NUMBER 148 • ISSUE 4 • 2007

WHY IT MATTERS THE EDITOR’S DESK REFUGEE or Migrant ? n the case of the man on the cover of this movement is justified may depend on what lies between their magazine, at the moment when the picture was taken, country of origin and the country where they eventually the question was irrelevant. Whoever he is, he deserved make their asylum claim. to be saved – and that is precisely what the coastguards There is, of course, nothing new about people moving. were trying to do after a boat of would-be migrants Migrations of people for both refugee and non-refugee reasons oIverturned off the coast of southern Spain, drowning several have been taking place since before the beginning of recorded of its occupants including at least two pregnant women. time. And if we were to trace our ancestors back far enough, all However, once he was safely on shore, the question of of us would find that we originated somewhere else. whether he was a refugee or a migrant may well have come Nor should voluntary migration – economic or otherwise – immediately to the fore. necessarily be viewed as negative (even 5

As a refugee, fleeing persecution or 0 though it is usually seen that way). 0 2 • P S

armed conflict, he would have been E Migrants often fill the gaps in the work - / S

entitled to “international protection” in E force, rather than take other workers’ R E M

an asylum country – in this case most . jobs – but they still make the perfect A / S

probably Spain. On the other hand, if he R scapegoat for a society’s ills, and their E T U E

was someone moving for financial R contribution is often hidden or ignored. reasons – to earn a better living than he © The linked issues of migration and could at home – then he would be classi - asylum are probably more widely de - fied as an economic migrant, and would bated (and confused) today than ever quite likely be sent back to his home before: perhaps because the number of country. people on the move has increased; This is a judgement that many coun - perhaps because the planet – or certain tries around the world make in varying countries on it – feel overcrowded; numbers of individual cases every day. perhaps for a host of other reasons, Sometimes the decision is relatively both real and imagined. straightforward, and sometimes it is an And, as the 21 st century progresses, it extremely difficult call to make. There is likely to become even more compli - are countries that produce lots of eco - Too soon to tell: a migrant or refugee cated, with more people forced – one nomic migrants, and very few refugees. picked up in the Mediterranean. way or another (war, economics, climate But they do produce some, and it is the change) – to pull up their roots and job of asylum adjudicators to spot them. move somewhere else. There are asylum seekers without documents who are Over 200 million people are believed to be living outside refugees, and there are asylum seekers with valid travel their original homeland already. Relatively few of them are documents who are most definitely not. There are people refugees. But, yes – taking the trouble to find out which ones who articulate a false story well, and people who articulate a are does still matter. true story badly – or not at all (because it is too painful and To undermine the system that identifies a refugee, and too personal). prevents him or her from being sent home, would in some And there is a grey zone: people who are leaving a country cases be like the coastguards in the cover photo cutting the where persecution and discrimination are unquestionably rope instead of hauling it in. It should be unthinkable – and it occurring, and the economy is also dire. Are people leaving is unthinkable, when one looks at asylum seekers and such countries for refugee reasons, or economic ones – or do refugees as individual human beings. both sets of reasons fuse into one that is, in many cases, almost But when they are reduced to statistics, and described in impossible to unravel? pejorative terms such as ‘floods,’ ‘waves,’ ‘unstoppable tides’ And what about the people who leave their country for (and other watery metaphors that bear a certain tragic irony refugee reasons, and then keep on moving for economic ones given the number of would-be refugees and migrants who (so-called ‘secondary movers’)? Whether or not their onward drown), they are all too easy to cast aside and ignore.

2 REFUGEES N°148 • 2007

Editor Rupert Colville French Editor Cécile Pouilly 6 0

0 COVER STORY 2 4

Contributors • M

Angel Suárez, Anja Klug, Francesca O S

/ States are having increasing difficulty Fontanini, Giulia Laganà, Ligimat Perez, R E T S

Nazli Zaki and unhcr staff worldwide. B distinguishing between refugees and migrants. E W .

Editorial Assistant A / R

Manuela Raffoni C H

N 12 WORSE THAN THE SHARKS Photo Department U Suzy Hopper, Anne Kellner Migrants and refugees The smugglers operating between Somalia Design take the same routes, and Yemen are among the most vicious in 4face the same hazards. Vincent Winter Associés, Paris the world. Production Françoise Jaccoud Distribution 15 MALAWI’S DILEMMA John O’Connor, Frédéric Tissot Many refugees and migrants only stay for a

Photo Engraving 2 9

9 short while before moving on to South Africa. 1

Aloha Scan, Geneva - 1 9 9 1 Maps • A S unhcr Mapping Unit U /

D 16 THE DEEP BLUE SEA R Historical documents A U G

T Anti-immigration policies, reckless smugglers unhcr archives S A O

REFUGEES is published by the Media Relations C and cold commercial calculations may be S U

and Public Information Service of the United © endangering lives at sea. Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The Protecting refugees opinions expressed by contributors are not in the Caribbean is 22 a challenge. necessarily those of UNHCR . The designations 22 CARIBBEAN CONUNDRUMS and maps used do not imply the expression of any opinion or recognition on the part of Every year, thousands from within the UNHCR concerning the legal status of a region – and beyond – try to reach the US territory or of its authorities. via the Caribbean. REFUGEES reserves the right to edit all articles 0

before publication. Articles and photos not 0 0 2 covered by copyright © may be reprinted without • N

U 23 MIGRATION TO THE NORTH prior permission. Please credit UNHCR and the H / Y photographer. Requests for copyrighted photos K

Z The route via Mexico to the US is fraught S L

should be directed to the agency credited. E

D with risk for refugees and migrants alike. N A Z

English and French editions printed in Italy S . B by AMILCARE PIZZI S.p.A., Milan. / R C

Circulation: 121,000 in Arabic, English, H 25 CONTROL VS. PROTECTION N French, Italian and Spanish. U Migration controls Within the EU, there has been a marked shift issn 0252-791 X make it hard for of focus from protecting refugees to halting 25 refugees to find safety. Front cover: Coastguards rescue a migrant irregular migration. or refugee off the coast of southern Spain. ©REUTERS / A. MERES / ESP•2002

Back cover: Some migrants and refugees 29 DIVERTED TO NAURU are killed, or badly injured, attempting to How different treatment, based on the way cross borders. people arrive, became a central feature of ©SERGIO CARO / MAR•2005 Australia’s asylum policy. UNHCR P.O. Box 2500 1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland 31 IS TOLERATION ENOUGH? www.unhcr.org Relatively few Asian countries have established formal asylum systems.

REFUGEES 3 VSTATiES AtREaHAVINlG INCRDEASINGIDIFSFICULTT Y DIS

BY J EFF C RISP a distraught and emaciated Chechen woman carrying a two-year-old baby boy. She begged the n 13 September, Polish border guards border guards to come with her to find her three patrolling the mountainous border area daughters, whom she had left behind as she went O near the border with Ukraine came upon tolookforhelp. Afewhourslater,aroundmidnight, 4 REFUGEES TIINGNUISHINGCBETWEENTREFUIGEOES AND MIN GRANTS.

X-ray and thermal imaging systems are now in use in several countries, including the US and ports in the Mediterranean and northern France.

they found the bodies of the three girls, aged 13, 10 and 6, Jamaldinova told Polish investigators that she had paid some huddled together and covered in fern leaves. Dressed in Moscow-based smugglers us $2,000 to get herself and her fam - 1 0 0 2

summer clothes, they had died of exposure after spending ilytoAustria.Butattheborder,theirguidehadsimplypointed • A S U

four days wandering disoriented in the mountains. inthegeneraldirectionofPolandandabandonedthemtotheir / P F A

While being treated in hospital, their mother Kamisa fate–justastemperaturesintheBieszczadymountainsplunged ©

REFUGEES 5 How the TID E has They had a dream – a dream of escaping Between 1946 and 1958, a total of some misery, or political oppression, and finding a 180,000 Spaniards emigrated, mainly from new El Dorado on the other side of the world. Galicia and the Canary Islands, to Venezuela, There were no Africans, Arabs, Asians or Latin a country the islanders sometimes refer as Americans among them – just desperate the “The Eighth Island” ( La Octava Isla ), Europeans, impoverished by the economic because of the large community of their slump that followed the end of the 1936-39 compatriots who still live there. Venezuela Spanish civil war. was not the only South American destination: “If you had breakfast, you had no supper,” in 1950 alone, some 60,000 Spaniards set sail remembered José Abreu, “and the only exit for Argentina, while thousands more went to [we] could think of was to emigrate.”Abreu, other countries in the region. who died in 2006, and his brother Sebastian Fernando Medina Valladolid, speaking to were interviewed by the makers of a Spanish UNHCR at his home in Venezuela, described documentary* half a century after they and the departure of the boats, dubbed buques 169 other people set sail from the Canary fantasmas (ghost ships) by the islanders Islands on the Telémaco , an old boat designed because they were leaving on a one-way trip, to carry around 20 passengers. never to return: “People hugged and cried... Their journey across the Atlantic began some jumped into the sea to swim after the on 9 August 1950, and lasted a seemingly boat and then swam back.” Researchers have interminable 36 days. catalogued at least 130 of these clandestine

© A. SUÁREZ / ESP•1950 Irregular migrants from the Canary to around zero degrees Celsius. MIXED MOTIVES Islands, during their Throughout the world, people are embarking As these examples suggest, the phenomenon epic 1950 voyage to Venezuela on board upon long, hazardous and clandestine journeys of of ‘irregular migration,’ in which people move from the Telémaco . the type undertaken by the Jamaldinova family. one country and continent to another without pass - InAsia,forexample,membersoftheRohingyacom - ports and visas, is growing in scale and scope. What munity are trying to make their way from Myanmar forcesaredrivingthistrend?Whoarethepeoplemov - to Thailand and then to Malaysia and Indonesia. ing? And how are they affected by their journey? People from Central American countries are Peoplemoveforavarietyofreasons.Insomecases, movingnorth,initiallytoMexicoandsubsequently– theyarefleeingpersecution,humanrightsviolations if they can – to the United States and Canada. and armed conflict in their home country, and can Somalis and Ethiopians are crossing the Gulf of therefore be considered as refugees under interna - AdentoYemenandtheGulfstates,whilepeoplefrom tional law. Central and Eastern Africa are making their way to Moreoften,theyaremigrantstryingtoescapethe South Africa. hardships and uncertainties of life in developing Inrecentyearstherehasalsobeenagrowingmove - countries with weak economies, high levels of ment of people from, or via, West African countries unemployment, mounting competition for scarce to Spain’s southern outpost, the Canary Islands; and resources, and poor standards of governance. via North Africa and the Mediterranean to the Refugeesandmigrantsfrequentlymovealongside European Union. Others enter the eu by land from eachother,usingthesameroutesandmeansoftrans - the south-east, making their way though countries port,andemployingtheservicesofthesamehuman such as Turkey and the Balkan states. smugglers as they try to reach the same countries of

