RSS: #île_de_l'ascension

#île_de_l'ascension

  • @cdb_77
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    @colporteur
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    @seenthis

    Remote Atlantic Ocean rock could host migrants, UK says

    https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c0/Ile_de_l%27ascension_routes.svg/langfr-1024px-Ile_de_l%27ascension_routes.svg.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c6/South_Atlantic_Ocean_laea_relief_location_map.jpg/280px-South_Atlantic_Ocean_laea_relief_location_map.jpg

    The UK is threatening to deport irregular migrants to Ascension Island if its plan to send people to Rwanda fails, amid another lethal shipwreck in the Mediterranean.

    British officials briefed national press anonymously on the Ascension Island idea on Sunday (6 August).

    “It’s pragmatic to consider all options and it makes sense to draw up proposals to stop the boats that could work alongside our Rwanda policy,” a “senior government source” told The Sunday Times.

    “We’re still confident that our Rwanda scheme is lawful, but having alternative proposals on the table would provide us with a back-up if we’re frustrated legally,” the source said.

    “All options were on the table”, British home secretary Suella Braverman also told the Mail on Sunday.

    Ascension Island is part of the Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha British overseas territory in the South Atlantic Ocean.

    The volcanic outcrop is just 88 km squared and located 6,000 km away from Europe.

    Braverman had planned to start deporting people to Rwanda on flights in January to act as a deterrent.

    But this was ruled illegal by the Court of Appeal in June over deficiencies in Rwanda’s asylum system, with a final verdict due by the Supreme Court in late autumn.

    Other “Plan B” locations alongside Ascension Island included Alderney in the Channel islands, a British military base in Cyprus, Ghana, Nigeria, Namibia, and Morocco, the Sunday Times reported.

    Niger had been on the list, but a coup in Niamey in July now threatened to see military intervention by neighbouring states, making the region a source of even higher numbers of refugees.

    The Falkland Islands had also been considered, but were deemed too sensitive due to the 1982 Falklands War between Britain and Argentina.

    And British officials cited Australia’s policy of processing asylum claims on Nauru in the South Pacific as a model for their far-flung schemes.

    The Rwanda Plan A has been pasted by human-rights groups as demonisation of vulnerable people by Britain’s ruling Conservative Party, which trails in polls ahead of elections likely in 2024.

    About 15,000 have crossed to the UK on small boats from France so far this year, down 15 percent on the same period in 2022.

    But arrivals to Europe are on the rise, via dangerous Mediterranean crossings and Turkey.

    Over 127,300 people came in the first seven months of this year compared to 189,600 in all of last year, according to the International Organisation for Migration, a UN limb.

    More than 2,330 people lost their lives or went missing, compared to 2,965 in 2022.

    Another woman and child died and 30 were still missing after two boats capsized near the Italian island of Lampedusa on Sunday, Italian authorities said.

    The coastguard saved 57 people so far.

    They also airlifted 34 others, including two pregnant women and a child, who had been clinging to a cliff face on Lampedusa since Friday following a previous shipwreck.
    Unwelcoming mood

    The right-wing government of Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni has been accused of complicating rescues by forcing charity ships to disembark at far-away ports, echoing the UK approach.

    And migration is likely to feature heavily in the European Parliament elections next year, just as in post-Brexit Britain.

    Germany’s far-right AfD party declared the EU a “failed project” and promised to crack down on migrants in its programme for next June’s vote, unveiled on Sunday.

    It called for the EU to reform as a “federation of European nations” that protected “different identities” in Europe.

    It also spoke of a “Europe of fatherlands, a European community of sovereign, democratic states”.

    The AfD is poles apart from the old German spirit under former conservative chancellor Angela Merkel, who welcomed refugees in 2015.

    But the far-right party is now polling at 19 to 22 percent, making it the second strongest political force in the EU’s largest member state.

