#externalisation

What to expect with the new European budget and the new pact on asylum and migration?

▻https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NzCP4ls3mA

#externalisation #frontières #migrations #réfugiés #contrôles_frontaliers #push-backs #Libye #refoulements #Trust_Fund
#vidéo #ressources_pédagogique #pacte #criminalisation_de_la_solidarité #gardes-côtes_libyens #EUTFA #new_pacte_on_migration_and_asylum #urgence #sécurité #approche_sécuritaire

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la vidéo existe aussi en italien:
▻https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvUXPVTxGrc

Le #Danemark veut envoyer 300 #détenus_étrangers au #Kosovo
(... encore le Danemark...)

La ministre kosovare de la justice a confirmé jeudi l’accord qui prévoit de confier à une prison de son pays des prisonniers étrangers, condamnés au Danemark et susceptibles d’être expulsés après avoir purgé leur peine.

Le Danemark a franchi, mercredi 15 décembre, une nouvelle étape dans sa gestion des étrangers. Le ministre de la justice, Nick Haekkerup, a annoncé que le pays nordique prévoit de louer 300 places de prison au Kosovo, pour y interner les citoyens étrangers, condamnés au Danemark, et qui doivent être expulsés vers leur pays d’origine après avoir purgé leur peine. Le 3 juin déjà, le gouvernement dirigé par les sociaux-démocrates, avait fait adopter une loi lui permettant de sous-traiter l’accueil des demandeurs d’asile et des réfugiés à un pays tiers.

L’accord sur les détenus étrangers a été confirmé, jeudi 16 décembre, par la ministre kosovare de la justice, Albulena Haxhiu. Il s’agit d’une première pour ce petit et très pauvre pays des Balkans, dirigé depuis le début de 2021 par le parti de gauche nationaliste Autodétermination !, proche du parti socialiste européen, et qui rêve d’adhésion à l’Union européenne.

Une lettre d’intention entre les deux gouvernements devrait être signée, lundi 20 décembre, à Pristina. Un traité sera ensuite soumis à l’approbation des deux tiers du Parlement. Mme Haxhiu a révélé que les prisonniers danois seraient enfermés dans le centre de détention de Gjilan, à l’est du pays, et assuré qu’il n’y aurait pas de terroristes, ni de prisonniers à « à haut risque » parmi eux. Selon elle, ce projet d’externalisation « est la reconnaissance du Kosovo et de ses institutions comme un pays sérieux ».
« Une prison danoise dans un autre pays »

A Copenhague, le ministre de la justice a fait savoir que les négociations avec Pristina avaient débuté il y a un an. Le dispositif a été présenté dans le cadre d’un accord entre les sociaux-démocrates, les conservateurs, le Parti du peuple danois et le Parti socialiste du peuple, pour réformer le système pénitentiaire. L’objectif est d’augmenter la capacité des prisons danoises pour pouvoir accueillir un millier de détenus supplémentaires.

Parallèlement à l’ouverture de nouvelles cellules dans les établissements existant, le gouvernement compte donc libérer 300 places en se débarrassant des détenus d’origine étrangère, condamnés à l’expulsion une fois leur peine purgée. Ils étaient 368 en 2020. « Il faut s’imaginer que c’est une prison danoise. Elle se situe juste dans un autre pays », a expliqué M. Haekkerup, précisant que l’équipe dirigeant le centre de Gjilan serait danoise.

A Pristina, Mme Haxhiu a confirmé : « Les lois en vigueur au Danemark s’appliqueront, la gestion sera danoise, mais les agents pénitentiaires seront de la République du Kosovo. Le bien-être et la sécurité [des détenus] seront sous leur entière responsabilité. »

Avec ce dispositif, le gouvernement danois veut « envoyer un signal clair que les étrangers condamnés à l’expulsion doivent quitter le Danemark ». Au ministère de la justice, on précise toutefois que si les détenus, une fois leur peine purgée, refusent d’être expulsés dans leur pays d’origine et que Copenhague ne peut les y forcer faute d’accord avec ces pays, alors ils seront renvoyés au Danemark, pour être placés en centre de rétention.

En échange de ses services, le Kosovo devrait obtenir 210 millions d’euros sur dix ans : « Cette compensation bénéficiera grandement aux institutions judiciaires, ainsi qu’au Service correctionnel du Kosovo, ce qui augmentera la qualité et l’infrastructure globale de ce service », a salué le gouvernement dans un communiqué. Le Danemark, de son côté, a indiqué qu’il allait aussi verser une aide de 6 millions d’euros par an au petit pays, au titre de la transition écologique.
De nombreux problèmes juridiques

Comme pour l’externalisation de l’asile, ce projet pose de nombreux problèmes juridiques. Le gouvernement danois a précisé que les détenus ayant une famille seraient les derniers envoyés au Kosovo, car ils doivent pouvoir « avoir des contacts avec leurs enfants ». Une aide financière au transport sera mise en place pour les proches.

Directrice de l’Institut des droits de l’homme à Copenhague, Louise Holck parle d’une « décision controversée du point de vue des droits de l’homme », car le Danemark, rappelle-t-elle, « ne peut pas exporter ses responsabilités légales » et devra faire en sorte que les droits des prisonniers soient respectés. Professeure de droit à l’université du sud Danemark, Linda Kjær Minke estime qu’il faudra modifier la loi, ne serait-ce que « pour imposer un transfert aux détenus qui refuseraient ».

Entre 2015 et 2018, la Norvège avait sous-traité l’emprisonnement de prisonniers aux Pays-Bas. Dans un rapport publié en 2016, le médiateur de la justice avait constaté que les autorités norvégiennes « n’avaient pas réussi à garantir une protection adéquate contre la torture et les traitements inhumains ou dégradants ». Jamais aucun pays européen n’a transféré des prisonniers aussi loin (plus de 2 000 km), et le Danemark devrait faire face aux mêmes problèmes que la Norvège, estime Linda Kjær Minke :« Même si la direction est danoise, les employés auront été formés différemment, avec peut-être d’autres façons d’utiliser la force. »

Ces mises en garde ne semblent pas affecter le gouvernement danois, qui multiplie les décisions très critiquées, comme celle de retirer leur titre de séjour aux réfugiés syriens. Le but est de décourager au maximum les demandeurs d’asile de rejoindre le pays. La gauche et les associations d’aide aux migrants dénoncent une « politique des symboles ».

▻https://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2021/12/16/le-danemark-veut-envoyer-300-detenus-etrangers-au-kosovo_6106356_3210.html#x

#asile #migrations #réfugiés #externalisation #pays-tiers #rétention #détention_administrative #détention #étrangers_criminels #criminels_étrangers #expulsion #renvoi #accord #Gjilan #prison #emprisonnement #compensation_financière #aide_financière #transition_écologique #étrangers

ping @karine4 @isskein

#Danemark : préoccupations vives à l’encontre de la #loi récemment adopté visant à externaliser l’examen des demandes d’asile au #Rwanda

Et demande expresse au Danemark de réévaluer son appréciation des zones en Syrie considérées comme « sûres » et qui justifieraient le renvoi des personnes dont la protection temporaire n’a pas été renouvelée voir annulée.

Le Comité des Nations Unies de suivi de la Convention pour l’Elimination des Discrimination Raciales (CERD en anglais) a passé en revue 4 pays fin novembre dont le Danemark.

