"There is no shortage of bad faith—on either side of the Evros"
August 15-22, 2022 Mixed Migration—hebdo
Welcome to Mixed Migration—hebdo! Here, in the time it takes to read one feature, you get a global sweep of the last week's most relevant migration policy developments, along with links to all the articles you need to dig deeper.
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Spotlight
Last week, as I was writing a Spotlight on the Kenyan presidential election, another weeklong standoff between Greek and Turkish border forces took place in the Evros—Groundhog Day again, with 38 Syrian refugees (initially 39) made to pay an unspeakable cost for the EU’s unwillingness to respond to the policy challenge of irregular migration with pragmatism, let alone humanity.
The facts:
Syrian refugees in Turkey are increasingly at risk of harm and deportation;
refugees fleeing persecution—or fleeing refoulement to a place where they will be persecuted—have an unambiguous right, under international and European law, to cross an international border into a safe country and request asylum;
last July, a group of ~50 Syrian refugees crossed the Evros River, marking the border between Turkey and Greece, to seek safety;
instead of being offered a chance to claim asylum, they were caught up in “what amounts to a geopolitical ping-pong game, being pushed back and forth across the land border by Greek and Turkish authorities for weeks,” and ended up stranded on islet in the middle of the river;
on July 14, the European Court of Human Rights issued a Rule 39 interim decision, ordering Greek authorities to retrieve that group of refugees from that islet and offer them access to asylum proceedings;
Greek authorities claimed they tried but were unable to find the group, which ended up back in Turkey instead, where they accuse “Turkish authorities of holding them in military barracks, and later bringing them back across to the river and ordering them—at gunpoint—to cross again into Greek territory,” ending up stranded an islet in the Evros again;
on August 9, the European Court of Human Rights issued another Rule 39 interim decision, again ordering Greek authorities to retrieve the group of refugees stranded on the islet, reduced to 39;
on August 9, a scorpion stung a 5-year old girl and her 9-year-old sister, killing the former and gravely harming the latter;
on August 11, Greek authorities claimed they could not rescue the group, as they believed them to be on Turkish territory;
on August 15, the group managed to cross from the islet to the western bank of the Evros, using a boat passed on by another group of crossing refugees, where they were finally admitted under Greece’s sovereignty and protection—despite having been present on Greek soil for over a week.
This standoff took not just the life of a 5-year old girl in August, but also of 3 other asylum seekers in mid-July. These 4 lives are just the tip of the iceberg as regards the human cost of how the EU controls its external borders.
There is no shortage of bad faith—on either side of the Evros—when it comes to scoring geopolitical points at the expense of asylum seekers’ well-being. Turkish authorities have deported over 150.000 Syrians since 2019, and over 32.000 Afghans just this year. Greek authorities have, in turn, illegally pushed back thousands to Turkey, pushing the disingenuous line that refugees are safe in Turkey, and that its border policing practices are above board—despite mountains of evidence to the contrary.
There is no shortage of injustice, either, in each country’s predicament. Turkey has been the world’s top refugee-hosting country for over a decade, bearing a disproportionate weight as a result of conflicts it did not initiate (though its footprint in northern Syria is far from innocent). Greece, in turn, has little say in how EU leaders in Brussels negotiate migration management and other bilateral issues with Ankara.
There is no shortage of bad faith, finally, in the EU one day blessing Greece’s violent border policing methods, and the next day covering up Greece’s misdeeds, all while preaching and feigning adherence to European values. It remains evident that, in sustaining the delicate balancing act between managing external borders and upholding asylum seekers’ rights, the EU remains willing to dispense not just with asylum seekers’ rights, but also their lives. This should come as no surprise: exclusionary ethno-nationalism is easier to package into effective politcal messaging than inclusion—than the art of carefully balancing the interests of every individual and group to advance their collective well-being. When it comes to EU migration policy, forget the European Convention on Human Rights—the far right remains very much in command of messaging. Horrific outcomes remain (and will remain) par for the course for months (years) to come—along the Evros and in the Aegean, Central Mediterranean and Atlantic routes.