6 REFUGEES HALF A CENTURY AGO EUROPEANS WERE LEAVING ON BOATS FOR TURNED LATIN AMERICA boats that sailed from the Canaries between a swim. But, after 10 days, the fuel ran out and Abreu was the cook on the Telémaco , and 1948 and 1955. bad things started to happen.” when the ship finally arrived in Venezuela, he Valladolid was eight years old, when he The Telémaco had hardly any navigation and the rest of the crew were jailed for left with his mother and his nine brothers and instruments and was steered by a crew who immigration offences, while the other sisters: “When I realized the boat was leaving had never crossed the Atlantic. It was passengers were taken to an island normally the shore and my grandfather – who had something of a miracle that nobody died used to quarantine cattle. Later, they were been like a dad to me – was not coming with during the crossing, after a big storm with moved to a reception centre on the mainland us, something hit me.” 15-metre waves left the boat drifting, badly where they stayed until they received proper Just like today’s clandestine travellers damaged, with its food supplies spoiled. documentation. Many of them subsequently coming to the Canaries from West Africa, the Many gave up hope, especially after a worked on farms cutting sugar cane for very islanders often had to save up for months in Spanish-flagged ship refused to take them on low wages. order to pay for themselves or a relative to board. Eventually they were rescued by men When Abreu (who later returned to the travel. “People in the Canary Islands used to with “a darker complexion” than they had Canary Islands) witnesses the current odyssey build big wooden boats; they worked day and ever seen before. They arrived in Martinique, of would-be immigrants from Africa to the night in a shed for three or four months to where they were well looked after – Canaries, he finds echoes of his own finish a boat,” said Valladolid. something that has left a lasting impression experience in theirs, and feels empathy The Atlantic crossing was notoriously on 90-year-old Sebastian Abreu: “They towards people who share the simple dream difficult. Carlos Medina was another offered us everything they had. They treated he once had: “They aren’t coming to ask for passenger on the Telémaco : “At first, we had a us very nicely… those coloured people – anything,” he said, “except a better life.” good time, we were playing guitar… going for much better than the whites.” Cécile Pouilly

* An excerpt of the Spanish documentary on the emigration of Canary Islanders to Latin America “El ruido del mar” can be viewed at http: //elruidodelmar.blogspot.com

PRINCIPAL ‘MIXED MIGRATION’ ROUTES

REFUGEES 7 5 0 0 2 • R A M / O R A C O I G R E S © Would-be migrants await a decision on destination.Thesehavebecomeknownas‘mixedmi - pensivebusiness,especiallywhen(asisoftenthecase) their future after gratory movements.’ peoplehavetopurchasecounterfeittraveldocuments being rounded up in and employ smugglers in order to find a way round the Sahara Desert. COMPLEX SOCIO -ECONOMIC FACTORS theincreasinglystringentbordercontrolsestablished Such movements generally – but not always by states. – involve people travelling from poorer and less sta - Sometimesfamiliesandcommunitiesselltheiras - ble states to more prosperous and secure countries. sets and club together so that one or two individuals However (contrary to popular opinion in the indus - canbesenttotrytheirluckabroad.Inothersituations, trializedstates),mixedmovementsareaglobalphe - people – especially women and children – are moved nomenon,affectingdestinationcountriesinboththe by professional traffickers from one country to an - SouthandtheNorth.Forexample,whileasmallnum - other for the purpose of sexual and other forms of ber of West Africans head for Europe, a far greater exploitation. numbermigratewithintheirownregion,takingad - The people involved in mixed movements – vantage of the ecowas treaty, which allows the free whether refugees or migrants, whether trafficked movement of people between West African states. or not – experience many of the same hazards and Thereisabroadconsensusthatmixedmigrations human rights violations in the course of their are likely to grow. Migration experts have pointed journey.Theseincludedetentionandimprisonment out that the world is characterized by increasing dis - in unacceptable conditions, physical abuse and parities in terms of development and democratic racial harassment, theft, extortion and destitution. process. Populations are shrinking and getting older Those who travel by boat are at risk of intercep - insomeregions,whereasothershaveyoung,growing tion,abandonmentanddrowningatsea,whilethose populations with little or no employment prospects. who move by land may be returned or transferred to Improvedcommunicationsandtransportlinksareen - remoteanddangerouslocations.Peopleonthemove couragingmorepeopletolookforalifebeyondthecon - wholoseordestroytheiridentitydocumentsmaybe finesoftheirowncommunity,countryandcontinent. unable to establish their nationality, become effec - tivelystatelessandfinditverydifficulttoreturnhome. THE POOREST STAY PUT While the issue of mixed migratory movements The most deprived and destitute are not raises a wide range of human rights and humanitar - usually to be found in mixed movements. Travelling ian concerns, the un refugee agency’s interest in the long distances in an irregular manner can be an ex - issue is quite specific.

8 REFUGEES MIXED MOVEMENTS ARE A GLOBAL PHENOMENON, AFFECTING COUNTRIES IN BOTH THE SOUTH AND THE NORTH.

PROTECTING THE REFUGEES thearrivalofpeoplewhosejourneysareorganizedby “Many states have introduced measures smuggling networks. And they find it difficult to ig - thatareintendedtopreventcertaingroupsofforeign noretheconcernsoftheirowncitizens,someofwhom nationals from arriving and remaining on their ter - (rightly or wrongly) fear the arrival of migrants and ritory,” said un Assistant High Commissioner for refugeeshasnegativeconsequencesfortheirsociety Refugees Erika Feller. “These measures are often and economy. indiscriminate in their application and make it very Taking full account of such concerns, Feller said difficult,ifnotimpossible,forrefugeestoenteracoun - unhcr is working with governments and other or - trywheretheycouldfindthesafety,securityandsup - ganizations in an attempt to ensure the drive to im - portwhichtheyneed,andtowhichtheyareentitled pose stricter forms of migration management does under international law.” not compromise the right of asylum ( see box below ). Fellersaidunhcr isparticularlyconcernedtoavert situations where refugees are apprehended during BROADENING HORIZONS their journey, given no opportunity to claim asy - One particularly important arena is to be lum, deprived of legal advice and social welfare found inso-called‘transitcountries,’whereinthepast services, and, “most seriously, are returned to a refugees had little or no prospect of gaining asylum, country where they may be at risk. For a refugee, be - forthesimplereasonthatthecountryinquestionhad ing forced to go home may quite literally be a matter an inadequate domestic asylum system – or no real of life and death.” asylum system at all. Nobodyarguesthatthereareeasyanswerstothese unhcr is currently working both with ecowas issues. States have a sovereign right to control their and with individual West African countries in a borders. They are understandably concerned about jointefforttomaketheregionsaferforrefugees,and The TEN POINT plan The UN refugee agency has drawn up a ‘10 situations. The mixed movements are keep on moving from country to country). Point Plan of Action’ that aims to alleviate so complex and fluid, that any system And it proposes establishing a flexible asy- some of the protection difficulties arising designed to cope with them has to be lum procedure that could be used to assess from the intertwined migration and extremely flexible.” cases with varying levels of complexity. “In refugee movements occurring around the In addition to addressing traditional some situations,” said Feller, “the proc- world. The plan provides a framework concerns, such as reception conditions, the edure could be streamlined and quick. But that states, UNHCR and other organizations plan contains some novel ideas. These in others, we would have to proceed with involved in asylum and migration issues include a ‘profiling and referral mechanism,’ caution so as not to make dangerous can use to develop comprehensive which would provide an early understand - mistakes. The bottom line remains the strategies in mixed migration situations. ing of the background and motivation same: people with a well-founded fear of “The 10 Point Plan is not a blueprint that underlying a new arrival’s journey, and help persecution, and those fleeing war or requires identical or similar action to be channel individual cases into the most widespread violence, should be able to find taken in all circumstances,” explains appropriate response mechanism. “By this, asylum in another country. But the ways of UNHCR ’s Assistant High Commissioner for we mean some sort of official refugee ensuring we identify all those people could Refugees Erika Feller. “Instead, it identifies protection status for those who need it,” be woven together into a more coherent main issues and objectives around which a said Feller, “but also repatriation, or possibly system. That would be to everyone’s comprehensive refugee protection strategy some legal migration alternative, for those benefit, not least the refugees themselves.” can be formulated, while recognizing that who don’t.” the activities of UNHCR and other actors The plan also flags the difficult issue of For a detailed analysis of the ‘10 Point Plan,’ will have to be tailored to suit specific ‘secondary movements’ (when refugees go to www.unhcr.org

REFUGEES 9 7 0 0 2 • P S E / S E R E M . A ©

thereby reduce the number of people who feel they integration for refugees. havetocontinuemovingnorthinsearchofsafetyand There has also been progress in some North a reasonably decent life. Such efforts take time to African countries which sit astride the mixed bear fruit, but most countries in West Africa have migration routes from the Middle East and Sub- now not only signed up to international laws such Saharan Africa to Europe. In February 2007, for as the 1951 un Refugee Convention and the 1969 example, unhcr signed an agreement with a local oau Convention, but have also enacted domestic ngo partner in Libya, called the International refugee legislation, adopted training programmes Organization for Peace, Care and Relief, which has for officials and in some cases are supporting local led to a breakthrough in that country in a number of

THERE HAS BEEN PROGRESS IN NORTH AFRICAN COUNTRIES WHICH SIT ASTRIDE THE ROUTES FROM THE MIDDLE EAST AND SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA TO EUROPE.