Document en anglais : ▻https://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/15/treatybodyexternal/Download.aspx?symbolno=CERD%2fC%2fDNK%2fCO%2f22-24&Lang=en

#Danemark #asile #migrations #réfugiés #Afrique
#offshore_asylum_processing #externalisation #réfugiés_syriens #retour_au_pays #procédure_d'asile #pays-tiers

–---

Fil de discussion sur l’externalisation des procédures d’asile du Danemark (2021) :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/918427

Le Danemark (comme d’autres pays européens d’ailleurs) avait déjà tenté par la passé de faire passer une loi dans ce sens, voir la métaliste :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/900122

Borders bill, a new plan

https://i.imgur.com/UR4TR8C.jpg https://i.imgur.com/sdYhX7h.jpg

▻https://twitter.com/pritipatel/status/1468619562027528192

#nouvelle_loi #loi #UK #Angleterre #asile #migrations #réfugiés #Priti_Patel #plan #nouveau_plan

–-> un copier-coller du #modèle_australien

–-

Autour des « #offshore centres », voire :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/938880
–-> et une métaliste sur les différentes tentatives de différentes pays européens d’#externalisation non seulement des contrôles frontaliers, mais aussi de la #procédure_d'asile dans des #pays_tiers :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/900122

ping @karine4 @isskein

La #coopération UE-Égypte sur les politiques migratoires : dépolitiser les enjeux, soutenir un régime autoritaire

https://i.imgur.com/vMYJ1HY.png

Le président égyptien Abdel-Fattah #Al-Sissi affirme avec fierté qu’aucun bateau d’immigration dite « clandestine » n’a quitté les côtes égyptiennes depuis 2016 à destination de l’Europe – un discours largement démenti par les communautés migrantes en Égypte. Or, depuis 2016, la coopération entre l’#Union_Européenne et l’Égypte sur le contrôle des migrations n’a cessé de s’accroître, permettant la création d’un « Comité national de lutte contre l’immigration irrégulière et le trafic d’êtres humains », la promulgation d’un texte de loi réprimant le trafic des passeurs, ainsi que la tenue de dizaines d’« ateliers » internationaux à destination des garde-frontières, policiers et juges égyptien·ne·s.

Le texte de 2017 définissant les priorités de partenariat entre l’Union Européenne et l’Égypte affirme que cette coopération est « guidée par un engagement commun pour les valeurs universelles de démocratie, de l’État de droit et du respect des droits humains ». Pourtant, depuis l’arrivée au pouvoir du régime militaire d’Abdel Fattah Al-Sissi en 2013, le nombre de prisonnièr·e·s politiques est estimé à plus de 60 000 (Human Rights Watch, 2018). Les militant·e·s des droits humains et les avocat·e·s en droit des personnes étrangères, accusé·e·s de « porter atteinte à la sûreté de l’État », ont été particulièrement ciblé·e·s par cette répression. Les arrestations et la détention des personnes étrangères (y compris celles qui possèdent un statut de réfugié·e) ont également augmenté de manière exponentielle entre 2015 et 2017. Le gouvernement militaire du maréchal Al-Sissi a par ailleurs défini les zones frontières comme des « zones militaires » où la répression des migrations irrégularisées échappe à tout contrôle de la loi.

Alors que les dispositifs d’accueil et de protection des organisations internationales sur le territoire égyptien ne cessent de se dégrader, le gouvernement « gère » l’accueil des personnes migrantes et réfugiées avec des méthodes contre-terroristes. Dans ce contexte, et en totale opposition avec les valeurs affichées, la coopération européenne avec l’État égyptien agit comme un soutien au gouvernement autoritaire d’Al-Sissi et à sa politique de répression généralisée des personnes en migration tout comme des citoyen·ne·s égyptien·ne·s.

Le présent rapport - fruit d’une enquête de terrain de cinq mois (octobre 2019-février 2020) basée principalement au Caire - s’attache à déconstruire les discours officiels sur la question migratoire en Égypte, en montrant que la coopération euro-égyptienne sur la « gestion migratoire » a servi de prétexte à une forte instrumentalisation de la question des migrations par le gouvernement égyptien depuis 2013-2014. Loin d’avoir garanti les droits des personnes en migration en application du droit international, cette coopération a entraîné une dégradation des libertés et des conditions de vie pour l’ensemble de la population (nationale, immigrée, réfugiée) vivant sur le territoire égyptien. Une coopération, qui répond avant tout aux intérêts stratégiques des États membres de l’UE et de l’État égyptien...

▻https://migreurop.org/article3072.html?lang=fr

#migrations #asile #réfugiés #Egypte #externalisation #frontières #contrôles_migratoires #partenariat #UE #EU #union_européenne #rapport #migreurop

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ajouté à la métaliste sur l’externalisation des politiques migratoires :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/731749

et plus précisément :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/731749#message767801

Tories break ranks on immigration to demand safe routes to UK for asylum seekers

Exclusive: Allowing asylum claims to be made outside the UK is ‘only viable alternative’ to deaths in Channel, says backbencher

Senior Tories have demanded a radical overhaul of the asylum system to allow migrants to claim refuge at UK embassies anywhere in the world – rather than having to travel to the UK – in a bid to cut the numbers attempting dangerous Channel crossings.

Ex-cabinet members #David_Davis and #Andrew_Mitchell are among those calling for the change, which marks a stark challenge to the punitive approach taken by Boris Johnson and Priti Patel, who are demanding tighter controls on French beaches and are threatening to “push back” small boats at sea.

Mr Davis, the former shadow home secretary and Brexit secretary, and Mr Mitchell, the former international development secretary, also poured scorn on the home secretary’s plan to take on powers through her Nationality and Borders Bill to send migrants arriving in the UK to camps in third countries overseas for processing – something that has already been ruled out by Albania after it was named as a potential destination.

Writing for The Independent, Pauline Latham, a Conservative member of the Commons International Development Committee, said that allowing migrants to claim asylum at embassies abroad was “the only viable alternative to the tragedy of deaths in the Channel and the chaos of our current approach”.

Twenty-seven migrants, including three children and a pregnant woman, drowned off the coast of France in November when their boat sank, marking the single biggest loss of life of the crisis so far.

The Home Office is opposing an opposition amendment to the borders bill, due for debate in the House of Commons this week, which would allow migrants to seek “humanitarian visas” in France, allowing them to be transported safely across the Channel to claim asylum.

But Ms Latham’s proposal goes a step further, removing the need for asylum seekers to pay thousands of pounds to criminal gangs to smuggle them into Europe and then risk their lives in order to reach Britain to make their claim.

The Mid Derbyshire MP said: “This feels to me like a genuine win-win. The customer base of the people smugglers would vanish, ending deaths in the Channel and ensuring that people seeking safety here can travel in a humane fashion.

“The UK would be better able to control who arrives here, and anyone arriving without a visa or pre-approved asylum claim would face non-negotiable deportation.”

Current government policy has “got it the wrong way round” and should be reshaped as a “global resettlement programme” similar to those set up in Syria and being established for Afghanistan, said Ms Latham.

With the vast majority of those arriving in the UK by small boat having a legitimate claim for asylum, the question Ms Patel must answer is why the UK’s current policy requires them to put themselves in the hands of lawless gangs and then risk their lives in order to be able to submit their paperwork, she said.

“Desperate people will continue to seek safety in the UK for as long as there is conflict and persecution elsewhere,” said Ms Latham. “But nobody puts their child in an overcrowded, flimsy dinghy on a cold November morning if they think a better alternative is available. So, when we talk about deterrence we have to talk about alternatives.”

And Mr Davis said: “Instead of a policy which is built solely on keeping people out, the government should consider creating a legitimate route in for genuine refugees. Migrants fleeing repression in Iran or famine in war-torn Yemen are not able to apply at British embassies. The only options available to them are either illegal, or dangerous, or both.”

The bill being debated in the Commons on Tuesday and Wednesday aims to deter small-boat crossings by restricting the rights of those who enter the UK by “irregular” routes, allowing “offshore” processing of claims in third countries, and speeding up the removal of failed asylum seekers.

It would also give border and immigration staff powers to redirect boats out of UK territorial waters in a way that MPs and unions have warned could increase the risk of capsize and deaths.