    ▻https://euobserver.com/world/157327

    #UK #Atlantique #Angleterre #île #île_de_l'ascension #externalisation #modèle_australien #asile #migrations #réfugiés #océan_atlantique

    L’île de l’Ascension après d’autres magnifiques idées :
    – le Rwanda : ►https://seenthis.net/messages/966443
    – la Bibby Stockholm : ▻https://seenthis.net/tag/bibby_stockholm

    Et ça rappelle farouchement ce que les Australiens ont mis en place (la #Pacific_solution) sur l’île de #Nauru : ►https://seenthis.net/tag/nauru

    D’ailleurs, je découvre grâce aux archives seenthis (#merci @seenthis) qu’en 2020, la #Grande-Bretagne avait déjà imaginé d’envoyer les demandeurs d’asile sur une autre île au milieu de l’Atlantique qui leur appartient : l’île de #Saint-Hélène : ►https://seenthis.net/messages/881888

    –—

    ajouté à la métaliste autour des #îles qui sont utilisées (ou dont il a été question d’imaginer de le faire) pour y envoyer des #réfugiés :
    ►https://seenthis.net/messages/881889

    CDB_77
    • @cdb_77
      CDB_77

      L’ultima idea di Londra per i richiedenti asilo: «spedirli» su un’isola in mezzo all’Atlantico

      All’Ascensione, territorio dipendente da Sant’Elena. Intanto da ieri decine spostati su una chiatta a Portland

      La buona notizia è che, causa golpe, è tramontata definitivamente l’ipotesi di spostare i migranti in Niger. La cattiva notizia? Tutto il resto.

      Gli arrivi record nel Regno Unito stanno mettendo a durissima prova il governo Sunak, anche se tra i presunti vantaggi di Brexit c’era proprio quello di «riprendere il controllo dei confini britannici» sottraendoli agli odiati burocrati di Bruxelles.

      Così l’ultima ipotesi è quella di portare migliaia di persone — in attesa di verdetto sulla richiesta d’asilo — su un’isola sperduta tra costa africana (1.600 chilometri) e costa sudamericana (2.300 chilometri), l’Isola dell’Ascensione, nell’amministrazione di Sant’Elena di napoleonica memoria. Charles Darwin, che durante il suo viaggio con il veliero Beagle la visitò nel 1836, la definì «orribile».

      L’esilio agli antipodi dei migranti non è neanche il problema più urgente di Sunak, che peraltro è in vacanza negli Stati Uniti con la famiglia, sadicamente pedinato dai tabloid inglesi anche alla lezione di spinning in una palestra di lusso a Santa Monica con accompagnamento musicale di Taylor Swift.

      È cominciato infatti ieri pomeriggio il trasferimento di alcune decine di migranti su una chiatta, la Bibby Stockholm, ancorata nel porto di Portland . Arrivano da alberghi di Oxford, Bristol, Torbay e Bournemouth: proprio il problema degli hotel è quello più urgente. Il governo paga infatti sei milioni di sterline al giorno (sette milioni di euro) per ospitare in albergo migliaia di migranti. L’idea della chiatta è venuta, semplicemente, per risparmiare mentre le lista d’attesa per le richieste d’asilo si allungano spaventosamente.

      Neanche i tabloid stanno facendo sconti al governo: due mesi fa campeggiava sulle loro prime pagine la protesta dei migranti iraniani che rifiutavano la sistemazione in un albergo londinese di Pimlico (centralissimo, 175 euro a notte) perché pretendevano camere singole, e per questo si erano accampati in strada.