10 REFUGEES A group of people arriving on a European beach, under close surveillance.

One WOMAN'S Ordeal The group of 58 migrants had just from the Eritrean army. She headed and raped by the guards… I hated myself been brought into the port on the north, eventually arriving in a North for having to live such a life and for not Italian island of Lampedusa on a African country, where she was arrested. being able to find a solution.” coastguard patrol boat. After a five-day “Words cannot explain what our life The day Eden was released from jail trip, during which two women died, was like in prison,” Eden said of her ten was not the day she became free. “A they were exhausted but relieved to months in detention for entering the group of us was handed over to a farm have been rescued. Many of them country without documents or a visa. owner,” she said. “We were sold for seemed happy, even eager, to describe “They kept us locked up 24 hours a day. approximately 50 dollars each, like their awful journey. There were 70 women in a 30-square animals.” They were forced to work on However, a young Eritrean woman metre room. Food was given to us once the farm from dawn to dusk, without called Eden (not her real name) stood a day – plain rice and salty drinking any pay. “He could do whatever he silently on the sidelines, a sad, distant water – and sometimes the guards only wanted to us, especially as far as the look in her eyes. threw us a piece of bread straight from women were concerned,” she said in On the second day, Eden began, bit the door.” her low, flat voice. They were finally by bit, to unburden herself to a UNHCR Tears began to stream down her freed after their families sent money to official in the island’s reception centre. face. “I could cope with this treatment, the land owner. She had left Eritrea because she “didn’t but the real nightmare began once the “I’m already dead,” she said, “and want to be a soldier for the rest of [her] sun had set,” she said. “We were under nobody will give my life back to me.” life” – in other words, she had deserted constant threat of being singled out Laura Boldrini

REFUGEES 11 Worse than the setting off from a beach just before dawn. make a meagre living on their own in Yemen’s BY A STRID VAN G ENDEREN S TORT There were 115 other people crammed into the cities or as shepherds up in the hills. And some itting in front of her empty tent in same flimsy boat. moved on to the Gulf States to work as maids, Yemen’s Kharaz refugee camp, “I did not know what kind of people the car cleaners – anything to earn a living and Aysha is trying to move on with life. smugglers were,” she said. “But now I know. send some money back home. When their But holding two young children in They are not human. They are animals.” residence permits expire, some attempt her arm, the thought of her three- The gangs operating in the anarchic stretch to move elsewhere in the Middle East or head ySear-old son keeps haunting her. of sea separating Somalia from Yemen are north to Europe. “He was sick and cried a lot,” she said, ten notoriously and consistently brutal. During The movement of people within the Horn days after crossing the Gulf of Aden to Yemen. the first 11 months of 2007, more than 26,000 of Africa – a region with more than its fair “The smugglers did not like it. They grabbed people – mostly Somalis and Ethiopians – share of poverty, famine and political instabil - him – I begged them not to. Then they threw each paid US$ 50-150 to make the crossing. ity – is scarcely a new phenomenon. However, him overboard.” During that period, at least 1,030 people died in recent decades, Yemen has become an ever “I saw him disappear into the deep dark or were reported missing – almost double the more important link between the Horn and water.” 2006 total. the oil-rich Gulf countries. Aysha is one of tens of thousands of Many died atrocious deaths: stabbed and The vast majority of those passing through Somalis and Ethiopians who every year risk beaten by the smugglers; drowned after being are Somalis, who have been fleeing for much their lives crossing the Gulf of Aden, looking dumped too far from the Yemen coast; or of the past 19 years as a result of alternating for safety or a better life. “When I felt we were asphyxiated when too many people were spells of extreme instability and outright no longer secure in Somalia, when gunmen crammed in a boat’s hold. Some were ‘luckier:’ conflict, including the most recent round of attacked all night, I decided to leave,” she they were only raped, robbed, beaten or fighting between Somali insurgents and the explains. scalded by the engine. But they made it. Transitional Federal Government (TFG) backed The family travelled from Mogadishu to In 2007, two-thirds of those who reached by Ethiopian troops. Bossaso in Puntland, northern Somalia, where Yemen alive sought assistance, and several Yemen, which is one of world’s poorest they spent seven days with relatives, followed thousand elected to live in the UNHCR -run nations, is the only country in the Arabian by three days with the smugglers, before refugee camp near Aden. Others attempted to Peninsula that has acceded to the 1951 UN 7 0 0 2 • M E Y / N O S S N I V G

Exhausted survivors waiting for help R Ö J B

on a Yemen beach after completing . J /

the dangerous crossing from Somalia. R C H N U

12 REFUGEES A map of the Horn of Africa, and the route to Yemen (‘Arabia’), drawn on the wall of an old fort near the Kenya-Somalia SHARKS border. 7 0 0

Refugee Convention. For years it has kept its 2 • N E doors open and offered prima facie refugee K / A N

status to all Somalis who make it across the I Z Z A F

Gulf of Aden (its generosity partly stemming . A from the fact that on some occasions in the © past it was Somalia that provided a haven for Yemenis). At the end of 2006, there were 95,000 refugees living in Yemen, 95 percent of whom were Somalis (other groups, such as Ethiopians, do not get automatic refugee status), and the numbers are rising – despite efforts on both sides of the Gulf of Aden to warn people of the dangers involved in dealing with smugglers. Under increasing strain, Yemen has called upon the international community for more support in dealing with the constant mixed flow of migrants and refugees. As a result, over the past year, UNHCR and its partners On the Somalia side, information and and until root causes of poverty in the have stepped up work in Yemen under a assistance projects have been launched in an region are addressed properly, desperate US$7 million operation that includes attempt to discourage people from placing citizens will most likely continue to climb additional staff, increased field presence, their lives in the hands of the smugglers into the boats, no matter what risk they more assistance, provision of additional unless they absolutely have to. face. shelter for refugees and training programmes But until Somalia finds some sort As Aysha put it: “I had to go. I lost my for coastguards and other officials. of lasting peace and economic stability, child in the sea. But what choice did I have?”

THE GANGS OPERATING IN THE ANARCHIC STRETCH OF SEA SEPARATING SOMALIA FROM YEMEN ARE NOTORIOUSLY AND CONSISTENTLY BRUTAL.

areas, including access, registration and assistance OFFERING ALTERNATIVES to asylum seekers in detention centres, and legal The task of protecting refugees could be andpracticalhelpwithvoluntaryrepatriation.Libya madeeasierbyinitiativesthatreducethenumberof has also been taking a more active role in helping lo - peoplewhomoveinanirregularmannerandsubmit cateboatsknowntobeintroubleintheMediterranean. unfoundedasylumapplicationsbecausetheyhaveno unhcr ’s presence is also now on firmer ground in otherlegalmeanstoenterandresideinanothercoun - Morocco, after the signing of a formal cooperation try. Prospective migrants need to receive better in - agreement with the government in July 2007, which formation about the consequences of irregular mi - should greatly improve its operational capacity, and gration as well as about new opportunities for them its ability to work alongside other agencies involved tomoveinasafeandlegalmanner,suchasexpanded in asylum and migration issues there. Further west, family reunion and labour migration programmes. in Mauritania, national asylum legislation has been Afinalissuethatmustbetackledconcernsthelim - in force since 2005, and the necessary structures to itedcapacity(andinsomecasestheunwillingness)of make it function are being established. some states to address the issues of mixed migration

REFUGEES 13 NEW INITIATIVES ARE NEEDED TO MAKE IT POSSIBLE FOR PEOPLE TO MOVE IN A SAFE AND LEGAL MANNER.

and refugee protection in an effective manner in re - nationneedencouragementtodevelopthenecessary gions of origin, transit and final destination. policies, practices and institutions to admit asylum On the one hand, countries of transit and desti - seekers to their territory, assess their claims and

1 provide solutions for those who qualify for refugee 0 0 2 • status. R U T

/ On the other hand, action is needed to provide S R E

T peoplelikeKamisaJamaldinovaandherfourchildren U E R

© withtheopportunitytoliveapeacefulandprosperous life in their homeland, thereby averting the need for themtoembarkondifficult,dangerousandsometimes deadly journeys to countries which seem to offer a brighter future. As the Global Commission on International Migration has stated, “women, men and children should be able to realize their potential, meet their needs, exercise their human rights and fulfil their A boy holds nougat given to him by Turkish gendarmes aspirations in their country of or igin, and hence guarding a group caught heading for Greece. migrate out of choice, rather than necessity.”

Planes, TRUCKS and trains ince the mid 1980s, governments Many industrialized states have enough attention is paid to the specific have been attempting to clamp introduced special accelerated border needs of unaccompanied children and Sdown on all modes of travel, by procedures to decide on an asylum other vulnerable people. introducing punitive fines against airlines request before a person is allowed to Some countries, however, have or transport companies that bring in formally enter the country. This can be adopted specific safeguards in their “irregular” migrants. They are also especially dangerous in airports where, airport procedures. In Austria, for example, sometimes made to pay the costs of if there are no proper safeguards, a everyone who wishes to claim asylum at detaining such people, and of returning refugee may very easily be bundled on the airport has access to legal counselling. them to their home countries. to the next plane home, before anyone The more complex cases are allowed entry As a result, airline check-in staff and is even aware of what is going on. into the country and channelled into the cabin crews have become quasi-immigra - Lack of access to proper legal advice regular asylum procedure. And the files of tion officials, and truck drivers have to is another common problem, along with the small minority of cases who are placed inspect their own vehicles as rigorously insufficient time for the preparation of into the accelerated airport procedure are as if they were border police. But, as the the asylum application, and restricted automatically sent for review to UNHCR if International Transport Workers’ appeal rights. Decisions on asylum claims the case is found to be “manifestly Federation has pointed out, “transport are also sometimes not taken by the unfounded.” If UNHCR disagrees with this workers are not trained for immigration proper authorities. Detention-like decision, the case will be looked at again in work, and should not be expected to take conditions at the airport (where some the regular procedure and the person is on the responsibility of policing borders.” people can end up living for months – or allowed to enter the country in the However, it is what happens next that even, in the occasional case, for years) are meantime. is of most concern to refugee advocates. also problematic; and sometimes not Rupert Colville

14 REFUGEES AFRICA I Malawi’s DILEMMA THE DIFFICULTIES FACING A TRANSIT COUNTRY

BY J ACK R EDDEN in the past two years has limited the chance THE REFUGEE ELEMENT to sell rations by providing smaller quanti - The desire to earn a decent living hen the un refugee ties weekly, rather than a larger monthly applies to refugees as much as economic agency team made ration. migrants, and the fact that so many Somalis final preparations on Withinamonth,mostSomalisand and Ethiopians do not remain in Malawi, or 24 October to move Ethiopianshaveheadedsouthoverthe other transit countries, should not be seen the last residents of borderintoMozambique.Somethenmove in any way as undermining the validity of WLuwani Refugee Camp north to an alter - quicklywestintoZimbabweanddowninto their claim to refugee status. Many of them native camp near the capital of Malawi, SouthAfrica.Analternativerouteheads start moving for refugee reasons – even if they counted 127 Somalis and Ethiopians furtherdownMozambiqueandstraight their onward journey is motivated by eco - in the reception shelter among the intoSouthAfricafromthere. nomic factors. Somalis, in particular, have refugees and asylum seekers who would “Wedosuspectthere’sanetworkthat no shortage of genuine horror stories from be boarding trucks the next morning. the years of conflict in a land with no func - But by the time the 32-vehicle unhcr tioning central government. convoy pulled out just after dawn, all of the “While in Kismayo [Somalia] for a short