Mr Davis said that offshoring would represent a “moral, economic and practical failure”, inflicting a terrible ordeal on those fleeing terror and persecution.

And Mr Mitchell said: “So far, Norway, Rwanda and Albania have all distanced themselves from suggestions that they would host a UK offshore processing centre. The bill seeks a power for a policy which the government is yet to define.

“Even in Australia, 75 per cent of those sent to remote islands for processing eventually had their claims upheld. Indeed, most of the people crossing the Channel are also having their asylum claims upheld. Offshore processing looks like a policy which delays the inevitable. But at far greater cost to the taxpayer.”

The Labour MP behind the humanitarian visa amendment, Neil Coyle, said Ms Patel’s proposals “will cause more dangerous routes and more risk to people seeking to reach the UK”. He told The Independent it was “garbage” for her to claim they would reduce the so-called “pull factors” attracting those fleeing war, civil conflict or persecution to Britain.

“A humanitarian visa offers the government the chance to prove it means what it says, when it says it doesn’t want people to be subjected to gangs and criminality,” said Mr Coyle. “The amendment would save lives, help us meet our international obligations, and prevent money going to smugglers.”

Stephen Farry of the Alliance Party, backing the amendment alongside MPs from the SNP, Liberal Democrats, Green Party and Labour, said: “Claiming asylum in the UK is a fundamental right, but asylum seekers are in a Catch-22, whereby asylum can only be claimed on UK soil yet the UK provides no safe and legal routes to enter the country for those purposes.

“The home secretary doesn’t care about asylum seekers, but if she were serious about tackling people smuggling, this visa is a workable solution.”

But a Home Office spokesperson said: “The government has noted the amendments relating to asylum visas for persons in France and they will be debated in parliament in due course.

“However, there is the risk of creating a wider pull factor, putting vulnerable people in danger by encouraging them to make dangerous journeys across the Mediterranean and overland to France in order to make claims to enter the UK, motivating people to again entrust themselves to heinous smugglers.”

The chief executive of the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, Minnie Rahman, dismissed this argument.

“Like people who travel to the UK for work or study, people seeking protection in the UK deserve safe ways of getting here,” she said. “If the government were serious about preventing dangerous crossings and upholding our commitment to refugee protection, they would back this amendment. Instead it seems they’re happy to continue driving refugees into smugglers’ boats.”

And Bridget Chapman, of the Kent Refugee Action Network, said: “The simple fact is that those who have made this journey tell us that they never wanted to leave their homes in the first place. It wasn’t the ‘pull factors’ that made it happen, it was violent ‘push factors’, such as war, conflict and persecution.

“Once displaced, most people stay close to their country of origin and only a relatively small number come to the UK. There is no evidence whatsoever that making their journey to the UK marginally more safe would be a ‘pull factor’, and we cannot allow that to be used as a reason not to give them better and safer options.”

Bella Sankey, director of Detention Action, said: “This humanitarian visa amendment would help to prevent deaths in the Channel and undermine the dangerous boat journeys offered by people smugglers.

“If the government is concerned about a so-called ‘pull factor’, they should show clear evidence of it and then expand this amendment to include refugees further upstream.”

▻https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/migrants-channel-borders-latham-patel-b1969795.html

#ambassades #Angleterre #UK #asile #migrations #réfugiés #
#offshore_asylum_processing #ambassade

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ajouté à la métaliste sur l’#externalisation de la #procédure_d'asile dans des #pays_tiers :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/900122

Afghans fleeing the Taliban face death, deportation and push-backs in Turkey

With financial support from the EU, Turkey has toughened up its migration policies – putting hundreds of thousands at risk.

https://i.imgur.com/HFnLVa8.png

As the US continues withdrawing its troops from Afghanistan, and the Taliban increases its control in the country, around 1,000 Afghans have been arriving to Turkey’s eastern border with Iran every day.

According to an aid provider for refugees in Eastern Turkey who wishes to remain anonymous, local authorities are exposing the arriving migrants to harsh controls as they struggle to process all those in need of safety. To avoid detection by state authorities and potential mistreatment, many migrants must rely on smugglers and use dangerous routes that can sometimes end in death.

When walking in the #Seyrantepe cemetery in #Van, in eastern Turkey, one might stumble across a large area at the end, lined with headstones without names. The gravestones are marked either by numbers or nationalities. Most are Afghans who tried to cross from Iran to Turkey before attempting to travel to Istanbul and finally to the European Union.

“The majority of refugees die during the smuggling accidents,” the local gravedigger, a Kurdish man in his late forties, explained while walking around the cemetery. “Smugglers put too many people in small fishing boats when trying to transport them across the Van Lake, which results in boat accidents and drownings.

“Refugees are also driven very fast through army road checks, drivers lose control and kill the passengers,” he added.

Residents say they find dozens of dead bodies in the mountains when the snow melts every spring. These are refugees who try to cross the border in the winter and either freeze to death, are attacked by wild animals or are shot by the Iranian army.

Who crosses the Iran-Turkey border?

Turkey’s eastern border with Iran has served as the main transit point for Afghans since the Soviet-Afghan War in the 1980s. The Afghans I met at this border were mostly Hazara Shia Muslims, LGBTIQ+ individuals and former soldiers or translators for the US Army. All were particularly vulnerable to the recent increase in Taliban control.

I also met Iranian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Iraqi, Syrian and Nigerian nationals crossing Turkey’s eastern border in search of an alternative transit route to safety after Turkey’s southern border with Syria was sealed with a wall in 2018.

Since refugees lack access to legal routes to safety, most move without authorisation and rely on smugglers. The Turkish Ministry of Interior estimates that almost half a million ‘illegal’ migrants entered Turkey prior to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2019 and around 62,000 in 2021. However, it is likely that the real numbers are much higher due to the clandestine nature of this movement.

https://i.imgur.com/LCayo7O.png

Toughening up migration policies in Turkey

Turkey hosts the largest refugee population in the world, with more than four million refugees. Since the country retains geographical limitation to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention, only people fleeing events in Europe can be given refugee status there. Yet, the majority of refugees in Turkey are Syrian nationals granted special status of temporary protection.

Those who are non-Syrian and non-European, including Afghans, are not entitled to seek asylum in the country but must instead ask for international protection, and if successful, wait for a third country to resettle them, explains Mahmut Kaçan, a lawyer from the Bar Van Association.

“I registered five years ago, but no one has even asked me for an interview to be resettled. We are losing hope to be resettled,” says Taimur, a refugee from Afghanistan currently residing in Van.

Turkey has recently toughened up its migration policies, which numerous people I spoke to considered to be driven by the government’s fear that migrants will overstay in Turkey.

My friend was crossing with a large group from Iran to Turkey. When the Iranian police saw them, they started shooting

In 2018, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) gave its responsibility for determining a person’s international protection status in Turkey to the Directorate General Migration Management (DGMM), which acts under the Turkish Ministry of Interior. This centralization had a catastrophic impact on non-Syrian refugees in Turkey. The DGMM gave positive international protection status to only 5,449 applicants in 2019, compared to 72,961 successful applications in 2018 under UNHCR mandate: a 92.5% drop.

At the same time, the number of removal centers, where people are accommodated before being deported, increased in Turkey from ten to 28 since the 2016 EU-Turkey Agreement. The European Commission gave €60m to Turkey for the management, reception and hosting of migrants, some of which was spent on the construction and refurbishment of these facilities. This boom of removal centers goes hand in hand with an increase in the number of deportations of Afghans from Turkey from 10,000 in 2017 to 33,000 in 2018 and 40,000 in 2019, according to an internal presentation allegedly from a Turkish government meeting, which was sent to the Afghanistan Analyst Network (AAN). While return flights mostly stopped in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, ANN reports that still more than 9,000 Afghans were deported from Turkey during the last year.
Navigating the local military conflict and push-backs

Migration in eastern Turkey takes place under the shadow of Turkey’s fight against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), a military struggle that has been ongoing since the 1980s.