      La capacità ricettiva dell’apparato dello Stato britannico pare uscita da un vecchio sketch dei Monty Python, e sarebbe un brutto gesto, oggi, quello di rinfacciare alla fazione pro-Brexit le vecchie critiche alle (effettive) falle nell’accoglienza ai migranti targata Ue. Ma certo è che il «piano B» è una priorità del governo Sunak: s’intende l’idea di trasferire fuori dai confini nazionali i migranti finché non sarà definito l’esito delle loro richieste d’asilo. Soltanto quattordici mesi fa, quando il governo Johnson ormai al capolinea ipotizzò di utilizzare il Ruanda come parcheggio per i migranti desiderosi di vivere nel Regno Unito stringendo con Kigali un accordo di cooperazione da 160 milioni di euro, l’allora principe Carlo con una clamorosa e inedita violazione della tradizionale neutralità politica della Corona — sempre silente sulle scelte governative — lasciò trapelare di essere rimasto «allibito».

      Un trasferimento di seimila chilometri nel territorio britannico d’oltremare nell’Atlantico meridionale provocherebbe, al netto di ogni altra considerazione politica e umanitaria, una serie di complessi problemi organizzativi, dato che l’isola di 88 chilometri quadrati ha soltanto ottocento abitanti e non è ovviamente attrezzata per diventare un campo profughi. Perfino il Daily Mail, giornale per nulla favorevole all’apertura delle frontiere, la definiva ieri «una pietra vulcanica in mezzo al nulla».

      Al momento il piano di collaborazione con Kigali è stato bloccato da un tribunale, ma il governo aspetta il pronunciamento definitivo della Corte suprema in ottobre.

      ▻https://www.corriere.it/esteri/23_agosto_07/ultima-idea-londra-richiedenti-asilo-spedirli-un-isola-mezzo-all-atlantico-

      CDB_77
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  • @reka
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    @cdb_77
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    Revealed: No 10 explores sending asylum seekers to Moldova, Morocco and Papua New Guinea | UK news | The Guardian
    ▻https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/sep/30/revealed-no-10-explores-sending-asylum-seekers-to-moldova-morocco-and-p

    Downing Street has asked officials to consider the option of sending asylum seekers to Moldova, Morocco or Papua New Guinea and is the driving force behind proposals to hold refugees in offshore detention centres, according to documents seen by the Guardian.

    The documents suggest officials in the Foreign Office have been pushing back against No 10’s proposals to process asylum applications in detention facilities overseas, which have also included the suggestion the centres could be constructed on the south Atlantic islands of Ascension and St Helena.

    The documents, marked “official” and “sensitive” and produced earlier this month, summarise advice from officials at the Foreign Office, which was asked by Downing Street to “offer advice on possible options for negotiating an offshore asylum processing facility similar to the Australian model in Papua New Guinea and Nauru”.

    #migration #asile #déportation #externalisation #déterritorialisation

    Reka CC BY-NC-SA
    • @cdb_77
      CDB_77

      Downing Street has asked officials to consider the option of sending asylum seekers to Moldova, Morocco or Papua New Guinea and is the driving force behind proposals to hold refugees in offshore detention centres, according to documents seen by the Guardian.

      The documents suggest officials in the Foreign Office have been pushing back against No 10’s proposals to process asylum applications in detention facilities overseas, which have also included the suggestion the centres could be constructed on the south Atlantic islands of Ascension and St Helena.

      The documents, marked “official” and “sensitive” and produced earlier this month, summarise advice from officials at the Foreign Office, which was asked by Downing Street to “offer advice on possible options for negotiating an offshore asylum processing facility similar to the Australian model in Papua New Guinea and Nauru”.

      The Australian system of processing asylum seekers in on the Pacific Islands costs AY$13bn (£7.2bn) a year and has attracted criticism from human rights groups, the United Nations and even the UK government, according to the documents, which reveal British ministers have “privately” raised concerns with Australia over the abuse of detainees in its offshore detention facilities.

      The Financial Times reported on Wednesday that the home secretary, Priti Patel, asked officials to consider processing asylum seekers Ascension and St Helena, which are overseas British territories. Home Office sources were quick to distance Patel from the proposals and Downing Street has also played down Ascension and St Helena as destinations for asylum processing centres.