127 young men had vanished. It was no TANZANIA period looking for work, his family was surprise. The government of Malawi had killed by a rival family clan,” says one recent ordered the camp closed after repeatedly unhcr report of an interview with a young M E A U L complaining that asylum seekers from the Q Somali asylum seeker. “His father was A I W B

I M Horn of Africa were just using Luwani as a A tortured and killed, while his mother was Z O M rest stop en route to South Africa. ZIMBABWE raped and then burned alive. Two of his “It’s a very difficult situation,” said siblings were also killed and one brother Kelvin Sentala, the unhcr protection was very badly tortured. He says when he field assistant in charge of the convoy. “We arrived home, the entire village had been have refugees and economic migrants ransacked and all their possessions were coming here – but very often both groups SOUTH AFRICA destroyed.” prefer to keep on moving.” According to the government of startsinEthiopiaandSomaliaandextends Malawi, during the first nine months of LOOKING FURTHER SOUTH allthewaytoSouthAfrica.Theyappearto 2007 more than 3,000 asylum seekers Many countries around the havepeopleineverycountryalongtheway,” crossed its northern border with Tanzania. world face a similar dilemma, but it is saidSarahThokozaniNayeja,seniorlegal Almost all were from Ethiopia or Somalia, especially acute in Malawi. There are advisorinMalawi’sOfficeofthe and by November most had already moved alternatives routes south, such as rough CommissionforRefugees.“It’sdifficult.If on south. tracks through the Mozambique bush, nothingchangesinEthiopiaandSomalia, The continual flow of refugees and but Malawi has the best road toward the nothingwillchange.Thecausecontinuesto migrants to South Africa, where it ultimate goal of so many travellers: the bethere–thatistherealproblem.” converges with the hundreds of continent’s economic powerhouse, South SouthAfricaisnotjustamagnetbecause thousands of Zimbabweans moving back Africa. As a result, people from many ofitseconomy.Unlikemanyothercountries and forth each year, is a challenge to troubled countries, like the Democratic thatstraddletheroutesfromthenorth,the unhcr as well as to the states in the Republic of Congo and Sudan, are travel - SouthAfricangovernmentdoesnotinsist region. There is a danger that the sheer ling this way. refugeesliveincamps.Inaddition,itgives volume of claims is clogging asylum Their stay in Malawi is usually brief, but refugeesandasylumseekersfreedomto procedures in South Africa, where in the long enough to receive food rations and workandlivewheretheywant. autumn of 2007 a backlog of more than items like blankets, before continuing the “In many respects,” said unhcr ’s 134,000 asylum cases from scores of journey. Because so few of the fresh Regional Representative Sanda Kimbimbi, different countries were awaiting

Ethiopian and Somali arrivals stay, unhcr “South Africa is a model asylum country.” decisi ons.

REFUGEES 15 BY W ILLIAM S PINDLER nly a relatively small number of the world’s migrants travel by sea. Yet the most familiar migration image is prob - aObly that of the men, women and children who, crammed on small, barely sea- worthy boats, brave the seas to escape poverty, conflict or persecution. Desta is one of them. After a harrowing trip across the Sahara desert, this 29-year old Ethiopian woman’s experiences cross - ing the Mediterranean were typical of thousands of others attempting to enter Europe each year: “We were 60 people, including 11 women and five kids. The boat was too small. We couldn’t move. There was no food, no water… We had a Thuraya [satellite phone], so we called for help – but we didn’t know where we were. On the third day, two women died. People cried and panicked. We thought we were all going to die. Then we saw a boat.” She was rescued and taken to the Italian island of Lampedusa, one of 11,800 migrants and refugees to end up there in the first ten months of 2007. Many others are less fortunate.

DYING FOR A BETTER LIFE Every year, thousands of desperate peopleinsearchofprotectionora newlifedrownastheirflimsyboatscapsize intheMediterranean,Atlantic,Indian Ocean,Caribbeanandotherseasandwater - waysaroundtheworld.Althoughattempts aremadetotrackcasualties,thetrueextent 5 0 0 2 ofthisglobaltragedywillneverbeknownas • A T I manyvesselssinkwithouttrace. / An overloaded I N I

R boat in the “The fact that there are children D L O

B southern .

among these people in danger, and that we L

/ Mediterranean. R

have unfortunately had to retrieve a num - C H N ber of dead ones, has deeply marked us,” U says Commander Michele Niosi of the Italian Coastguard. “Children are symbols occasions, they have declared “a state of INTERCEPTION AT SEA of renewal, and in these conditions it feels emergency” to deal with perceived “inva - While stopping short of like defeat rather than renewal.” sions” by people who are not only measures that drastic, some countries While individual naval and coastguard unarmed, but very often half-starved, sick have sent warships to turn back boats sus - officers often treat the people they rescue and destitute. Some national and local offi - pected of transporting migrants or asylum with sympathy, governments tend to cials have even gone so far as to suggest seekers, a practice known as interception approach the phenomenon of boat people that the boats should be shot at with live or interdiction at sea. from a national security perspective. On ammunition. Given the unseaworthy state of so

16 REFUGEES EVERY YEAR, THOUSANDS OF DESPERATE PEOPLE IN SEARCH OF PROTECTION OR A NEW LIFE DROWN AS THEIR FLIMSY BOATS CAPSIZE OR SINK. many of the vessels carrying would-be Nevertheless, the practice of interception toavoiddetectionboatpeopleareresorting migrants, many lives are undoubtedly is highly con troversialforavarietyof toeverlongerandmoredangerousroutes. saved by naval and coastguard ships reasons,includingtherisksitmayentail.It The other main cause of concern is that prowling the high seas in search of them. isforexampleanapparentfactthatinorder some of the people embarking on these

REFUGEES 17 A sunbather helps aid a group of 46 exhausted and dehydrated people after their boat ran aground on a tourist beach in the Canary Islands.

perilous voyages are refugees. The Viet Nam and Cambodia were routinely EUROPEAN INTERVENTIONS percentage differs from boat to boat and apprehended and towed out to sea by Several European countries route to route. “For this reason,” said countries in the region, and thousands have also been intercepting boats suspect - un Assistant High Commissioner for of Vietnamese may have perished at sea ed of carrying uninvited migrants in the Refugees Erika Feller, “ unhcr has an as a result of such ‘pushbacks.’ Mediterranean. Since the creation of the interest in maritime issues such as On the other side of the world, the US European Agency for the Management of interception, search and rescue, Coastguard has been intercepting ships in Operational Cooperation at External Bor - disembarkation, people smuggling and the Caribbean carrying migrants and asy - ders (or ‘Frontex’), a series of high-profile stowaways. Our position remains that the lum seekers from Cuba and Haiti for years. joint interception operations by various interception process, even if it may be “We have expressed fears that this poli - eu member states have taken place in both necessary to protect lives and borders, must cy may have resulted in restricted access to the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. include safeguards that allow any refugees asylum procedures, particularly in the case One such operation, code-named on board to claim asylum.” of the Haitians,” said Feller. “The bottom “Hera 2007,” deployed Spanish and Italian Interception at sea, whether in line is that this could lead to refugees being naval ships and planes to patrol the waters territorial or international waters, is not forcibly returned to a place where their life off Mauritania, Senegal and Cape Verde new. During the 1970s, boat people from or freedom is at risk.” and intercept irregular migrants attempt -

THE INTERCEPTION PROCESS, EVEN IF IT IS NECESSARY TO PROTECT LIVES AND BORDERS, MUST INCLUDE SAFEGUARDS THAT ALLOW REFUGEES TO CLAIM ASYLUM.”

18 REFUGEES ‘‘ FOR CENTURIES, RESCUE AT SEA HAS BEEN GOVERNED BY AN UNWRITTEN CODE, THAT HAS EVEN BEEN APPLIED TO THE ENEMY IN TIMES OF WAR.

ing to sail to Spain’s Canary Islands. Yet, cracking down on smugglers – as country would give me a visa. What can I According to the Spanish Ministry of important as this is – may not only reduce do? There was no other choice.” Omar Interior, the number of arrivals in the irregular migration, but close the only was subsequently recognized as a refugee Canaries plummeted from 32,000 in 2006 avenue left for refugees to escape persecu - by the Italian authorities. to 9,500 in the first ten months of 2007, as tion or conflict. “I can’t go back to Iraq, as I a result of stepped-up interception opera - will be tortured and killed,” insisted MY BROTHER ’S KEEPER tions, better collaboration with countries Omar, an Iraqi who paid smugglers US $ For centuries, rescue at sea has of departure, and information campaigns 1,600 to ship him from Libya to Italy in been governed by an unwritten code, informing potential travellers of the risks. August 2007. “I was working in Libya but which has even been applied to the enemy The number of arrivals in the Italian my contract ended. I was afraid they in times of war. mainland and islands, where the Frontex- would send me back to Iraq… no [other] “As history progressed and the annals of coordinated “Operation Nautilus” has been active, also fell slightly from 22,000 in 2006, to 19,000 during the first ten months of 2007. By contrast, the number of migrants Fatal diversion and refugees arriving by boat from Turkey in the Greek islands of Samos, n 29 April 2006, some towed for a while, and then the tow-rope Chios and Lesvos doubled from 3,500 in fishermen approached a was cut. The bodies of the other 6 0

0 2006 to 7,000 in the first ten months of Osmall, white rusty motor boat passengers had apparently either been 2 • P S E 2007 – perhaps partly because it is one of drifting in the Caribbean, off Barbados. It thrown or washed overboard. / Z E the principal routes used by Iraqis. contained a grim cargo: the bodies of 11 Boats of all shapes and sizes are used U G I R

D men, partly mummified by the sun and to reach the Canaries. However, until late O R .