Although the fighting has calmed down over the past five years, a large Turkish military presence and military operations continue across the region, marked by killings and arrests of PKK suspects.

Civilians are also subjected to military surveillance and anti-terror operations, including Kurdish people who are economically dependent on the smuggling of goods (e.g., tobacco, petrol, food) or refugees across the border.

“You can be killed on the spot if you cross the border through a military area,” explained Muge, a member of the Hayatadestek (‘Support to Life’), a humanitarian organization helping disaster-affected communities and refugees in Turkey.

The European Commission has criticised Turkish authorities for detaining, persecuting and convicting journalists, students, lawyers, opposition political parties and activists mostly on overly broad terrorism-related charges, which concern particularly populations in eastern Turkey. However, at the same time, the commission has dedicated extensive funds and support for military projects in eastern Turkey with the aim to stop onward ‘illegal’ migration to the European Union.

These involve millions of euros for walls and the construction of barbed-wire fences, as well as delivery of surveillance vehicles, communication and surveillance masts, thermal cameras, and hardware and software equipment, as well as training of border patrols along the Iran-Turkey border.

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

Outsourcing borders

What this approach does is push the borders of the European Union much further away, and outsource anti-migration measures to authoritarian governments who apply local anti-terror policies to exclude border crossers.

“My brother keeps trying to enter Turkey from Iran. He tried to cross six times recently but was beaten up by Turkish army each time, and then pushed back to Iran. The army was shooting at him,” Amir, another Afghan living in Van, told me.

The experience of Amir’s brother is an example of ‘push-backs’: the illegal procedure by which people are forced back over a border without consideration of their individual circumstances. Push-backs by EU state authorities and Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, have been reported to take place in Greece, Bulgaria, Croatia and other places along the EU’s physical borders.

A soldier from the Turkish Gendarmerie General Command, who agreed to provide commentary as long as he remains anonymous, confirmed the regular practice of push-backs from Turkey to Iran. “The [national] police told the gendarmerie [serving at the Iran-Turkey border] not to take all migrants for registration, because it is a financial burden to accommodate them all in removal centers, feed them, and legally process all of them,” he explains. “So, the gendarmerie was told to push some migrants back.”

People who are pushed back are often trapped in the rough mountainous terrain between Turkey and Iran and face harsh treatment by the Iranian state authorities, as Ali, an Afghan in his late twenties, recalls while drinking tea in a café in Van: “My friend was crossing with a large group of people from Iran to Turkey. When the Iranian police saw them, they started shooting. They killed 14 people. My friend was shot in his leg but survived.”

While these tough border measures have been deployed to stop onward ‘illegal’ migration, they paradoxically push refugees to flee further from Turkey without authorization. “If we do not get resettled from Turkey in a few years, our family will try to cross into Europe by ourselves,” says Taimur while holding his young son on his lap in a small flat in Van.

Those arriving in Eastern Turkey often do not stay long in the country for fear of push-backs and rapid deportations. Instead, they place their money and lives in the hands of more smugglers and wish to move on.

▻https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/north-africa-west-asia/afghans-fleeing-taliban-face-death-deportation-and-push-backs-turkey

#Iran #Turquie #frontières #décès #morts #cimetière #externalisation #asile #migrations #réfugiés #montagne #réfugiés_afghans #refoulements #push-backs

ping @isskein

Exils sans fin - Chantages anti-migratoires le long de la route des Balkans

https://migreurop.org/IMG/arton3069.jpg?1637573353#.jpg

Depuis plus de 20 ans, l’UE développe une coopération avec des pays non-membres (dits « tiers ») pour externaliser le contrôle de ses frontières. Identifiés comme des pays de départ puis comme des pays de transit des migrations à destination de l’UE, les pays des Balkans ont été rapidement intégrés au cœur de cette stratégie d’externalisation. Ce, particulièrement depuis la malnommée « crise migratoire » de l’année 2015 lors de laquelle près d’un million de personnes venues principalement du Moyen-Orient ont été compatibilisées le long de la route des Balkans, itinéraire reliant la Grèce à des pays de l’UE situés plus à l’Ouest, et notamment l’Allemagne.

Prétendant résoudre une crise que l’UE a elle-même engendrée, les politiques migratoires européennes dans la région sont celles de pompiers pyromanes. Zone tampon ou zone de « sécurité migratoire », cela fait plusieurs décennies que la région des Balkans est utilisée par l’UE pour la sous-traitance du contrôle de ses frontières, au détriment tant de la population locale que des personnes exilées. Sommés de s’ériger en gardes-frontières et en véritables « #hotspots » au service de l’UE, les pays des Balkans sont aujourd’hui le théâtre d’une multitude de violations de droits et de #violences exercées à l’encontre des personnes exilées.

Fruit d’un travail in situ réalisé entre janvier et avril 2021 pour le réseau Migreurop, le présent rapport documente ce processus d’externalisation des frontières européennes dans la région des Balkans. Il s’appuie sur des observations de terrain et plus d’une centaine d’entretiens réalisés avec des personnes exilées, des représentant·e·s d’ONG locales et internationales, des chercheurs et des chercheuses, des militant·e·s, des avocat·e·s, des journalistes, ainsi que des actrices et acteurs institutionnels.

Le rapport se décompose en trois parties. La première examine la manière dont les dirigeant·e·s européen·ne·s instrumentalisent le processus d’adhésion des pays des Balkans à des fins de contrôle migratoire. La deuxième s’intéresse à la transformation de ces pays en véritables « chiens de garde » des frontières de l’UE, en accordant une attention particulière aux pratiques de #refoulements et aux violences comme outils normalisés de gestion des frontières. La troisième partie documente la mise en place de « l’approche hotspot » dans la région.

▻https://migreurop.org/article3069.html
#externalisation #asile #migrations #réfugiés #frontières #Balkans #route_des_Balkans #contrôles_frontaliers #zone_tampon #pays_tiers #push-backs #rapport #Migreurop #refoulements #violence

Cost of Australia holding each refugee on Nauru balloons to $4.3m a year

Exclusive: Taxpayer cost of offshore processing regime revealed as government remains silent on where $400m went.

The cost to Australian taxpayers to hold a single refugee on Nauru has escalated tenfold to more than $350,000 every month – or $4.3m a year – as the government refuses to reveal where nearly $400m spent on offshore processing on the island has gone.

Australia currently pays about $40m a month to run its offshore processing regime on Nauru, an amount almost identical to 2016 when there were nearly 10 times as many people held on the island.

No refugees and asylum seekers have been sent to Nauru since 2014, and with numbers of refugees held there dwindling – through resettlement to the US, transfer to Australia for acute medical care, abandonment of a protection claim, or death – the cost to Australia to hold each person has increased dramatically.

In May 2016, Australia held 1,193 people on Nauru at a cost of $45,347 a month per person – about $1,460 a day or $534,000 a year.

By August 2021, the number of asylum seekers and refugees held on the island had fallen nearly tenfold, but the costs of running the offshore program remained broadly static. In that month, there were 107 refugees and asylum seekers on Nauru at a cost to taxpayers of $464,486 a month for each person, or more than $15,000 a day.

The average monthly cost in 2021 is $358,646 for every refugee and asylum seeker held on the island, equal to $4.3m per person each year, a Guardian Australia analysis of government figures provided to the Senate shows.

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The majority – 78 of those people – are refugees whose claims for protection have been formally recognised and Australia is legally obliged to protect them. Others are still awaiting a final refugee status determination, or have had their claim rejected.

There are no women, children or family groups remaining among those held by Australia on Nauru. There are only single men, meaning services around maternal health, infant healthcare and childhood education are no longer being provided.

A spokesperson for the Department of Home Affairs told the Guardian that “regional processing in Nauru remains a key pillar of Operation Sovereign Borders”.