      However, the documents seen by the Guardian suggest the government has for weeks been working on “detailed plans” that include cost estimates of building asylum detention camps on the south Atlantic islands, as well as other proposals to build such facilities in Moldova, Morocco and Papua New Guinea.

      The documents suggest the UK’s proposals would go further than Australia’s hardline system, which is “based on migrants being intercepted outside Australian waters”, allowing Australia to claim no immigration obligations to individuals. The UK proposals, the documents state, would involve relocating asylum seekers who “have arrived in the UK and are firmly within the jurisdiction of the UK for the purposes of the ECHR and Human Rights Act 1998”.

      The documents suggest that the idea that Morocco, Moldova and Papua New Guinea might make suitable destinations for UK asylum processing centres comes directly from Downing Street, with documents saying the three countries were specifically “suggested” and “floated” by No 10. One document says the request for advice on third country options for detention facilities came from “the PM”.

      The Times reported that the government was also giving serious consideration to the idea of creating floating asylum centres in disused ferries moored off the UK coast.

      While composed in the restrained language of civil servants, the Foreign Office advice contained in the documents appears highly dismissive of the ideas emanating from Downing Street, pointing out numerous legal, practical and diplomatic obstacles to processing asylums seekers oversees. The documents state that:

      • Plans to process asylum seekers at offshore centres in Ascension or St Helena would be “extremely expensive and logistically complicated” given the remoteness of the islands. The estimated cost is £220m build cost per 1,000 beds and running costs of £200m. One document adds: “In relation to St Helena we will need to consider if we are willing to impose the plan if the local government object.”

      • The “significant” legal, diplomatic and practical obstacles to the plan include the existence of “sensitive military installations” on the island of Ascension. One document warns that the military issues mean the “will mean US government would need to be persuaded at the highest levels, and even then success cannot be guaranteed”.

      • It is “highly unlikely” that any north African state, including Morocco, would agree to hosting asylum seekers relocated to the UK. “No north African country, Morocco included, has a fully functioning asylum system,” one document states. “Morocco would not have the resources (or the inclination) to pay for a processing centre.”

      • Seeming to dismiss the idea of sending asylum seekers to Moldova, Foreign Office officials point out there is protracted conflict in the eastern European country over Transnistria as well as “endemic” corruption. They add: “If an asylum centre depended on reliable, transparent, credible cooperation from the host country justice system we would not be able to rely on this.”

      • Officials warned of “significant political and logistical obstacles” to sending asylum seekers to Papua New Guinea, pointing out it is more than 8,500 miles away, has a fragile public health system and is “one of the bottom few countries in the world in terms of medical personnel per head of population”. They also warn any such a move would “renew scrutiny of Australia’s own offshore processing”. One document adds: “Politically, we judge the chances of positive engagement with the government on this to be almost nil.”

      A Foreign Office source played down the idea that the department had objected to Downing Street’s offshoring proposals for asylum seekers, saying officials’ concerns were only about the practicality of the plan. “This was something which the Cabinet Office commissioned, which we responded to with full vigour, to show how things could work,” the source said.

      However, another Whitehall source familiar with the government plans said they were part of a push by Downing Street to “radically beef-up the hostile environment” in 2021 following the end of the Brexit transition. Former prime minister Theresa May’s “hostile environment” phrase, which became closely associated with the polices that led to the Windrush scandal, is no longer being used in government.

      But the source said that moves are afoot to find a slate of new policies that would achieve a similar end to “discourage” and “deter” migrants from entering the UK illegally.

      The documents seen by the Guardian also contain details of Home Office legal advice to Downing Street, which states that the policy would require legislative changes, including “disapplying sections 77 and 78 of the Nationality Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 so that asylum seekers can be removed from the UK while their claim or appeal is pending”.

      Another likely legislative change, according to the Home Office advice, would require “defining what we mean by a clandestine arrival (and potentially a late claim) and create powers allowing us to send them offshore for the purposes of determining their asylum claims”.