A RUTHLESS SMUGGLERS salt spray. The men had probably been 2005, most migrants were using smaller / P

A One of the main reasons given dead for several weeks. One of them had vessels called pirogues from West Africa, © by governments for intercepting boats at left a note to his family in Senegal. His or pateras (which carry up to 20 people) sea is to combat the smuggling and traf - name was Diao Souncar Dieme. from Morocco and the Western Sahara ficking of people. There is little doubt The other ten, also thought to be from territory, from where it takes only 10 or 12 that smugglers, some of whom appear to Senegal, had still not been identified hours to sail to the Canaries. be linked with international organized when they were finally buried in Barbados Over the last two years, larger open crime, are behind most irregular cross - in January 2007, in a joint Muslim and boats (known as cayucos ), which carry up ings by sea. Some of them are utterly Roman Catholic ceremony. to 150 people, have become more ruthless characters who all too often rob, Investigators believe the boat left the common. In order to avoid detection, the beat and even murder their clients. Cape Verde Islands, off West Africa, on cayucos are taking longer, more round- In March 2005, for example, 15 Christmas Eve 2006 with about routes from countries such as Chinese migrants were forced to jump around 50 people on board. Senegal, Gambia, Guinea, Sierra Leone overboard into the sea by “snakeheads” They were almost certainly and Ghana. As a result, the journey (people smugglers) about 30 km off Sicily. taking the long way round I w to the Canaries can now Only two women and four men survived. to Spain's Canary Islands, se ou take up to 25 nd ld l A forensic examination of one of the but the boat ran into in B to ike days and involves o ass my to bodies showed fractures and a severe con - trouble and was swept f m ad fam much greater risks exc one a a ily tusion in the skull, apparently inflicted by the prevailing g us y. P sum – as demonstrated ood e m lea before the victim was tossed into the sea. currents across the th bye e a se by the tragic fate of i e en . T nd unhcr staff in Yemen also frequently Atlantic. Some n t d o his the passengers on the M his f m is report instances when boat people in the reports have or big y boat with no name that occ life Gulf of Aden – where the smugglers are suggested it may From an drifted 4,000 kilometres ano se tefo a… especially brutal – have been beaten, mur - have been of D und to Barbados. iao onth dered or thrown overboard and attacked Sou ebo ncar dy Die by sharks [ see p. 12 ]. me.

REFUGEES 19 7 0 0 2 • A T I / O H , Y V A N N A I L A T I human conflict continued to / O T O

grow, there remained only H P P one common enemy with A © which the entire race could consider itself at war, and that was the brute force and wrath of the sea and its elements,” writes Clayton Evans, author of a book on

the history of rescue at sea. 5 0 0 2 •

“A bond would develop A T I / amongst seafarers and water I N I R D travellers the world over: L O B . when it came to survival at L / R sea they were their brother’s C H N keeper.” U The moral imperative to rescue fellow An Italian coastguard officer checks up on a man brought ashore after being humans in peril at sea was eventually giv - rescued at sea. en an international legal framework, espe - cially through the 1974 International Con - vention for the Safety of Life at Sea ( solas ), José Durán, skipper of the Spanish and the 1979 International Convention on trawler FranciscoyCatalina , which rescued Maritime Search and Rescue ( sar ). 51 people – including ten women and Infamous episode: A group of 27 people But many migrants and refugees in dis - a 2-year-old child – from a dinghy in the rescued by the Italian tress are still saved, not by professional res - Mediterranean, exemplifies the principle Navy after spending cuers, but by passing fishermen, leisure of solidarity that binds people at sea. The three days clinging to a yachts, commercial ships, luxury cruise FranciscoyCatalina was stuck off Malta for tuna pen. liners – and even by other boat people. a week, as countries in the region argued Stowaways

esperate situations call for face hefty fines, high repatriation costs members to force four Tanzanian and desperate solutions and and administrative delays. three Kenyan stowaways to jump into the Dstowing away in boats, lorries Although international maritime sea off Durban harbour. Two of the men, or planes is, in some cases, the only regulations say that stowaways have to be Omar Kemu and Amir Jesh, could not escape route open to those fleeing war treated humanely, fear of losing their jobs swim and drowned almost immediately. or persecution. or bonuses has occasionally turned Every year, the world’s media carries As in other forms of irregular migra- sailors into murderers: “In some terrible similar reports about stowaways who tion, refugees and migrants frequently cases, stowaways on board ships have have been shot, thrown overboard or find themselves, quite literally, in been thrown overboard, because ships’ beaten to death. In some cases, crew the same boat. Regardless of their captains or shipping companies would be members have reported their superiors reasons for travelling clandestinely, fined if they came into port with the to the authorities; in others, stowaways stowaways hiding in cargo holds face stowaway on board,” said David Cockroft, have survived to tell the tale. considerable hazards, ranging from General Secretary of the International Prosecutions, however, are all too death by asphyxiation to exposure to Transport Workers’ Federation, in an rare, as evidence of the crime often sinks extreme temperatures. In addition, interview with a trade magazine. to the ocean floor, together with the ships’ crews often resent their presence, In January 2006, a South African reasons why the stowaways were since shipping companies that court heard how the captain of the so desperate to leave their countries transport undocumented migrants African Kalahari ordered two crew of origin.

20 REFUGEES SHIP MASTERS WHO SAVE PEOPLE IN DISTRESS SHOULD NOT BE PENALIZED WITH FURTHER EXPENSES.” about where the people it had rescued seriously jeopardizing the centuries-old oblige states to cooperate and coordinate should disembark. humanitarian tradition of sea rescue. with a view to disembarking rescued peo - Askedifhewoulddoitagain,giventhe The autumn 2007 trial of seven ple to a place of safety as soon as possible. financiallossesandlegalwranglesitmay Tunisian fishermen in Sicily, on charges of However, several key maritime states have entail,thisfishermanfromtheportofSanta aiding and abetting illegal immigration, not yet ratified these amendments. Pola,nearAlicante,replied:“Iwoulddo has also aroused considerable concern Financial pressures also sometimes exactlythesamething.Nodoubtaboutit.In among people who believe the fishermen override humanitarian principles. In May ourwayofthinking,weputourselvesin had actually rescued the 44 people (includ - 2007, for example, a group of 27 Africans theirplace.IfIwasintheirsituation,I ing 11 women and two children) found on were rescued by the Italian Navy after they ‘wo‘ uldn’twantanothershiptopassmeby their boat from a flimsy rubber dinghy. had spent three days and nights clinging to a withouthelpingme.‘Hell!’Iwouldsay, If convicted, they face between one and tuna pen dragged by a Maltese fishing boat, ‘I’mgoingtodie!’” 15 years in jail. the Budafel . The boat’s captain told the “Ship masters who save people in dis - media he refused to divert his ship to TOO EXPENSIVE TO SAVE ? tress should not be penalized with further disembark the men because he was afraid But, as the episode involving the expenses,” says John Lyras, Chairman of of losing his valuable catch of tuna. Fran cisco y Catalina illustrates, vessels the Shipping Policy Committee of the Such incidents provoke fears that a fulfilling their duty to rescue people at sea International Chamber of Shipping. combination of anti-immigration policies, are increasingly encountering problems “They should be allowed to disembark the reckless smugglers and cold commercial as states refuse to let migrants and people as soon as possible.” calculations may well signal the demise of a refugees disembark. To the alarm of the Amendments were made to the solas noble practice that is almost as old as shipping industry, such incidents may be and sar Conventions in July 2006, which humanity itself.

REFUGEES 21 THE AMERICAS i Caribbean CONUNDRUMS

HIDDEN TRAGEDIES riving from other continents appears to be BY G RAINNE O’H ARA Every year, thousands take the on the increase. Trinidad is a transit point roviding effective northward passage towards the United for West Africans, on a long and compli - protection to refugees caught up States along overlapping, winding mar - cated journey that often includes an ear - in mixed migratory flows criss- itime routes. During periods of regional lier stop in Cape Verde, before its weary crossing the Caribbean is quite a tension, the figures have sometimes risen passengers are eventually disembarked challenge. There are some 25 in - into the tens of thousands. US Coastguard somewhere along the South America dPependent island nations and dependent statistics on the intercepted and returned coastline. Sri Lankans have appeared in overseas territories spread along the 2,300 only tell part of the story. several locations in the Lesser Antilles; kilometre expanse of ocean separating the Nobody is keeping an accurate account Ethiopians have sought asylum in Haiti; Bahamas, just off Florida, from Trinidad of the number of people who succumb to and Iraqis have been noted transiting the and Tobago which lies within sight of storms and other hazards en route. Over region, apparently heading to final desti - Venezuela. 60 people died in a single incident in nations in both North and South America. TheCaribbeanhasitsshareofsmug - May 2007, when an overcrowded Haitian While the number of non-Caribbean glerspeddlingtheirservicestomigrants sloop attempting to reach the Turks and people arriving remains low in absolute soldonthedreamoffindingabetterlifeon Caicos Islands capsized, pitching its terms, the presence of some people with theNorthAmericanmainland.Numerous passengers into choppy seas in the dead very specific protection needs brings an secludedislandssurroundedbyazure of night. additional dimension to an already com - waters–thesamefeaturesthatattractthe In terms of numbers, Dominicans, plex situation. Even though almost all tourists–alsocatchtheeyeofruthlessop - Cubans and Haitians consistently domi - states in the region are signatories of the portunistskeentoturnaquickprofit nate the mixed flows of migrants and 1951 un Refugee Convention, effective regardlessofthehumancostinvolved. refugees heading north. But the dizzying domestic asylum systems are virtually What could be easier than dumping an variety of routes and transit points, and the non-existent. unsuspecting Sri Lankan on the beach of growing diversity of nationalities in - The quantity of arrivals is straining volved, reveal a far more complex picture. local reception capacity on islands more at -

UNITED STATES tuned to tending to the needs of paying MIGRATION KALEIDOSCOPE guests than responding to the weather- MEXICO There is considerable movement beaten, dehydrated migrants who wash up to, and between, locations in the on their shores, and the reactions of Caribbean. Cubans and Haitians tran - Caribbean states tend to be ad hoc and un - sit via the Bahamas (most, but not predictable. Refugees are as likely to find all, with the clear intention of themselves intercepted, detained, deemed