I wish I had a solution to offer to those among us who still believe in the liberal state. I started this newsletter over a year ago with the intention of compiling credible, properly-sourced journalism and research about human mobility and migration policymaking, that might one day serve as a basis for healthy, reality-based discussion. I had few illusions back then, and retain few now, of this newsletter’s ability to lead us to that outcome—though I still hope it might contribute in some small way to leading us toward a solution to the thorny issue of reconciling sovereign border control with organic human mobility.
If you’re keen, however, for a way to make a more direct contribution to the specific problem highlighted above, there are two organizations working tirelessly on behalf of arriving asylum seekers, raising legal challenges in Greek and European courts to protect their rights and their lives. Human Rights 360 and the Greek Council for Refugees are essential actors in the shrinking space of NGOs and CSOs upholding human rights at the Evros. I couldn’t possibly credit them enough for the work they’ve done to ensure the 38 asylum seekers whose story this Spotlight told were eventually admitted into the custody of Greek authorities. You will not solve the issue of the liberal state’s difficulty balancing the politics and policy of crafting functional, rights-respecting migration policy with a single donation—but you can make a huge difference in the lives of asylum seekers braving the Evros by supporting either of these organizations.
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On to the news…
Asia
Post-occupation Afghanistan
Last Wednesday, a bomb attack targeting a mosque in Kabul’s northwestern district of Khair Khana killed at least 21 worshipers, and wounded another 33. | On Friday, Eurasianet highlighted the difficulties faced by the ~8.500 Afghan refugees in Tajikistan, where they are not allowed to reside in the 2 largest cities, and where many can only obtain access state services by way of hefty bribes. | On Sunday, Afghan authorities signaled that recent flooding has killed ~165 civilians, and injured another ~300, with thousands of acres of farmland flooded across the country and hundreds of roads and highways damaged. | This Monday, Biden Administration officials leaked that they intend to continue discussions with Taliban leadership on releasing frozen reserves belonging to the Afghan Central Bank, despite rising tensions on the heels of the recent U.S. drone strike that killed al-Qaeda commander Ayman al-Zawahiri in Kabul.
Myanmar and its neighbors
Last Wednesday, India’s Home Ministry announced that the ~1.100 Rohingya living in New Delhi should be held in detention centers pending repatriation—reversing commitments made earlier on the same day that the same population would be allocated housing, basic services, and police protection. | On Thursday, The Irrawaddy highlighted a growing brain drain as Burmese youth pursue work opportunities across southeast Asia’s recovering economies while political freedoms and dignified livelihoods remain on hold in Myanmar. On the same day, the Malaysian Labor Ministry acknowledged the pressing need for foreign labor in Malaysia, but announced it would let the Home Office decide whether to allow Rohingya refugees to access the labor market, based on internal security considerations.
Asylum in east Asia
Last Thursday, Middle East Eye highlighted a weeks-long protest by ~40 Egyptian asylum seekers in Seoul, aggrieved by South Korea’s slow asylum adjudication process and limited financial support and labor market access for asylum seekers. | On Friday, Japanese authorities granted asylum to 98 Afghan refugees from 18 households, with another ~700 Afghan civilians evacuated to Japan in August 2021 awaiting a durable solution.
Sources: al Jazeera, Eurasianet, TOLOnews, Reuters, The Irrawaddy, Free Malaysia Today, Middle East Eye, the Asahi Shimbun.
Sub-Saharan Africa
Civil war and natural disaster in Ethiopia
Last Tuesday, OCHA began returning ~8.550 IDPs encamped in the Afar State capital of Semera to their communities of origin in the Ab’ala district, bordering Tigray. | On Thursday, officials in Somali State reported that armed clashes in Sitti zone, along its border with Afar State, have displaced thousands of civilians in urgent need of humanitarian assistance. | On Friday, the WFP assessed that half of the population of Tigray is food-insecure, with half of lactating mothers malnourished, as humanitarian aid deliveries remain grievously insufficient to meet needs. On the same day, the Guardian highlighted the financial difficulties, caused by the longstanding banking shutoff in Tigray, and by more recent cash flow controls, pushing women and girls into sex work to sustain themselves and their families. Also on Friday, 72 domestic civil society organizations operating in Tigray demanded an end to the blockading of essential services in the embattled region, to enable the resumption of unimpeded humanitarian aid. | On Saturday, The EastAfrican highlighted that despite Ethiopian authorities’ profession of a wish to conduct peace talks with the TPLF, their insistence on the signing of a formal ceasefire before restoring basic services to Tigray is prolonging hostility. | This Monday, regional authorities signaled that nearly 4.150 households had been displaced by flooding in Ethiopia’s southwestern Gambella State.