“Costs associated with regional processing have saved lives at sea, by providing ongoing deterrence against illegal maritime people smuggling.”

But Labor argues Australia’s spending on Nauru is opaque.

The government has declined to tell the Senate to whom it has paid nearly $400m to help run the regime on Nauru.

Responses to Senate questions on notice show that from November 2017 to January 2021, the Australian government spent more than $1.67bn on “garrison and welfare” for those held on the island.

The vast majority of that – nearly $1.3bn – was paid to its three “primary entities”: construction and facilities management firm Canstruct International; healthcare provider International Health and Medical Services (IHMS); and the government of Nauru.

Canstruct was paid a little over $1bn to provide garrison and welfare services; IHMS received $138.3m to provide healthcare; and the Nauru government was paid $73.3m.

The total cost to the three “primary entities” identified by the department was $1,272,681,862.

But Australia’s total payments for garrison and welfare services on Nauru were $1,671,500,000, according to government figures, with an additional $398,818,138 paid to other individuals, organisations, or governments.

Under questioning from Labor in the Senate, the department said it would not provide details on to whom that additional money was paid.

“Payment data subsequently recorded in the Department’s Financial Management Information System is not disaggregated … and the manual intervention required to identify this level of detail constitutes an unreasonable diversion of resources.”

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Senator Kristina Keneally, the shadow minister for home affairs, said Scott Morrison’s government had serious questions to answer over the escalating costs of offshore processing on Nauru.

“This is yet another example of Mr Morrison using taxpayers money as if it was Liberal Party money.”

Keneally said the government’s response to the Senate that payments could not be detailed publicly was inadequate, arguing the Australian people “absolutely have a right to know how it has been spent”.

“We are not talking about a missing tin of petty cash. This is $400m. Where did it go? Has it gone into the pockets of Liberal mates? Has it been lost?

“The Morrison government either doesn’t know what has happened to this $400m or it doesn’t want Australians to know.”

The Department of Home Affairs told the Guardian “the questions on notice seek different types of information, and as such are not directly comparable”.

“The figures provided in response to various questions reflect payments made to suppliers on a cash basis with total expenditure accounted for on an accrual basis. As a result, the figures will not neatly total or realise month-to-month consistency.”

The Guardian understands the “total” costs figure for Nauru captures all expenses related to regional processing there, including ancillary costs such as government administration, transport, road maintenance, utilities, staff accommodation, land leases, staffing costs and legal services.
Canstruct contract scrutinised

Canstruct’s large and growing contract – now worth nearly $1.6bn – to run the Nauru facility has attracted particular scrutiny.

The Brisbane company, which is a Liberal party donor, helped build the Nauru detention centre, and started running the offshore regime on the island in late 2017.

The original contract awarded to Canstruct for services on Nauru was worth just $8m in October 2017. But this was amended almost immediately, increased by 4,500% to $385m just a month after being signed.

Since then, seven further amendments have escalated the cost to taxpayers to $1,598,230,689 a total increase of more than 19,300%, government tender documents show.

The eighth and latest amendment to the contract was published this month, with another $179m to continue operating on the island until the end of 2021.

The contract was awarded under limited tender, with “no submissions or value for money submissions received”, government tender documents show.

Canstruct, or individuals or entities associated with it, has made at least 11 donations to the Coalition since 2017, according to state electoral disclosures. The company has previously strenuously denied any link between political donations and the awarding of any contracts.

Asked about Canstruct’s Nauru operations, a spokesperson for the company said: “Unfortunately we are unable to comment on these matters. Please direct any questions to the federal government.”

In September, the Australian government signed an agreement with the government of Nauru for an “enduring” offshore processing regime on the island.

Australia’s offshore processing arrangement with Papua New Guinea will end on 31 December this year. In 2017, Australia’s detention centre on PNG’s Manus Island was ruled unconstitutional and the detention of people there illegal. Australia was required to pay more than $70m in compensation.

▻https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/nov/07/cost-of-australia-holding-each-refugee-on-nauru-balloons-to-43m-a-year?
#externalisation #coût #prix #business #asile #migrations #réfugiés #Nauru #Australie #Pacific_solution

ping @karine4 @isskein

L’industrie de la #sécurité tire profit de la crise climatique

Les pays riches, pires contributeurs au #changement_climatique, dépensent bien plus d’argent à renforcer leurs #frontières qu’à contribuer au #développement des pays pauvres : c’est ce qu’a étudié un rapport du Transnational Institute. Les habitants de ces pays sont pourtant les premières victimes de l’alliance occidentale entre business du #pétrole et de la sécurité.

Le changement climatique est bon pour le #business. Du moins celui de la sécurité. C’est ce que démontre un #rapport publié ce lundi 25 octobre par l’organisation de recherche et de plaidoyer Transnational Institute. Intitulé « un mur contre le climat », il démontre que les pays les plus riches dépensent bien plus pour renforcer leurs frontières contre les migrants que pour aider les pays pauvres, d’où ils viennent, à affronter la crise climatique.

Il décortique les #dépenses, dans ces deux domaines, des sept pays riches historiquement les plus émetteurs de gaz à effet de serre que sont les États-Unis, l’Allemagne, la France, le Japon, l’Australie, le Royaume-Uni et le Canada. Ils sont à eux sept responsables de 48 % des émissions de gaz à effet de serre dans le monde. Le Brésil, la Chine et la Russie, qui font partie des dix plus gros émetteurs aujourd’hui, ne sont pas inclus car, s’étant enrichis beaucoup plus récemment, ils ne sont pas considérés comme des responsables historiques.

2,3 fois plus de dollars pour repousser les migrants que pour le climat

Pour les États étudiés, les auteurs ont regardé leur contribution au « #financement_climatique » : prévu par les négociations internationales sur le climat, il s’agit de fonds que les pays riches s’engagent à verser aux pays dits en développement pour les aider à faire face à la crise climatique. Ils ont ensuite traqué les sommes allouées par chaque pays aux contrôles frontaliers et migratoires. Résultat : entre 2013 et 2018, ces sept pays ont en moyenne dépensé chaque année au moins 2,3 fois plus pour repousser les migrants (33,1 milliards de dollars) que pour contribuer au financement climatique (14,4 milliards de dollars). Et encore, les auteurs du rapport signalent que les pays riches ont tendance à surestimer les sommes allouées au financement climatique.

Une disproportion encore plus criante quand on regarde en détail. Le Canada a dépensé 15 fois plus, l’Australie 13,5 fois plus, les États-Unis 10,9 fois plus. À noter que ces derniers sont en valeur absolue les plus dépensiers, ils ont à eux seuls mis 19,6 milliards dans la sécurité de leurs frontières sur la période, soit 59 % de la somme totale allouée par les sept pays réunis.

https://reporterre.net/IMG/jpg/emissions-militarisation-climat.jpg

Le cas des pays européens est moins explicite. La France pourrait avoir l’air de bon élève. A priori, elle dépense moins dans les contrôles aux frontières (1 milliard) que dans le financement climatique (1,6 milliard). Idem pour l’Allemagne (3,4 milliards dans la militarisation des frontières contre 4,4 milliards dans le financement climatique). Mais ce serait oublier qu’une grande partie des dépenses sécuritaires est déportée au niveau de l’Union européenne et de l’agence de contrôle des frontières Frontex. Celle-ci a vu son budget exploser, avec une augmentation de 2 763 % entre 2006 et 2021.