GUATEMALA Caribbean Sea continuing onwards to the economic migrants and promptly deported EL SALVADOR HONDURAS US ). Cubans also use the as they are to be admitted to a national asy - Cayman Islands as a step - lum system. And even for those few admit - VENEZUELA ping stone on the ted to the asylum process, recognition rates lengthy journey to in the Caribbean are uniformly low. St. Lucia and telling him he is Honduras and other only one step away from Canada? Or Central American locations, GENEROUS PARTNERS telling an Iraqi she is already in Florida? before heading back northwards on the Under such circumstances, Weeks may pass before the bewildered mi - long overland trek to the Mexican- US providing even a minimum of protection grants and refugees actually work out ex - border. Haitians head for the Turks and coverage depends on effective partner - actly where in the world they are, by Caicos Islands, and destinations further ships. For this reason, unhcr has taken which time – since the fee is nearly always south – including the French overseas de - the unusual step of setting up a network of paid up front – there is little they can do. If partments of Martinique and Guadeloupe Honorary Liaisons, who undertake essen - they have avoided ending up adrift in a – which are seen as a gateway to continen - tial protection work on a pro bono basis in leaky boat with no food and water, that is tal Europe. ten key locations around the Caribbean. already a bonus. In addition, the number of people ar - Hailing from all walks of life, these dedi -

22 REFUGEES 4 0 0 2 | 3 0 0 2 • A S U / D L A W E . G / D R

cated volunteers (who in - A collaborative responses to U G T S

clude a university lecturer in A migration, refugee protec - O C

Jamaica, and the head of a S tion and trafficking. U legal aid clinic in the © The protection chal - Bahamas) have been filling lenges in the Caribbean are some of the gaps which just that – challenging but unhcr cannot hope to cover not insurmountable. with its own small roving Cubans taking a valuable asset across the Straits of Florida. Establishing a predictable team operating out of the US system that would provide and Caracas . Partnership arrangements A recent seminar on migration flows, reliable protection for refugees is well with ngo s in the Dominican Republic, organized by unhcr and the International within the reach of Caribbean states which Haiti, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago are Organization for Migration in the Cayman are, after all, accustomed to looking after a another vital piece in the protection jigsaw Islands, provided a platform for Caribbean constant stream of visitors from foreign

that now extends across the Caribbean. states to exchange ideas on strengthening lands.

The Great MIGRATION to the North THE ROUTE VIA MEXICO TO THE US IS FRAUGHT WITH RISK FOR REFUGEES AND MIGRANTS ALIKE.

BY M ARIANA E CHANDI , metres of railway by Hurricane Stan in Others died in vehicle and train acci - M ARION H OFFMANN AND 2005, most migrants have had to walk dents, or drowned in the great river R UPERT C OLVILLE hundreds of kilometres across the borders (known to Americans as the Rio Grande t is estimated that half of El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala and to Mexicans as the Rio Bravo) which a million undocumented migrants to reach the city of Arriaga in Mexico’s extends for more than half the length of cross Mexico’s southern border Chiapas Province, where they climb on the 3,200 kilometre border. every year, most of them Central cargo trains heading north. Americans attempting to move on to At the southern border itself, there WOMEN AT RISK tIhe United States or, to a lesser extent, appear to be at least three main land Many more probably d ie, or are Canada. According to figures from Mex - routes into Mexico, via the Guatemalan syphoned off by criminal gangs, long be - ico’s National Migration Institute, in the cities of El Naranjo, la Mesilla or Tecún fore they get anywhere near the United first nine months of 2007, some 45,000 Uman. Some migrants are also now States, with women particularly vulnera - undocumented migrants were detained using boats from Guatemala’s Pacific ble to being sexually abused or forced into at migration holding centres across the sea ports to avoid migration checkpoints long-term prostitution. Indeed, one country. However, many migrants appear on the land borders. Mexican Senator, Maria Elena Orantes, to succeed in crossing Mexico undetected, Although most of the migrants are has suggested that up to 80 percent of and the US Border Patrol often ends up men, there are also many women and women migrants heading up from the apprehending more than 1,000 a day. children travelling along these danger - south end up involved in the sex trade in Stricter migration controls by both ous routes, which cost hundreds – if not some way or other, with tens of thousands Mexico and the United States, as well as a thousands – of lives a year. forced into prostitution each year in the string of natural disasters affecting south - At the US border alone, at least 400 Guatemala-Mexico border area alone. ern Mexico and Central American States, people died during the year up to 30 Sep - Nobody questions the fact that the have had a strong impact on the migration tember 2007, many of them from thirst, great majority of the people heading up routes. Since the destruction of 300 kilo - heat or exhaustion in the Arizona desert. to North America in this way are doing

I WAS HIDDEN IN THE MACHINERY ROOM OF A TOURIST BOAT THINKING THAT I WAS HEADING TO EUROPE. AND WHEN I GOT OFF THE SHIP, THEY TOLD ME I WAS IN GUATEMALA .”

23 ‘‘ REFUGEES 6 0 0 2 • X E M / S E R R O T . O / P F A © so for economic reasons, and there is no room of a tourist boat thinking that I Hopeful migrants making their way end of debate about whether this is, on was heading to Europe,” he told unhcr through the desert just south of the US-Mexico border. During the balance, a good or bad thing for the officials in Mexico, “and when I got off Central American wars, many refugees economies of their home countries, of the ship, they told me I was in took similar routes. Mexico and of the US. But there are al - Guatemala.” ways some among them – if not today, From there, he joined the thousands then yesterday or tomorrow – who are of undocumented Central American mi - (the word is derived from the name of an refugees. And when the percentage is grants travelling north, until he reached especially fierce carnivorous ant species) small, they are often less easy to identify. Tapachula, where he was advised by a include children as young as ten. The number of asylum applications ngo working with unhcr to apply for Most of the asylum claims presented made in Mexico is minuscule compared asylum with the Mexican authorities. by Hondurans, Salvadorans and to the number of people passing through Another asylum seeker, a 26-year-old Guatemalans to the Mexican asylum au - – perhaps one in a thousand, although man from Darfur in Sudan, came by an thorities are by youngsters or families al - some of the others will later claim asylum equally haphazard route. “First I went to leging persecution by these gangs. Some in the US. Ethiopia, then to Somalia and then to fear forcible recruitment by the maras . In 2003, unhcr established a small of - Egypt, where I took a boat that went to Others are petrified of revenge because fice in Tapachula, a city close to the Panama,” he said. “Once in Panama, I met they have witnessed crimes. Guatemalan border in the state of Chia - some Africans there who told me that if I In 2007, the Mexican National Migra - pas. Since then, a total of some 600 peo - wanted to apply for asylum, I should go to tion Institute issued internal regulations ple have filed asylum applications to the Mexico.” (drawn up with assistance from unhcr ) the Mexican authorities there. From Jan - Unlike many of his fellow travellers, he to facilitate the granting of humanitarian uary to October 2007, 154 individuals ap - says he is happy to stop in Mexico, where status to those asylum seekers who are plied for asylum in Tapachula, of whom he is trying (with difficulty) to get a job as found not to qualify for refugee status 12 percent were Somalis, 11 percent an English teacher. “They kept me in cus - under the 1951 Refugee Convention or Bangladeshis, 10 percent Eritreans, and 8 tody at the immigration detention centre the key regional refugee instrument percent Colombians and Ethiopians. where I met other Sudanese, and Eritre - known as the Cartagena Declaration, but ans and Ethiopians,” he recalls. “They told who may clearly be in need of another FROM A FAR CONTINENT me that they were going to the US.” form of protection. And unhcr, unicef Some of the non-Latin American and other agencies have been attempting asylum seekers end up in Mexico for RAMPANT GANGS to set up a system to help the exception - bizarre reasons. One 31-year-old Sri One of the most intriguing ally vulnerable unaccompanied children Lankan, for example, claims he fled after phenomena in the region involves people stranded in this febrile border zone. escaping from the Tamil Tigers. After escaping from the so-called ‘ maras ,’ the ex - Meanwhile the great migration north hitching a lift on a fishing boat to the tremely violent street gangs that are pres - continues, full of largely unseen tragedies Maldives, he stowed away on a bigger ent in force throughout Central America and heartbreak as people, for one reason ship. “I was hidden in the machinery and also in southern Mexico. The maras or another, fall by the wayside.

24 REFUGEES EUROPE i Control vs. PROTECTION REFUGEES, MIGRANTS AND THE EU

piece of first-phase legislation, the so- which incorporates a general provision BY J UDITH K UMIN called Qualification Directive, which stating that the rights of refugees and n 1999, the European Union sets out who is eligible for protection in other people requesting international states agreed to build a “Common the eu . The study examined 1,488 asy - protection should not be prejudiced, in European Asylum System” based on lum decisions taken in five eu states. It particular with regard to non-refoule - the “full and inclusive application” confirmed that there were still signifi - ment (the key element of international of the 1951 Convention relating to cant differences on a variety of issues law that forbids states to deport refugees tIhe Status of Refugees. The first phase that result in refugees being recognized back to a potentially dangerous situation was devoted to the development of mini - in one country and not in another. The in their own country). mum common standards to ensure more report found “striking Yet at the eu ’s busy external frontiers, consistent treatment of asylum seekers disparities” in border personnel are sometimes not and refugees throughout the eu . Since it recognition even aware that refugees must be was completed in mid-2004, work on de - rates for given the possibility to apply for veloping a common asylum system has asylum asylum. continued. However, there has been a very marked shift of focus from protect - DIVERSIONARY TACTICS ing refugees to halting irregular migra - Intensified efforts by tion. states to deter or deflect During the first phase, the eu adopted movements before people legal directives covering some of the actually reach the eu ’s external most fundamental elements of the sys - frontier have been arousing concern tem, including how asylum proce - for several years. dures should be conducted, who Then, in mid-2005, a new European qualifies for refugee status, and what Agency for the Management of Opera - the minimum assistance levels for seekers tional Cooperation at the External Bor - asylum seekers should be. It also from various ders (known as ‘Frontex’) began function - agreed on two other pieces of legisla - countries such as ing, with a wide-ranging mandate, in - tion – known as the Dublin II and Euro - Iraq, Somalia and Sri cluding the coordination of states’ joint dac Regulations – that determine which Lanka — with an individual Iraqi asylum efforts to patrol the eu ’s external borders. eu state is responsible for handling a par - seeker’s chances of receiving protection The most visible of these have in - ticular asylum application. within the eu varying from 75 percent in volved multinational operations in the Sweden to zero percent in the Slovak Re - Mediterranean and the Atlantic to inter - DIFFERENT STANDARDS public and Greece. cept boatloads of migrants heading for Eu - As the eu navigates its way Refugee advocates are also increas - rope’s southern coasts. The Frontex opera - through the second phase of harmoniza - ingly concerned about how migration tions aim to prevent these vessels from tion (geared mainly to implementing the control efforts are affecting people in reaching eu waters and, if possible, to re - new laws and filling any remaining search of protection. As internal border turn them to their points of departure. gaps), a clear need to reduce the discrep - checks within the eu are progressively So far, what has been happening to the ancies between the practices of various abolished, it has concentrated on rein - people among them who could be eu states has emerged. forcing controls at its external frontiers. refugees is not entirely clear. unhcr is In November 2007, unhcr published In 2006, it adopted a common policy, working to establish a relationship with a study on the implementation of a key called the Schengen Borders Code, Frontex, with the aim of ensuring a clear

IN SOME INDUSTRIALIZED NATIONS, DETENTION HAS BECOME AN ACCEPTED MEANS OF IMMIGRATION CONTROL .”