Conflict and displacement in the Sahel
Last Tuesday, MSF announced it was expanding its child care facilities in northwestern Nigeria to deal with dramatic increases in child malnutrition, in the hope of treating 100.000 at-need children through the rest of the year. On the same day, HumAngle revealed the miserly results of a ₦133.1 million (~$313,000) investment in housing for IDPs returning to Guzamala, in Nigeria’s northeastern Borno State, where few buildings have been finished since 2019, and those completed are already coming apart. | On Wednesday, just under 300 refugees returned to the CAR from exile in Cameroon. | On Thursday, al Jazeera highlighted a recent OCHA report tallying ~14.500 homes destroyed by flooding in Sudan and ~136.000 civilians affected (see the full OCHA report here). | On Friday, HumAngle revealed the difficulties faced by returned IDPs in Nigera’s northeastern border town of Kiwara, where resource-scarcity is forcing returnees to cross over to Cameroon to obtain water, facing risks unique to border crossing to meet his most basic of needs.
Sources: Addis Standard, The EastAfrican, Reuters, the Guardian, HumAngle.
Middle East and North Africa
Displacement within and beyond Syria
Last Monday, the WFP announced it would have to cut food stipends by one-third to ~353.000 mostly Syrian refugees in Jordan—from $32 per month to $21 per month, or $21 to $14, depending on vulnerability—due to competing needs provoked by displacement out of Ukraine and to dramatic increases in food prices. | On Tuesday, Lebanese authorities announced their intention to shortly begin repatriating 15.000 Syrian refugees per month, with assent and collaboration from the Assad regime. | On Wednesday, Canadian Minister of International Development Harjit Sajjan signaled his opposition to Lebanon’s emerging Syrian refugee repatriation plan during a visit to Beirut, admonishing that Syria is not a safe country of return. | On Thursday, OCHA warned of rising violence and water scarcity in the al-Hol detention camp in northeastern Syria, which hosts ~55.000 suspected former ISIS fighters of numerous nationalities as well as their family members. | On Friday, an artillery attack on a market in al-Bab, in opposition-controlled Idlib, killed 15 civilians and injured at least 28.
Asylum seeker (im)mobility in north Africa and Turkey
Last Monday, Libyan authorities announced they had found the lifeless bodies of 15 asylum seekers who became stranded in the desert near the border with Sudan. On the same day, Libyan authorities detained several dozen asylum seekers living in Tripoli. | On Wednesday, Turkish authorities announced they had repatriated just under 70.000 asylum seekers thus far this year, with another ~17.000 asylum seekers in pre-removal detention across Turkey. On the same day, a Moroccan court sentenced 13 asylum seekers to 32 months’ imprisonment and a 10.000 dhirams (~€95) for their role in the June 24 deadly mass attempted crossing of the Melilla border fence. | On Thursday, 103 asylum seekers arrived to Rwanda from Libya on a UNHCR-sponsored humanitarian evacuation flight. | On Friday, Middle East Monitor tallied 11.111 asylum seekers rescued in the Aegean thus far this year, just under 9.800 of which they attribute to pushbacks from Greek waters, and just under 1.150 of which they attribute to departure prevention.
Sources: the National, ANSA, AP, Anadolu, InfoMigrants, Hürriyet, The News Times, Middle East Monitor.
Maritime Migration Routes to & through the West
Ruta Canaria
Last Thursday, Salvamento Marítimo rescued 43 asylum seekers, including 8 minors, from a distressed vessel off the coast of Lanzarote. | On Sunday, Salvamento Marítimo rescued 61 asylum seekers, including 4 minors, off the coast of Fuerteventura.