Cet argent est très concrètement dépensé dans diverses #technologies — #caméras, #drones, systèmes d’#identification_biométriques, et dans l’embauche de #gardes-frontières et de #gardes-côtes. « Il y a aussi une #externalisation, avec par exemple l’Union européenne qui conclue des accords avec les pays d’Afrique du Nord et des régimes totalitaires, pour qu’ils empêchent les migrants d’arriver jusqu’à leurs frontières », décrit Nick Buxton, un des auteurs du rapport interrogé par Reporterre. Ces partenariats contribuent à la multiplication des murs anti-migrants partout dans le monde. « La plupart des grands constructeurs de murs du monde ont reçu une aide des programmes d’externalisation de l’Union européenne ou des États-Unis (ou des deux, dans le cas de la Jordanie, du Maroc et de la Turquie) », pointe le rapport.

L’édification de ces murs empêche-t-elle les pays riches de voir le drame qui se déroule derrière ? À travers divers exemples, les auteurs tentent de montrer l’injustice de la situation : en Somalie, à la suite d’une catastrophe climatique en 2020, un million de personnes ont dû se déplacer. Pourtant, le pays n’est responsable que « de 0,00027 % du total des émissions depuis 1850. » Au Guatemala, l’ouragan Eta ainsi que les inondations fin 2020 ont provoqué le déplacement de 339 000 personnes. Le pays « a été responsable de seulement 0,026 % des émissions de gaz à effet de serre ». Nombre de ces migrants Guatémaltèques tentent désormais d’atteindre les États-Unis, responsables à eux seuls de 30,1 % des émissions depuis 1850.

Pourtant, parmi les pays riches, « les stratégies nationales de #sécurité_climatique, depuis le début des années 2000, ont massivement présenté les migrants comme des « menaces » et non comme les victimes d’une injustice », indique la synthèse du rapport. Le 11 septembre 2001, en particulier, a accéléré la tendance. Qui s’est maintenue : les budgets de militarisation des frontières ont augmenté de 29 % entre 2013 et 2018. Une orientation politique mais aussi financière, donc, saluée par l’industrie de la sécurité et des frontières.
Taux de croissance annuel : 5,8 %

« Des prévisions de 2019 de ResearchAndMarkets.com annonçaient que le marché de la sécurité intérieure des États allait passer de 431 milliards de dollars en 2018 à 606 milliards en 2024, avec un taux de croissance annuel de 5,8 % », indique le rapport. Une des raisons majeures invoquée étant « l’augmentation des catastrophes naturelles liées au changement climatique ». Il cite également la sixième entreprise mondiale en termes de vente de matériel militaire, Raytheon. Pour elle, l’augmentation de la demande pour ses « produits et services militaires […] est le résultat du changement climatique ».

https://reporterre.net/IMG/jpg/migrantsvontaugmenter.jpg

Transnational Institute, qui travaille sur cette industrie depuis un certain temps, a ainsi calculé qu’aux États-Unis, entre 2008 et 2020, les administrations de l’immigration et des frontières « ont passé plus de 105 000 contrats d’une valeur de 55 milliards de dollars avec des entreprises privées. » Si le mur de Trump a défrayé la chronique, « Biden n’est pas mieux », avertit Nick Buxton. « Pour financer sa campagne, il a reçu plus d’argent de l’industrie de la sécurité des frontières que Trump. »

L’Union européenne aussi a droit à son lobbying. « Ces entreprises sont présentes dans des groupes de travail de haut niveau, avec des officiels de l’UE. Ils se rencontrent aussi dans les salons comme celui de Milipol », décrit Nick Buxton.

#Pétrole et sécurité partagent « le même intérêt à ne pas lutter contre le changement climatique »

Le rapport souligne également les liens de cette industrie de la sécurité avec celle du pétrole. En résumé, il décrit comment les majors du pétrole sécurisent leurs installations en faisant appel aux géants de la sécurité. Mais il souligne aussi que les conseils d’administration des entreprises des deux secteurs ont beaucoup de membres en commun. Des liens concrets qui illustrent, selon Nick Buxton, le fait que « ces deux secteurs ont le même intérêt à ne pas lutter contre le changement climatique. L’industrie pétrolière car cela va à l’encontre de son business model. L’industrie de la sécurité car l’instabilité provoquée par la crise climatique lui apporte des bénéfices. »

Autant d’argent dépensé à protéger les énergies fossiles et à refouler les migrants, qui « ne fait que maintenir et générer d’immenses souffrances inutiles » dénonce le rapport. Les pays riches avaient promis d’atteindre 100 milliards de financements climatiques annuels pour les pays en développement d’ici 2020. En 2019, ils n’en étaient qu’à 79,6 milliards selon l’OCDE. Et encore, ce chiffre est très surévalué, estime l’ONG Oxfam, qui en déduisant les prêts et les surévaluations aboutit à environ trois fois moins. C’est cette estimation que les experts du Transnational Institute ont adoptée.

« Il est évident que les pays les plus riches n’assument pas du tout leur responsabilité dans la crise climatique », conclut donc le rapport. Il prône des investissements dans la lutte contre le changement climatique, et des aides pour que les pays les plus pauvres puissent gérer dignement les populations contraintes de se déplacer. À l’inverse, le choix de la militarisation est « une stratégie vouée à l’échec, même du point de vue de l’intérêt personnel des pays les plus riches, car elle accélère les processus d’instabilité et de migration induite par le climat dont ils s’alarment. »

►https://reporterre.net/L-industrie-de-la-securite-tire-profit-de-la-crise-climatique

#complexe_militaro-industriel #climat

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déjà signalé ici par @kassem
▻https://seenthis.net/messages/934692

Revealed: EU migration plans for Morocco, Libya and others

The European Commission is working on plans to strengthen relations with so-called “#partner_countries”, as part of its pact on migration and asylum.

Leaked commission documents dated earlier this month outline draft proposals on Afghanistan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia - all available for download below.

The document on Afghanistan (▻https://s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/euobs-media/7a84a36c8daf383092286a09308ac34b.docx) offers immediate and short-term plans, including sending a possible Frontex EU-border guard agent to neighbouring Pakistan to deal with the war-torn country.

“Frontex does not currently implement border-related activities in Afghanistan,” it says, noting negotiations on a working arrangement with the country are not foreseen.

Talks are also underway to allocate around €1bn for Afghanistan under the new €79.5bn EU purse known as the #Neighbourhood_and_Development_Cooperation_Instrument.

But it also says that “work to take this forward through the country’s multi-annual indicative programme 2021-2027 are now on hold.”

Another €79m is also in the pipeline for 2022 to deal with the “regional dimension of Afghan displacement”, notes the document.

On Bosnia and Herzegovina, the EU is planning to discuss its migration policy and enlargement prospects in November and December, with possible funding measures on top.

“Bosnia and Herzegovina is called upon to adopt sectoral countrywide strategies whose implementation may receive EU financial support,” it notes.

On Libya, it says it wants to build a rights-based migration and asylum system.

The country has already been given some €455m in EU funds. Over half has gone to the protection of migrants and third to “community stabilisation” and border management, it says.

Now it wants to provide Libya “with a flexible source of funding to respond to changing needs and routes.”

This includes muscling up the AU-EU-UN Taskforce, set up to rescue stranded migrants and refugees in Libya, before the end of the year.

It also wants to hold a migration dialogue with Libya after the mid-December presidential elections.

On Morocco, it wants Rabat to strengthen border controls, search and rescue operations, and dismantle smuggling networks.

Plans are also underway for “#structured_cooperation” with the Frontex and Moroccan authorities. A working arrangement with the EU’s police agency, Europol, is also envisaged.

As for money, the commission says a draft budget for 2021-27 is being prepared and is likely to focus on root causes of migration among other things. It also notes Morocco will be able to draw on another fund, set up for other neighbouring countries, to curb migration.

On Tunisia, it notes some €30m of EU funds has gone to shoring up its coast guard. “A €10m top-up is being finalised,” it notes.

The objective, it says, is to ensure Tunisian migration strategy and asylum law are finalised and approved.

“Frontex does not currently implement border-related activities in Tunisia and Tunisian authorities are reluctant to cooperate with it,” it states.

