The Global Refugee Forum is just a week away.
Here's a (somewhat random) selection of situations & issues that it might address.
1/6 Situations:
- mass deportation of Afghan refugees from Pakistan & Iran
- EU externalization in Mediterranean/Libya/North Africa
- UK-Rwanda refugee deportation deal
- Rohingya in Bangladesh: living conditions & pressures to return
- the Palestinian right to seek asylum
2/6

Why exactly is the UK government so obsessed by the refugee deportation deal with Rwanda, despite its evident failings?
Some answers in this thread. In general terms, the government has convinced itself that the asylum issue is the one that can deliver it success (or at least minimize its losses) at the next general election.

A very long Tunisia update!
UNHCR Tunisia has kindly provided me with this statement concerning the situation of refugees in that country.
"Dear Mr. Crisp,
Please find below some information that I hope will help to clarify the situation." "Demonstrations occurring in front of UNHCR Zarzis office followed the announcement of a decrease in the level of financial assistance to be provided by UNHCR from the beginning of February, although the main request coming from demonstrators is 'evacuation' from Tunisia..."

Here are a few quotes from UNHCR's new comment on the UK's asylum proposals: "Resettlement & other legal pathways cannot substitute
for or absolve a State of its obligations towards persons seeking asylum at its borders, including those who have arrived irregularly and spontaneously. This includes those arriving by boat."

Wow. Over £300 million in funding!

https://twitter.com/migration_team/status/1313456982230208514

Thematic breakdown in terms of projects:

Thread:
A non-exhaustive list of the methods states have used or proposed to block or deter the arrival of asylum seekers:

1. Impose visa controls on them
2. Impose passport controls on them
3. Deploy immigration officials at foreign ports/airports
(1/4) 4. Fine airlines/shipping companies bringing them in
5. Build a wall/fence to stop them crossing a border
6. Deploy the military, police & vigilantes to stop them crossing a border
7. Detain them at the border
8. Detain them on an island
9. Detain them on a boat
(2/4)

A bit more on aid agency branding.
In response to a tweet about the increasingly large agency logos seen on refugee tents (below), a couple of humanitarian workers suggested that this was (a) to improve security & prevent attacks; and (b) to limit their theft and/or sale. I don't dispute that this may well be part of the reason for using such large and obtrusive logos, and acknowledge that the internationally recognized Red Cross symbol has been used for many decades for protective and security purposes.

Refugee voices from Moria:

Priority: to publicize UNHCR
Not a priority: to publicize the fact that these people will almost certainly now be in an abusive detention centre
Even less of a prioriity: to publicize the EU's role in interception and forced returns

https://twitter.com/UNHCRLibya/status/1303500914679001088

Remind me to put this in my 'ethics of humanitarian communications' file.

From the Nobel Prize speech of the first High Commissioner for Refugees, 1922:
"The golden produce of the earth has been trampled under iron feet, the land lies in ruins everywhere, and the foundations of its communities are crumbling. People bow their heads in silent despair." "The soul of the world is mortally sick, its courage broken, its ideals tarnished, and the will to live gone; the horizon is hazy, hidden behind burning clouds of destruction, and faith in the dawn of mankind is no more."

In this new article, Elena Haberski and I examine an issue that has been almost entirely neglected in the refugee literature: what happens to rejected asylum seekers in the Global South?
rli.blogs.sas.ac.uk/2020/09/07/the…
@Bur_ski There is scope for a lot more research, analysis and advocacy on this issue. Let us know if you are interested!

Pictures from today's Guardian:
1. Sicily 2. The English Channel

I'm all in favour of 'safe and legal routes' for refugees, as explained in this recent article:
moas.eu/saving-lives-a…
But as I pointed out five years ago, there's also a danger of this notion becoming a somewhat complacent slogan:
thenewhumanitarian.org/analysis/2015/… And for those who lament the fact that people can only claim refugee status once they have left their own country, well, the UN Refugee Convention describes a refugee as someone who "is outside the country of his nationality" and who is "unable or unwilling" to return to it.

Great question Mike!

https://twitter.com/MikeWoldemariam/status/1300840340736352259

Hypothesis:
While the political elites of some developing countries were sending their kids to universities in the US, UK, Canada etc., they espoused the idea that economic growth & national income could be boosted by getting poorer citizens to work abroad & send back remittances

I just looked at the Global Compact on Refugees (GCR) and Global Compact on Migration (GCM). The word "disembarkation" does not appear in either of them.

https://twitter.com/Refugees/status/1299687598395453441

But the GCM does say "We commit to cooperate internationally to save lives & prevent migrant deaths & injuries through individual or joint search & rescue operations, assuming collective responsibility
to preserve the lives of all migrants, in accordance with international law."

Well, my strong sense is that UNHCR is deliberately diluting the difference between 'IDPs' and 'refugees' so that it can rebrand itself as the 'UN agency for forced displacement'. I think it's called 'market share'.

https://twitter.com/AhmedRobleh4/status/1299052421088448514

Not least because the UN has established a so-called 'High Level Panel' to look into this issue.
Let the turf wars commence!

UK:
Good to see the growing momentum behind the 'safe and legal routes to asylum' movement. But I fear that we will struggle to make much of an impact on government policy. 1. The whole notion of welcoming refugees is contrary to the culture of the government and its right-wing supporters, even if those refugees were to be pre-selected and were to arrive in an 'orderly' manner. (With the possible exception of Hong Kongers).

Fleeing by boat.
an illustrated history:
The 1920s: The 1930s:

Calling all refugee lawyers!
Help me with this one...
The Universal Declaration on Human Rights says that "Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution."
@ProfCCostello @DanGhez @profjmcadam @JC_Hathaway @tgammeltoft And a UNHCR policy statement says that "Persons rescued or intercepted at sea cannot be summarily turned back or otherwise returned to the country of departure, including in particular where to do so would deny them a fair opportunity to seek asylum."
refworld.org/pdfid/5a2e9efd…

The last year in Libya:

Good stuff from Vincent! The official UNHCR position is weaker: "Any assistance & responsibilities assigned to relevant Libyan entities should be made conditional on noone being arbitrarily detained after they have been rescued & guarantees of human rights standards being upheld"

https://twitter.com/cochetel/status/1289172196938715139

The more often I read that UNHCR/IOM statement, the less I understand it. Is it an excessively diplomatic way of saying that the EU should withdraw support from the Libyan coast guard?