      One of the documents states that the option of building detention centres in foreign countries – rather than British overseas territories – is “not the favoured No 10 avenue, but they wish to explore [the option] in case it presents easier pathways to an offshore facility”.

      On Wednesday, asked about the FT’s report about the UK considering plans to ship asylum seekers to the south Atlantic for processing, Boris Johnson’s spokesperson confirmed the UK was considering Australian–style offshore processing centres.

      He said the UK had a “long and proud history” of accepting asylum seekers but needed to act, particularly given migrants making unofficial crossings from France in small boats.

      “We are developing plans to reform our illegal migration and asylum policies so we can keep providing protection to those who need it, while preventing abuse of the system and criminality. As part of this work we’ve been looking at what a whole host of other countries do to inform a plan for the United Kingdom. And that work is ongoing.”

      Asked for comment about the proposals regarding Moldova, Morocco and Papua New Guinea, Downing Street referred the Guardian to the spokesman’s earlier comments. The Foreign Office referred the Guardian to the Home Office. The Home Office said it had nothing to add to comments by the prime minister’s spokesman.

      #UK #Angleterre #Maroc #Papoue_Nouvelle_Guinée #Moldavie
      #offshore_detention_centres
      #procédure_d'asile #externalisation_de_la_procédure #modèle_australien

      #île_de_l'Ascension

      https://i.imgur.com/9mE2Wyd.png

      #île_Sainte-Hélène

      https://i.imgur.com/lwNFun8.png

      #Sainte-Hélène

      –---

      Les #floating_asylum_centres pensés par l’UK rappellent d’autres structures flottantes :
      ►https://seenthis.net/messages/879396

      –—

      Ajouté à la métaliste sur l’externalisation des frontières :
      ►https://seenthis.net/messages/731749

      CDB_77
    • @cdb_77
      CDB_77

      Ascension Island: Priti Patel considered outpost for UK asylum centre location

      The government has considered building an asylum processing centre on a remote UK territory in the Atlantic Ocean.

      The idea of “offshoring” people is being looked at but finding a suitable location would be key, a source said.

      Home Secretary Priti Patel asked officials to look at asylum policies which had been successful in other countries, the BBC has been told.

      The Financial Times says Ascension Island, more than 4,000 miles (6,000km) from the UK, was a suggested location.

      What happens to migrants who reach the UK?
      More migrants arrive in September than all of 2019
      Fleeing the Syrian war for Belfast

      The Foreign Office is understood to have carried out an assessment for Ascension - which included the practicalities of transferring migrants thousands of miles to the island - and decided not to proceed.

      However, a Home Office source said ministers were looking at “every option that can stop small boat crossings and fix the asylum system”.

      "The UK has a long and proud history of offering refuge to those who need protection. Tens of thousands of people have rebuilt their lives in the UK and we will continue to provide safe and legal routes in the future.

      “As ministers have said we are developing plans to reform policies and laws around illegal migration and asylum to ensure we are able to provide protection to those who need it, while preventing abuse of the system and the criminality associated with it.”

      No final decisions have been made.
      ’Logistical nightmare’

      Labour’s shadow home secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds said: “This ludicrous idea is inhumane, completely impractical and wildly expensive - so it seems entirely plausible this Tory government came up with it.”

      Alan Nicholls, a member of the Ascension Island council, said moving asylum seekers more than 4,000 miles to the British overseas territory would be a “logistical nightmare” and not well received by the islanders.

      He also told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the presence of military bases on the island could make the concept “prohibitive” due to security concerns.

      Australia has controversially used offshore processing and detention centres for asylum seekers since the 1980s.

      A United Nations refugee agency representative to the UK, Rossella Pagliuchi-Lor, said the proposal would breach the UK’s obligations to asylum seekers and would “change what the UK is - its history and its values”.

      Speaking to the UK Parliament’s Home Affairs Select Committee, she said the Australian model had “brought about huge suffering for people, who are guilty of no more than seeking asylum, and it has also cost huge amounts of money”.

