As Ireland’s deputy PM Micheál Martin headed to London for scheduled inter-governmental talks with British officials, attention was firmly focused on the increasingly thorny issue of cross-border migration.

Over recent days, politicians from the two nations have been engaged in a war of words over whether it is possible for some asylum seekers who cross over to the Republic of Ireland from Northern Ireland – part of the UK – to be sent back.

Stating his position on Monday, the Irish leader, Simon Harris, said his country would not "provide a loophole" for other countries' migration challenges.

The Irish justice minister, Helen McEntee, had been due to discuss the issue with the UK Home Secretary James Cleverly on Monday, but that meeting was postponed because McEntee is busy preparing emergency legislation to make such returns to the UK possible.

No agreement with Ireland

But Britain has remained firm, saying it will refuse to accept any returned asylum seekers from Ireland.

"We're not going to accept returns from the EU via Ireland when the EU doesn't accept returns back to France were illegal migrants are coming from," Prime Minister Rishi Sunak told ITV News.

Ireland is struggling with an increase in asylum seekers which has resulted in an accommodation crisis, accompanied by growing discontent among some locals.

McEntee revealed last week that more than 80 percent of recently arrived asylum seekers in Ireland had come from the UK via the land border with Northern Ireland.

And on Friday, Deputy Prime Minister Martin said the UK's Rwanda policy was already causing more people to seek protection in Ireland because they feared being deported to the African country.

Sunak told Sky News on Sunday that his government's policy was working as a deterrent and putting people off trying to reach the UK.

The Safety of Rwanda Act, which came into force last week, will see asylum seekers who arrive in the UK detained and sent to Rwanda to have their claims for asylum processed there.

Also read: UK: Government considers 'Rwanda-like' deal with four other countries

The law was drafted to circumvent a British Supreme Court ruling that sending people to Rwanda would be illegal because of the country's human rights record. It has been criticized by, among others, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, as well as many church and religious leaders.

The Labour party’s Shadow Home Secretary, Yvette Coooper, said last week that no asylum seeker will be sent to Rwanda if it wins government in elections expected later this year.

Panic spreads over rumored Rwanda operation

Sunak said the deportations to Rwanda would happen within the next 10 to 12 weeks. Late Sunday, following a report in The Guardian newspaper, rumors began circulating that raids were to take place to send people to pre-removal detention centers ahead of that date.

Some law firms which are struggling with what they say is an acute shortage in immigration legal aid capacity warned on social media that they could only deal with the most urgent cases of people who had received removal letters since the Rwanda Bill was passed.

Migrant support organizations were also using social media on Monday to advise asylum seekers on what to do if authorities tried to transfer them to detention, and how they might dispute Rwanda removal directions.

They also warned asylum seekers not to give details to the media which could put them at greater risk.

"[Asylum seekers] are genuinely terrified to report [to immigration centers]," wrote Louise Calvey, an expert on asylum and refugees at the group Refugee Action, on X.

In a separate post, Calvey said "People [are] already terrified of being raided & shackled. We'll see people vanishing into destitution & exploitation."

While there was at least one report of a van "only used when asylum seekers are being taken away" outside an immigration office in the East Midlands, InfoMigrants is unaware of any such incidents having taken place at the time of writing on Monday.