Central and western Mediterranean
Last Tuesday, Tunisian authorities announced they had intercepted 80 asylum seekers trying to reach European waters in 5 vessels, and also prevented the departure of another 11 before they had set sail. | On Wednesday, the Open Arms Uno rescued 101 asylum seekers in its inaugural mission in the Central Mediterranean. On the same day, Italian authorities rescued 20 asylum seekers from a vessel in waters just off of Lampedusa, as Tunisian authorities intercepted 127 asylum seekers trying to cross the Mediterranean in 2 boats, and prevented another 24 from departing. | On Sunday, the Geo Barents (MSF) rescued 106 asylum seekers in a rescue operation coordinated by Italian authorities. | This Monday, IOM disclosed that 140 asylum seekers had been returned to Libya from the Central Mediterranean this week, where they face indefinite detention and virtually certain abuse. On the same day, Salvamento Marítimo rescued 22 asylum seekers from a distressed vessel off the coast of southern Spain.
Aegean Sea
Last Tuesday, Aegean Boat Report relayed the testimony of a group of 9 asylum seekers who documented their arrival on the Greek island of Leros on Monday, and were found adrift off the coast of Didim by Turkish Coast Guard vessels on the following day. On Wednesday, 2 sailboats carrying ~150 asylum seekers ran aground near the southern Aegean island of Kythera, with no reported casualties. | On Thursday, another 67 asylum seekes reached Kythera autonomously, believed, alongside preceding arrivals, to have been trying to reach Italy from Turkey. | On Friday, 51 asylum seekers arrived autonomously in Lesvos, where they were allowed to access reeption facilities and attempt asylum claims. | On Sunday, Aegean Boat Report relayed media from 26 asylum seekers stranded on a distressed vessel in Turkish waters, who relayed they had been pushed back from Greek waters and had their vessel’s engine removed by Greek Coast Guard officers.
The English Channel
Last Wednesday, UK Defence officials disclosed that just over 600 asylum seekers had been rescued from 12 vessels over the day. | On Thursday, French authorities announced they had prevented just over 250 asylum seekers from crossing the English Channel in 5 operations over the previous 4 days.
Gulf of Mexico and U.S.-Pacific maritime borders
Last Friday, a cruise ship rescued 6 Cuban asylum seekers from a makeshift raft drifting in waters off the coast of Mexico, eventually disembarking them in Cozumel for reception by Mexican authorities. On Saturday, the U.S. Coast Guard rescued 19 asylum seekers from a boat adrift off the coast of Los Angeles. | On Sunday, Mexican authorities rescued 6 Cuban asylum seekers from a homemade vessel adrift off the coast of the Yucatán Peninsula. | This Monday, the U.S. Coast Guard announced it had identified 41 asylum seekers autonomously arrived to the Florida Keys, on the heels of 27 arrivals and 200 returns on the Saturday prior.
Sources: EFE, AFP, ANSA, BBC, euronews, InfoMigrants, Europa Press, Aegean Boat Report, CNN, CBS News, Imagen de Veracruz, Local10News.
Europe
EU migration policymaking
Last Monday, Italian authorities disclosed that, over the last 12 months, just under 6.000 Afghan nationals had obtained asylum in Italy, alongside just under 150.000 people fleeing Ukraine obtaining temporary protection, and just under 130.000 third-country nationals acquiring Italian citizenship. On the same day, German Chancellor Olaf Scholtz contested calls from Baltic EU states to restrict tourist visa issuance to Russian nationals, arguing that doing so would impede the flight of Russian opposition members. | On Wednesday, Denmark announced it would resettle 200 refugees from Rwanda in the coming year, while keeping admission firmly closed to irregular asylum seeker arrivals.
European migration (mis)management
Last Wednesday, the Dutch Refugee Council sued national authorities over the months-old asylum seeker reception crisis, leading to overcrowding at the Ter Apel reception center and to the long-term accommodation of asylum seekers in unsuitable conditions. On the same day, the European Court of Human Rights issued a Rule 39 interim measure demanding that Greek authorities rescue a group of 49 asylum seekers stranded on an islet in the Evros River. | On Thursday, Greek authorities announced they had prevented 1.500 irregular crossings of the Evros, and detained 60 smugglers. On the same day, Greek police clashed with residents apprehensive of removal from Eleonas camp, in an industrial area near the center of Athens, which authorities intend to decommission—with camp residents fearing precariousness and dislocation.