      The proposal comes amid record numbers of migrants making the journey across the English Channel to the UK in small boats this month, which Ms Patel has vowed to stop.

      Laura Trott, Conservative MP for Sevenoaks in Kent, said it was “absolutely right” that the government was looking at offshore asylum centres to “reduce the pressure” on Kent, which was “unable to take any more children into care”.

      In order to be eligible for asylum in the UK, applicants must prove they cannot return to their home country because they fear persecution due to their race, religion, nationality, political opinion, gender identity or sexual orientation.

      Asylum seekers cannot work while their claims are being processed, so the government offers them a daily allowance of just over £5 and accommodation, often in hostels or shared flats.

      Delays in processing UK asylum applications increased significantly last year with four out of five applicants in the last three months of 2019 waiting six months or more for their cases to be processed.

      That compared with three in four during the same period in 2018.

      –—

      Ascension Island key facts

      https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/624/cpsprodpb/4A05/production/_114694981_ascension_island_locator_map_640-nc.png

      The volcanic island has no indigenous population, and the people that live there - fewer than 1,000 - are the employees and families of the organisations operating on the island
      The military airbase is jointly operated by the RAF and the US, and has been used as a staging post to supply and defend the Falkland Islands
      Its first human inhabitants arrived in 1815, when the Royal Navy set up camp to keep watch on Napoleon, who was imprisoned on the island of St Helena some 800 miles away
      It is home to a BBC transmitter - the BBC Atlantic Relay station - which sends shortwave radio to Africa and South America

      ▻https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-54349796

      CDB_77
    • @cdb_77
      CDB_77

      UK considers sending asylum seekers abroad to be processed

      Reports suggest using #Gibraltar or the #Isle_of_Man or copying Australian model and paying third countries

      The Home Office is considering plans to send asylum seekers who arrive in the UK overseas to be processed, an idea modelled on a controversial Australian system, it is understood.

      Priti Patel, the home secretary, is expected to publish details next week of a scheme in which people who arrive in the UK via unofficial means, such as crossing the Channel in small boats, would be removed to a third country to have any claim dealt with.

      The government has pledged repeatedly to introduce measures to try to reduce the number of asylum seekers arriving across the Channel. Australia removes arrivals to overseas islands while their claims are processed.

      A Home Office source said: “Whilst people are dying making perilous journeys we would be irresponsible if we didn’t consider every avenue.”

      However, the source played down reports that destinations considered included Turkey, Gibraltar, the Isle of Man or other British islands, and that talks with some countries had begun, saying this was “all speculation”.

      Last year it emerged that meetings involving Patel had raised the possibility of asylum seekers being sent to Ascension Island, an isolated volcanic British territory in the south Atlantic, or St Helena, part of the same island group but 800 miles away.

      At the time, Home Office sources said the proposals came when Patel sought advice from the Foreign Office on how other countries deal with asylum applications, with Australia’s system given as an example.

      Labour described the Ascension Island idea as “inhumane, completely impractical and wildly expensive”.

      After the Brexit transition period finished at the end of 2020, the UK government no longer had the automatic right to transfer refugees and migrants to the EU country in which they arrived, part of the European asylum system known as the Dublin regulation.

      The UK government sought to replace this with a similar, post-Brexit version, but was rebuffed by the EU.

      With the government facing political pressure on migrant Channel crossings from some parts of the media, and from people like Nigel Farage, the former Ukip leader who frequently makes videos describing the boats as “an invasion”, Patel’s department has sought to respond.

      Last year, official documents seen by the Guardian showed that trials had taken place to test a blockade in the Channel similar to Australia’s controversial “turn back the boats” tactic.

      Reports at the time, denied by Downing Street, said that other methods considered to deter unofficial Channel crossings included a wave machine to push back the craft.

      ▻https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/mar/18/asylum-seekers-could-be-sent-abroad-by-uk-to-be-processed

      CDB_77
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