Home Office attacks us in order to justify their racist and xenophobic migration policies.”
The Home Office have refused to comment on the individual case.