Internal EU highlights

They also spell out bilateral initiatives among EU states.

Among the highlights:

On Tunisia, Austria, Belgium and Germany want better cooperation when it comes to sending unwanted Tunisians back home.

“[Austria] is generally not satisfied by the cooperation with Tunisia, due to issues related to identification,” says Austria.

On Libya, the Czech Republic is providing support to the Libyan Coast Guard but does not go into detail.

But along with the Visegrad 4 countries (Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Czech Republic), they are now planning more financial support on Libyan border management.

Italy says it will deliver two “second-hand” rubber boats to the Libyan Coast Guard and port security, while Malta is mulling options on providing expertise on reception facilities.

“A technical team has already visited Tripoli to assess the vessels available to the Libyan coastguard,” says Malta.

In Morocco, Germany is training authorities on document fraud-detection and air security.

Spain is carrying out “infrastructure reforms” on its north Moroccan enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla, including surveillance.

Madrid is also boosting the exchange of information and police collaboration with Morocco to fight migrant smuggling, it says.

On Afghanistan, Bulgaria helped train police from Iraq and Afghanistan with an aim to dismantle migrant smuggling.

Denmark provided finance for return and reintegration programmes. Estonia has suspended all bilateral projects in Afghanistan, given the current crisis.

Italy carried out a €900,000 project to help Afghan refugees in Iran.

Slovenia says it currently has two Afghans on scholarships, studying civil engineering.

It also deployed one police officer to Afghanistan for six months to train and educate local police, it says.

▻https://euobserver.com/migration/153360

#commission_européenne #EU #UE #Maroc #externalisation #Frontex #asile #migrations #réfugiés #Libye #pacte #Tunisie #Bosnie #Bosnie-Herzégovine #frontière #Pakistan
#Instrument_de_voisinage_de_coopération_au_développement_et_de_coopération_internationale

Le #Danemark offre des #barbelés coupants à la #Lituanie pour sa clôture antimigrants

https://i.imgur.com/sWeGRSM.jpg

A Copenhague, le gouvernement social-démocrate, qui s’est fait élire en 2019 sur la promesse d’une politique migratoire ultrarestrictive, défend la construction de #clôtures aux frontières de l’Europe.

Quinze kilomètres de #fils_barbelés. Voilà le généreux #cadeau du Danemark à la Lituanie : une contribution certes modeste à l’échelle des 500 kilomètres de clôture que l’Etat balte est en train d’installer sur sa frontière avec la #Biélorussie, pour empêcher les migrants d’entrer sur son territoire. Mais une #contribution symbolique, de la part du royaume scandinave, dont la première ministre sociale-démocrate, #Mette_Frederiksen, en poste depuis 2019, s’est fixé comme objectif d’atteindre « zéro demandeur d’asile ».

Le 28 septembre, son ministre de l’immigration, #Mattias_Tesfaye – lui-même fils d’un réfugié éthiopien –, s’est rendu en Lituanie, pour rencontrer la ministre de l’intérieur, #Agne_Bilotaite. Il en a profité pour aller inspecter la clôture. Les barbelés envoyés par le Danemark ne sont pas des fils classiques, mais un modèle spécial, en accordéon, couvert de #lames similaires à celles d’un rasoir, pouvant causer des blessures mortelles.

En 2015, ce sont ces mêmes barbelés que la Hongrie de Viktor Orban avait déployés à la hâte, face à la Serbie : un #mur antimigrants alors fortement décrié en Europe. Six ans plus tard, Mattias Tesfaye a estimé sur la chaîne TV2 que les critiques contre Budapest n’étaient « pas correctes » et que, face à « l’#immigration_incontrôlée », la clôture était une solution « de #bon_sens ». Au passage, le ministre danois a remercié Vilnius de ses efforts pour « protéger les frontières de l’Europe et de l’OTAN ».

Indignation des ONG

Mattias Tesfaye n’en est pas à son premier coup d’éclat. C’est à sa demande que les services de l’immigration ont suspendu les titres de séjour de plusieurs centaines de réfugiés syriens ces derniers mois. Il est aussi à l’origine du projet de loi, voté au Parlement en juin, qui devrait permettre à Copenhague d’externaliser l’asile dans des pays tiers, en dehors de l’Europe – le Rwanda faisant figure de favori.

Au Danemark, son soutien à la construction du mur lituanien a suscité l’indignation des ONG. Amnesty International a accusé le gouvernement danois de faire preuve d’un « déni de la réalité » face à la crise migratoire actuelle. Le quotidien de gauche Politiken a dénoncé, de son côté, le cynisme du Danemark, qui « envoie 15 km de barbelés », quand « les migrants pris au piège meurent dans la forêt ».

Dans les rangs de la majorité de centre gauche, cependant, les opinions divergent. Alors que la Liste de l’unité (rouge et verte) s’est dite « profondément consternée », le parti social-libéral défend le principe d’un mur aux frontières de l’Europe : « Nous ne pouvons pas accueillir tous les gens du Moyen-Orient et d’Afrique qui veulent venir ici », a estimé Andreas Steenberg, un des responsables du parti.

En 2020, le Danemark a reçu 1 515 demandeurs d’asile et 1 017 autres depuis le début de l’année. Ces chiffres ne semblent pas émouvoir Mattias Tesfaye, qui a annoncé que Copenhague allait verser 33 millions de couronnes (4,4 millions d’euros) à la Turquie, pour l’aider à protéger ses frontières.

►https://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2021/10/02/le-danemark-offre-des-barbeles-coupants-a-la-lituanie-pour-sa-cloture-antimi

#cadeau #murs #barrières_frontalière #externalisation #fermeture_des_frontières #murs_frontaliers #barrières_frontalières

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Sur le mur entre la Lituanie et la Biélorussie :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/920493

The Temporary Hosting of Evacuated Afghans in Third Countries : Responsibility Sharing or Externalisation ?

In the days after the Taliban took over Kabul, tens of thousands of people tried to escape Afghanistan through emergency airlift evacuations. Many sought passage to the United States (US), having been associated with the American presence in the country. Between the fall of the Afghan government on 15 August and the end of the US withdrawal on 31 August, tens of thousands of Afghans were able to flee the country among the nearly 130,000 people evacuated on US aircraft.

However, not all of the Afghans landed on US soil. Instead, a range of other countries, with various levels of experience hosting refugees and some with no ties to the conflict in Afghanistan, announced that they would temporarily host evacuated Afghans on behalf of the US. As reported by the US State Department, this list now includes Albania, Bahrain, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, Chile, Ecuador, Guyana, India, Kuwait, Mexico, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Rwanda, Singapore, Uganda, and the United Arab Emirates. In addition, thousands of other Afghans transited or are still in one of the US military bases in the Middle East or in Europe. Altogether, these agreements represent an novel form of international cooperation: the provision of temporary protection in third states at US request, in the context of the largest emergency evacuation since the Kosovo crisis.

While the Biden administration has not made explicit why it asked third countries to provide temporary refuge to evacuees, three main factors can explain this decision. First, these deals have bought the US government some time to run security screenings in these countries, before moving evacuees to US soil. While a number of the evacuated Afghans already applied for the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) or Priority 2 (P-2) programs,[1] the Biden administration initially needed more time to decide on the legal channels for all those who have not completed their application, as well as the at-risk Afghans who are not SIV or P-2 applicants. Lastly, some analysts have pointed that these arrangements with third countries were partly driven by political concerns, with the Administration worried about a public backlash if tens of thousands of Afghans landed on US soil simultaneously and without a thorough security vetting.

This post sets out what we know about the situation of the Afghans who were evacuated to a third country (outside of a US military base), specifically looking at what living conditions, protection, and legal pathways to the US the evacuees have access to. The post finally discuss whether these agreements between the US and third countries should be understood as a form of responsibility sharing or externalisation of international protection.