Dystopia at the Home Office
Last Monday, the Migration Observatory issued a report finding that low-skilled labor migration to the UK has plummeted post-Brexit, as barriers to labor migrant arrivals from EU states have gone up—all while post-Brexit labor migration rules prioritize high-skilled migration and labor-scarce sectors take time to adjust to this new reality (see MO’s full report here). | On Tuesday, the Royal Navy suggested it may cease collaborating with the Border Force on maritime migration control at the end of this year. On the same day, ongoing High Court litigation revealed that the Home Office received and ignored advice from the Foreign Office making it clear that Rwanda’s human rights record made it an unsuitable destination for removed asylum seekers—with advocacy and media organizations now petitioning for the full disclosure of this advice, and UK authorities trying to prevent its release. | On Wednesday, UK authorities disclosed they are considering increasing support payments to families hosting Ukrainian refugees from £350 to £700 to encourage the renewal of Homes for Ukraine placements—amid 1.300 recently-arrived Ukrainians assessed to in or near homelessness, and a quarter of the nearly 80.000 existing placements set to not be renewed. On the same day, the High Court issued a ruling allowing the Foreign Office to retain 4 redactions to its advisory report, and denying the remaining 6 demanded redactions. Also on Wednesday, UK authorities announced a steep reduction in trade barriers with developing countries, controversially including Syria among the 8 states to be included in an ‘enhanced preferences’ scheme allowing an 85% cut in export tariffs.
Sources: Deutsche-Welle, ANSA, InfoMigrants, Border Violence Monitoring Network, EURACTIV, the Guardian, BBC, the Independent, iNews.
The Americas
Migration policymaking in North America
Last Monday, U.S. authorities reported just under 200.000 asylum seeker encounters in July at the U.S.-Mexico border, a ~4% decline from June. On the same day, seasonal farm workers from Jamaican working in Canada issued an open letter to Jamaican Labour Minister Karl Samuda complaining of rampant abuse, including low wages, long hours, and mistreatment from employers, directed at them as well as at seasonal workers of other origins. | On Thursday, CBP director Chris Magnus delivered rare criticism from within U.S. border enforcement against Title 42, to which he attributed both harm visited unto asylum seekers returned to Mexico, and for operational difficulties faced by Border Patrol agents intercepting repeat arrivals. | On Sunday, the Refugee Advocacy Lab issued an open letter to U.S. President Joe Biden, signed by public officials from all 50 states, urging him to uphold his campaign commitment to resettling 125.000 refugees per fiscal year—noting that 2021’s 11.411 arrivals were the lowest number on record since the resettlement program began in 1980 (see RAL’s full letter here). | This Monday, The National relayed U.S. officials’ intention to increase Syrian refugee resettlement in coming years, noting that nearly 3.800 arrivals have taken place thus far this fiscal year, a 300% increase from FY 2021 and the highest number since FY 2017.
Irregular migration in Latin America
Last Wednesday, Colombia’s national ombudsman revealed a proposal under review by the governments of Ecuador, Colombia, Panama, and Costa Rica to establish a humanitarian corridor to minimize risks at border crossings and circumvent irregular routes across the Darién Gap. On Thursday, Mexican authorities intercepted a truck carrying 47 asylum seekers in its trailer, detaining the driver and retaining the passengers for processing. | On Sunday, human rights defender Itsmania Platero revealed over 70.000 Honduran asylum seekers have been repatriated from Mexico thus far this year, exceeding official figures released by Mexican authorities, which Platero charges do not include informal returns conducted between official ports of entry. On the same day, authorities in Guatemala disclosed they had intercepted 5.900 asylum seekers transiting irregularly through Guatemalan soil thus far this year, nearly three quarters of them nationals of Venezuela. Also on Sunday, Guatemalan authorities disclosed that 815 asylum seekers had been repatriated from the U.S. and Mexico over the week prior.
Sources: AP, CBS News, VOA, The National, en Frontera, Milenio, EFE, Tiempo, AGN, la Hora
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