REFUGEES 25 ‘‘ In the autumn of 2005, hundreds of desperate would-be migrants (and some refugees) were rounded up as they tried to reach Europe via Spain’s North African enclaves.

understanding of the principles of inter - clauses should be inserted in all future 1951 Refugee Convention, signatories national refugee law, including the vital cooperation, association or equivalent of the readmission agreements have so provision that no refugee should be un - agreements between the eu and non- eu far omitted to include more detailed wittingly returned somewhere where he countries. It also gave the European protection safeguards. or she might be in danger. Commission a wide-ranging mandate to A further priority for the eu in the fight negotiate readmission agreements with REAL RISKS against illegal immigration has been the specific states. There is a real danger that conclusion of readmission agreements, Concerns persist about the compati - asylum seekers whose claims have not including with countries along the eu ’s bility of this aggressive readmission been examined substantively in the eu eastern and southern borders. In 2002, in policy with international refugee will be removed under the terms of these Seville, the European Council (a biannual protection norms. Although the agreements to countries which do not meeting of eu government leaders) agreements contain a general provision have fair and effective asylum procedures. proposed that compulsory readmission repeating states’ obligations under the Indeed, there are regular examples of such

26 REFUGEES events taking place under bilateral arrangements: Dr. Katrine Camilleri, a lawyer whose work for the Jesuit Refugee Service includes monitoring Malta’s detention centres, described one such case to members of unhcr ’s governing body in Geneva, the day after she received the prestigious 2007 Nansen Refugee Award for exceptional services to refugees. She recounted the words of a Somali asylum seeker describing what happened after he was handed back by an eu coun - try to the authorities of a country he had previously transited: “‘When we landed… we were placed in custody at the airport for a few days and then we were blind - folded, placed in a van and taken to an - other location... We were kept in this location for seven days. These were the worst days of my life. I was heavily interro - gated and tortured, beaten on my shins and electrocuted. They tied my legs and put a piece of wood behind my knees, then placed me upside down. They then beat me on the soles of my feet. There were

5 times where I was beaten so severely that I 0 0 2 •

R urinated blood.’” A M

/ He and the others deported with him O R R

A were sentenced to nine months in prison, C O I

G where they were kept in appalling R E S

© conditions, 50 to a cell. At the end of his sentence, he was put in a jeep with some Died in the Attempt Three weeks of documented deaths of people trying to reach Europe

DATE NUMBER FOUND OF DEAD NAME ORIGIN CAUSE OF DEATH 17-9-06 13 No name unknown drowned; 1 found, 12 missing after shipwreck 115 miles South West of Malta 16-9-06 1 No name (man) Sub-Saharan Africa body found in boat with 56 survivors landed on Los Cristianos, Canary Islands (Spain) 12-9-06 250 No name unknown missing; boat, at the mercy of the waves, sent SOS signal near Lampedusa, Italy 10-9-06 2 No name Kurdish died in minefield after entered Vyssas area, in Evros (Greek/Turkish border) 9-9-06 17 No name (5 women, 3 minors) Somalia died of starvation; thrown overboard from drifting ship on way from Libya to Italy 5-9-06 2 No name unknown drowned; bodies found on the beach of Torretta Granitola near Mazara del Vallo, Italy 3-9-06 1 No name (man, 19) Algeria Stowaway; fell in field in Vinantes (France) from wheelbay of a plane from North Africa 3-9-06 1 Janvier Makiadi (man, 44) Congo Suicide; hanged under bridge, asylum claim refused (UK); known also as Paul Kiese 3-9-06 1 No name Maghreb found near Los Ancones, Spain; body thrown overboard by boat landed in Lanzarote 2-9-06 8 No name Eritrea/Somalia died of hunger and thirst; bodies thrown overboard during journey to Italy 1-9-06 1 No name (man +/- 30) Pakistan drowned; boat hit rocks near Hania (Greece) on way from Egypt to Italy 1-9-06 3 No name (2 adults, 1 minor) Sub-Saharan Africa died after been rescued off El Hierro, Canary Islands (Spain), after boat sank 1-9-06 7 No name unknown reportedly drowned; missing after boat sank near coast of Crete (Greece) 30-8-06 10 No name unknown died in boat with 13 survivors; bodies thrown overboard during journey to Italy 29-8-06 132 No name Sub-Saharan Africa drowned; 84 found, 48 missing, shipwreck off coast of Mauritania 28-8-06 1 No name (man) Mali died of dehydration after been abandoned in Sahara desert

Source: UNITED - www.unitedagainstracism.org. As of March 2007, this NGO network had assembled reports of 8,855 documented deaths of would-be migrants and refugees in, or heading for, Europe since 1993. The use of an excerpt from this list does not constitute endorsement by UNHCR of all details contained within it. Greek studies

ue to its geographic location, other aspects of the country’s asylum mentioned any legal reasoning. Although Greece has always been one of system. each asylum claim should be evaluated on Dthe main gateways to Europe Irregular entrants in Greece face major its individual merits, all the decisions from the Middle East and beyond by land, difficulties accessing asylum procedures. examined contained a standard paragraph air and sea. Recent arrivals include a These include lack of information about with exactly the same information. substantial number of people fleeing their rights and asylum procedures, lack of As a result of these deficiencies, the war-torn countries such as Somalia and qualified interpreters and insufficient legal study said, “the research was not able to Afghanistan. And in the first six months aid. However, a new Interior Ministry guide discern legal practice in Greece.” of 2007, some 3,500 Iraqis applied for to asylum procedures in Greece, published A few weeks earlier, in October 2007, asylum in Greece, the second highest in six different languages, is expected to another report was issued – by the Greek number in any industrialized country, after help improve this situation somewhat. Group of Lawyers for the Rights of Sweden. For several years, UNHCR has been Refugees and Migrants and the German Overall, the number of migrants and expressing concern at the extraordinarily NGO Pro Asyl – which alleged that the asylum seekers crossing by boat from low numbers of refugees being recognized Greek coastguard was pushing back boat Turkey increased sharply in 2007. As a in Greece, compared to other EU countries people. “It tries to block their boats and result, detention centres on the islands of (the overall Greek recognition rate has force them out of Greek territorial waters,” Samos, Chios and Lesvos experienced tended to be just above or below 1 percent). the report stated. “Regardless of whether serious problems of overcrowding. And a study on the implementation of the they survive or not, passengers are cast The UN refugee agency has repeatedly European Union’s Qualification Directive in ashore on uninhabited islands or left to raised concerns about the poor conditions five EU states, released by the agency in their fate on the open sea.” The report also under which migrants and asylum seekers November 2007, appeared to confirm that alleged there had been serious physical are kept in Greece – and in October 2007, there are serious problems with the maltreatment of migrants in Greece, as UNHCR called for the immediate closure of country’s asylum procedure. well as cases of forced returns of people, one particular holding centre, on the island The study examined 305 randomly who could be refugees, across the land of Samos, because of its overcrowded and selected first instance decisions on claims border with Turkey (an issue UNHCR has extremely unhygienic condition. An earlier lodged by asylum seekers from Sudan, Iraq, raised separately on a number of European Parliament report (July 2007) had Afghanistan, Somalia and Sri Lanka. All 305 occasions). The Greek government ordered described the same centre as “squalid, decisions were negative. The study found an investigation into the claims. deplorable, inhuman and unacceptable,” that none of the decisions contained any and had cast a critical eye over a number of reference to the facts, and none William Spindler 6 0 other people and driven into 0 become an accepted 2 • N U

the desert. After three days, H means of immigration / Y they were forced out of the K control,” said Camilleri. Z S L E

vehicle in the middle of the D “At times, it seems as if the N A Z desert and told they were at S fundamental right to . B /

the border. Of the six people R personal liberty has been C H in the group, only two – N turned on its head, and U including the Somali there is an almost interviewed by Camilleri – unquestioned assumption survived. that detention is the only option available.” RESTRICTED VISION So even as ground- No monitoring arrange- breaking efforts continue ments for readmitted A Romanian boy picked up by the Hun- to build a high quality asylum seekers are in place or being garian border police waits in an airport common system for those people who do contemplated by the eu or its Member detention area prior to his deportation. manage to reach the European Union States, although unregulated detention and lodge their asylum claims, the eu ’s upon readmission – as in the case facilities, in several cases with significant migration control policies may be described above – is a real risk. And not amounts of eu funding. leaving many refugees and just in North Africa. On the eu ’s Eastern Long periods of detention are also a other vulnerable people in a potentially fringe, for example, a number of feature in some states within the eu , dangerous protection limbo in countries are heavily engaged in including Malta and Greece: “In some other countries in the European constructing immigration detention industrialized nations, detention has neighbourhood.

