Minister David Lammy said he was “appalled” by the error, adding that his department was “working urgently with the police to find him.”
According to The Sun newspaper, the man was due to be transferred from Chelmsford Prison in Essex, south-east England, to an administrative detention centre with a view to being deported, but was accidentally released by the authorities.
“Kebatu (the man’s name, editor’s note) must be deported for his crimes, not back on our streets,” added David Lammy on X, who ordered an investigation into this erroneous release.
The asylum seeker was sentenced in September to one year in prison by the British courts for sexual assaults on a 14-year-old girl and a woman in Epping, northeast London.
Following his arrest in July, protests, some of which turned violent, took place outside the Bell Hotel in Epping, where he was staying with some 130 other asylum seekers, before spreading to other towns across the UK.
Hadush Kebatu arrived in the UK at the end of June by crossing the Channel in a small boat.
“Britain is collapsing,” Nigel Farage, leader of the far-right Reform UK party, reacted on Friday to X, which has made the fight against immigration his main electoral argument.
A prison officer has been suspended, according to the British PA news agency.