28 REFUGEES ASIA i DIVERTED to Nauru Two women drowned in the incident. their refugee claim was being questioned. BY A RIANE R UMMERY The survivors were taken first to “We sold our house and our shop in n A ugust 2001, after a Ashmore Reef for two days, then to Afghanistan because we couldn’t stay Norwegian freighter, the MV Tampa , Christmas Island for almost two months, there. We had problems and had to leave,” rescued 433 mainly Afghan asylum and eventually to Nauru. she explained. They stayed in Iran for six seekers from a sinking Indonesian months. But without id papers or formal fishing boat, the Australian authori - THE MINISTER EXPLAINS status, they faced many obstacles and felt Ities refused to let them disembark on Zerghona recalls a visit, soon extremely vulnerable. “It was hard. My Christmas Island. New Zealand accepted after her arrival on Nauru, by the then son couldn’t go to school. And my hus - 131 of the Afghans directly from the boat, Australian Immigration Minister Philip band was taken from the street. He had to and the rest were transferred to the Pacific Ruddock who spoke briefly to the group of pay money two times.” island state of Nauru, sparking what mainly Afghan and Iraqi asylum seekers. became known as the ‘Pacific Solution.’ “I remember I was standing close to DETERRING ARRIVALS Zerghona Jawadi was one of some him,” Zerghona said. “He said you are The different treatment of 1,600 asylum seekers who were taken to not refugees because you do not come people based on their mode of arrival has Nauru or Manus Island in the wake of through the door, you just come through become a central feature of Australia’s the Tampa incident. the window. You are not welcome in asylum policy. Zerghona, her husband Hadi and Australia.” Building on the policy of mandatory their ten-year-old son Mustafa originally But the Minister’s metaphor was lost detention for ‘unauthorised arrivals’ in - fled to Iran from Taliban-controlled on Zerghona and many of the others. Nor troduced by a Labour government in Afghanistan, after the family had did she understand why, simply because 1992, the Howard Coalition Government received threats. They subsequently her family had scraped together some deepened the differential treatment be - moved on to Australia via the well- cash to pay for their passage, and initially tween those asylum seekers who arrive trodden route through Malaysia and spent some time in Iran, the legitimacy of with visas and those who come without. Indonesia. 1

After eight days at sea, the small 0 0 2 • U fishing boat she shared with about R N /

160 other asylum seekers started to T F O R sink in waters near Ashmore Reef C Y R . off north-western Australia on R / P A

November 8, 2001 – just two days © before the federal election. The Sumber Lestari – known to the Australian authorities as ‘Suspected Illegal Entry Vessel (siev ) 10’ – then caught fire. Almost overcome by smoke, Zerghona, Hadi and Mustafa jumped into the water and were eventually rescued by an Australian naval vessel.

Some of the first group of asylum seekers deposited by the Australian navy on the Pacific island of Nauru in September 2001.

REFUGEES 29 Temporary protection visas, offshore gration and Citizenship onshore figures Things are looking up for the Jawadi family. processing, and lengthy delays in off - from July 1999 to June 2007, of the 11,266 Zerghona was the first of “the Afghan shore centres for recognized refugees all asylum seekers who arrived in Australia ladies off Nauru” to gain a driving licence became part of the special regime applied without a valid visa (and were automati - and work in a shop in Canberra, and she to those who come through the ‘window,’ cally detained), 87 percent were found to hopes to study nursing once her youngest rather than the ‘door.’ be refugees. By contrast, over the same child Hedayat – one of around 20 babies This differential treatment has long period, only 15 percent of the 49,573 ‘law - born on Nauru – starts school. been of concern to unhcr , lawyers, ngo s ful’ arrivals who claimed asylum were and advocates – not least because it is at found to be refugees. AN ETHICAL QUESTION odds with protection and human rights The government has insisted principles. DIFFERENT STANDARDS that the decline in boat arrivals shows But if the suite of measures is about unhcr is especially concerned offshore processing works as a deterrent deterring would-be economic migrants, by the reduced procedural safeguards in to would-be illegal immigrants and the does the logic still stand up if most of those place for people who are processed off - people smuggling industry. impacted turn out to be genuine refugees? shore: these asylum seekers, unlike those Others, like Australian National Uni - As time goes on, the recognition rate of processed in mainland Australia, do not versity’s Professor William Maley, argue those asylum seekers who arrive without have ready access to legal advice, to a that drawing connections between poli - a visa in Australia remains consistently fully independent merits review or to the cies and observed outcomes is ‘fraught higher than those who arrive with one. Australian courts. As a result, they may with difficulty’. In Australia, the words “onshore” and face a higher risk of being wrongly re - “There’s a multiplicity of influences “offshore” feature constantly in the pub - turned against their will to a dangerous at play that can shape the way in which lic debate, although they are little known situation in their own country. people make decisions about migration elsewhere. “Onshore” asylum claims are Towle acknowledges the legitimate or movement from one country or area to made by people who make it to the Aus - concerns of states over border control, another,” Maley said, adding that tralian mainland, these days usually by but argues that protection needs should changes in political circumstances in air and mostly with valid visas. Some remain at the heart of all policies relating source countries may have done more to boat arrivals make it through the cus - to the treatment of refugees both on - influence boat arrivals than the govern - toms patrols to the mainland, but most shore and offshore. ment’s deterrent policies. arrive on outlying territories like Ash - “We need to look at the nature and Under international law, people enter - more Reef or Christmas Island (or are in - character of the people actually moving, ing Australia without a visa to claim asy - tercepted at sea) and are diverted into the rather than making generalized assump - lum have not committed any offence, ‘Offshore’ system – which included being tions about illegal migration,” Towle said . Maley said. And for him, there is also an transferred to the controversial reception “Currently, in the Asia Pacific region, important “moral question about the le - centres on Nauru and Manus Island. the question is not so much whether gitimacy of … treating one potentially unhcr ’s Regional Representative in these ‘secondary movers’ are in need of quite innocent group poorly, in order to

Canberra, Richard Towle, observes that protection, but which country is best deter others.”
the Australian system, in practice, ap - placed to provide it,” he added. “Very few pears to penalize the genuine asylum of the countries refugees pass through on In November 2007, the claims of seven seekers in the offshore system. their way to Australia and New Zealand asylum seekers from Myanmar, who had “In Europe there are some larger flows have signed the Refugee Convention, un - already spent over a year on Nauru, were of people with a wide range of motives like in Europe where virtually every still undecided. And 74 recognized refugees moving in clandestine ways which have country has done so.” out of a group of 82 Sri Lankans sent to relatively low refugee components, and After two and a half years on Nauru, Nauru in March 2007 remained on the recognition rates,” he said. “But statistics Zerghona Jawadi and her family were island while the Australian government show that the so-called ‘irregular eventually found to be refugees and taken searched for another country willing to movers’ in the Australasian region are to the Australian capital Canberra in July accept them. The newly elected Labor actually, for the most part, refugees.” 2004. Hadi is working as a house painter party has pledged to end offshore processing According to Department of Immi - and Mustafa (now 16) is doing well at school. on Nauru and Manus Island.

WE NEED TO LOOK AT THE NATURE AND CHARACTER OF THE PEOPLE ACTUALLY MOVING, RATHER THAN MAKING GENERALIZED ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT ILLEGAL MIGRATION.”

30 ‘‘ REFUGEES Is TOLERATION Enough ? REFUGEES IN ASIA 7 0

0 asylum systems either. 2

BY Y ANTE I SMAIL • S Y There is a tradition of host - M /

ixteen- year-old step- N ing refugees informally in A T . brothers Amin and Hashim had E most Asian countries, but / R C

endured over a fortnight of hard H toleration alone is not N work with no pay – and virtually U enough to provide refugees no rest or food – on a small with the security they Sfishing boat in the Bay of Bengal. need. “The fisherman told us we had been sold to him to pay off our debts to the MIXED RECEPTION smuggling agent,” recalls Amin. “We were The country with the in the middle of the sea – there was no one most known refugees from to help us.” Myanmar is Thailand, The two young Muslim Rohingya Three mothers with babies shortly where some 140,000 live in refugees thought they had paid a smug - after their release from immigration nine camps along the Thai-Myanmar gler to help them flee from Myanmar to detention in Malaysia. border. Of those, 128,500 (mainly ethnic Malaysia. Instead, they were sold into Karen and Karenni) are registered forced labour in Thailand. Myanmar is Southeast Asia’s biggest pro - refugees and the rest are awaiting a Late one night, in an act of sheer des - ducer of refugees – with 203,000 recorded decision on their status by Thailand’s peration, the boys jumped into the sea. in neighbouring countries at the begin - Provincial Admissions Boards. “We swam for hours,” said Amin. ning of 2007 (although the true total may In Bangladesh, there are 27,000 “When we finally reached the shore, the be nearer 400,000). Of these, some 31,000 Muslim Rohingya refugees in two sky was pink and getting light.” Hiding have entered Malaysia over the past ten unhcr -run camps – as well as up to during daylight hours, they travelled years or so to find safety. 200,000 other Rohingyas not officially furtively on foot through the Thai coun - Within Asia, refugee and migratory registered as refugees who are living tryside over several nights, until they movements frequently intersect. With among the local population. finally arrived at the Malaysian border. some countries, such as Myanmar, impos - Some Myanmar refugee communities ing strict exit control measures, refugees have been in Malaysia – where they live in FORBIDDEN TO LEAVE often have no choice but to engage in the cities rather than in camps – for close Amin and Hashim had fled their unauthorized forms of movement in to two decades. But their technically ille - village in Myanmar’s northern Rakhine order to reach safety or join their families gal status has made life difficult, leaving state after discovering the authorities – and they are often obliged to use the refugees vulnerable to arrest for immigra - were looking for them because of an same routes and methods as migrants. tion offenses such as “illegal entry.” earlier trip they had made to find work in As a result, refugees in Asia – like Restrictive measures introduced by Bangladesh (the Rohingyas are stateless refugees elsewhere – are stigmatized as countries to curb irregular migration and therefore unable to acquire the people trying to circumvent the law. In ad - often prevent refugees from accessing necessary documentation to work outside dition, the reliance on the netherworld of safety – with Amin and Hashim almost Rakhine state legally – let alone leave smugglers increases the vulnerability of becoming a case in point: after they the country). both refugees and migrants to abuse – as crossed the border, they were immedi - Fearing the worst, the boys’ family paid happened in the case of Amin and Hashim, ately picked up by the Malaysian authori - almost us $1,000 – a huge sum for a when a smuggling transaction metamor - ties and taken to an immigration Rohingya family – to an agent to smuggle phosed into trafficking for bonded labour. detention facility. Weeks later, their luck them to the Malaysian capital Kuala Had they been teenage girls, their fate finally changed when unhcr intervened Lumpur, where they have relatives. might have been even worse. on their behalf and they were released. Amin’s and Hashim’s story is all too fa - Relatively few Asian countries have ac - Many others, in Asia and elsewhere, may miliar. Similar journeys have been taking ceded to international refugee instru - be less fortunate. How many, we will place for similar reasons for decades. ments, and most do not have formal never know.

REFUGEES 31