Temporary hosts

So far, the group of states that have offered temporary protection to evacuated Afghans announced pledges ranging from 450 in Northern Macedonia, 2,000 in Uganda and 5,000 evacuees in Ecuador. But while governments have publicised these targets, there is limited information as to how many Afghans each country has received so far, and how many more people, including family members of evacuees, could be evacuated in the future.

The nature of the agreements between the US and third countries has also been informal so far, mainly publicised through government press releases or media coverage. There are presently no signs of more detailed arrangements, suggesting they were negotiated hastily, with operational details being worked out after public announcement.

At operational level, reception conditions for Afghans upon arrival vary from country to country, with evacuees being hosted in reception centres or ad hoc accommodation, including student housing and hotels. In Albania, for instance, the reception capacity for asylum seekers is limited overall but the government decided to open a separate mechanism to host the rescued Afghans.

The budget and funding for these arrangements are yet to be made public, but the US government is presumably bearing the costs of reception and processing. However, in high-income countries like Canada or where the government is directly coordinating the operation, it remains unclear which state bears the costs for these arrangements.

Finally, and critically, the duration of the arrangements remains unclear. The agreements for the purpose of transit through US military bases made clear that Afghan evacuees should not spend over 10 days in the third countries, including the United Arab Emirates or Germany. In contrast, the information available on the temporary hosting arrangements with third countries shows that these governments have not set a time limit, simply calling it a temporary mechanism. The Albanian government, for example, already shared that it expected the evacuees to stay for at least one year.

Unanswered questions and emerging answers

The procedure for Afghans in these third countries is yet to be clearly outlined, starting with the question of who was (and could be) sent there in the first place. Due to the chaotic situation at Kabul airport before 31 August, it is possible that evacuated Afghans were sent to US bases abroad or third countries more-or-less at random. But it is also likely that people who had already launched a SIV or P-2 application were sent to US military bases to be processed more quickly. Some anecdotal evidence also suggests that the distribution may be based on the occupation of the evacuees in Afghanistan. For instance, the North Macedonian government reported they would host people who previously worked with US-led international forces while the Albanian Prime Minister said they were focusing on Afghans who previously worked for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Second, it remains to be seen what status Afghans will enjoy in these third countries, and the implications for their rights, including reception conditions and freedom of movement. Albania, for instance, reported that it would grant evacuees temporary protection status, Kosovo announced they would get a one-year residence permit and North Macedonia provided them with a three-month visa.

Third, there is limited information as to what will happen to evacuees after screenings in these third countries and how this procedure differs in nature and duration from a screening in the US or at a US military base abroad. It remains unclear, for example, how many of the evacuees in these third countries could benefit from the humanitarian parole scheme announced for 50,000 Afghans on 23 August, that allows access to the US on a temporary humanitarian residence permit. Other legal pathways to the US could be offered to these groups, but it remains to be seen what they would be and how long it would take for these options to materialize.

The third country agreements seem to leave open the possibility that some Afghans could be granted a form of local integration in the host state as refugees or beneficiaries of other forms of international protection. While there has been little indication of such development in the third countries so far, 90 Afghans staying in a US base in Germany have applied for asylum there in the past week.

Ultimately, one of the most pressing questions is what will happen to those evacuees who are ‘screened out’ by the US. The government insists that Afghans who do not pass the security vetting will not be allowed into the US, or may be deported if security concerns arise after their arrival on US soil. However, officials have not specified where these people will be sent.

Of course, the US and third states are bound by the principle of non-refoulement, which prohibits the return of any person to a real risk of torture or other ill treatment at the hands of the Taliban. Some Afghans in third states may receive offers of local integration or an alternative resettlement country, though where they are rejected by the US on security grounds, it is difficult to imagine that any other country would want to assume this responsibility.

Responsibility sharing or externalisation?

The rapid emergence of these temporary protection agreements could be a sign of a new responsibility sharing mechanism for refugees, but it could also constitute another form of externalisation designed to prevent Afghan refugees from accessing US territory and protection. Given that these arrangements grew out of an emergency situation and were primarily agreed upon broad principles, their operationalization in the next few weeks should provide a definitive answer to this question.

Responsibility sharing, on the one hand, is a principle of international refugee law emerging from the preamble to the 1951 Refugee Convention, which provides in part:

the grant of asylum may place unduly heavy burdens on certain countries, and that a satisfactory solution of a problem of which the United Nations has recognized the international scope and nature cannot therefore be achieved without international co-operation

The principle does not form part of the substantive obligations of the Convention, though a UNHCR expert roundtable on the principle recommends that cooperation must ‘enhance refugee protection and prospects for durable solutions’ and ‘must be in line with international refugee and human rights law’. The Global Compact on Refugees, a non-binding agreement passed by the United Nations General Assembly in 2018, has ‘more equitable sharing of the burden and responsibility for hosting and supporting the world’s refugees’ as its primary objective.

Thus, one reading of the third country arrangements for Afghan refugees is as a new form of responsibility sharing, with a varied range of states, often with no prior links to Afghanistan, stepping up to host evacuees as a sign of international solidarity. This might neatly fit into what Durieux labels the ‘rescue paradigm’ as the provision of a safe haven by a collective of states. Many of these countries are from the Global South, with some like Colombia and Uganda already hosting very large refugee populations despite widely underfunded humanitarian and development responses. But even though these arrangements were born to a sense of global responsibility, it remains to be seen how the US will have to show its appreciation and payback.

On the other hand, externalisation describes migration control policies carried out by high-income states outside their borders. Crisp previously defined externalisation as ‘measures taken by states in locations beyond their territorial borders to obstruct, deter or otherwise avert the arrival of refugees.’ UNHCR recently referred to ‘measures preventing asylum-seekers from entering safe territory and claiming international protection, or transfers of asylum-seekers and refugees to other countries without sufficient safeguards.’ While the term ‘externalisation’ does not appear in international refugee law, it has developed into an umbrella concept encompassing migration control measures intended to deter asylum seekers and refugees either extraterritorially or with extraterritorial effects.

Another reading of these arrangements could then place them alongside existing externalisation efforts. Thus, rather than providing evacuees admission into its territory, the US government is using its diplomatic clout to delegate responsibility for Afghans to partner states. This is likely to raise serious challenges as without guarantees that evacuated Afghans will receive protection in the US, they could enter a form of legal limbo, with no status in the third country nor the US, and no possibility to return home.

Conclusions

It is too early to say whether the current US-led temporary protection arrangements for Afghan evacuees in third countries should be considered responsibility sharing, externalisation or even a third policy approach. What is clear is that the US government is still figuring out how these arrangements will be implemented. Ultimately, they will be assessed based on their impact on the rights of Afghans in need of protection, including their reception conditions and freedom of movement in third countries, the duration of their temporary hosting, the scale of admission to the US, and the provision of solutions for those who are not granted passage to the US.

Many thanks to Camille Le Coz for her invaluable help in drafting this piece.

[1] The SIV program grants those who worked with the American government of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) or a successor mission in Afghanistan legal status in the US. On August 2, the US government also announced a broader category, the Priority-2 refugee status, opened to a broader category of applicants such as Afghans who do not qualify for SIV but still worked for the US government or ISAF, Afghans who worked for a US-funded program, and Afghans who were employed by a US-based media organization or non-governmental organization.

▻https://rli.blogs.sas.ac.uk/2021/09/15/the-temporary-hosting-of-evacuated-afghans-in-third-countries-responsibility-sharing-or-externalisation/#es_form_f1-n1

#externalisation #asile #migrations #réfugiés #réfugiés_afghans #transit #pays_de_transit #Afghanistan #évacuation #réinstallation #responsabilité

–—

ajouté à la métaliste des pays qui ont accepté d’accueillir des #réfugiés_afghans sur demande des #Etats-Unis (#USA) et dans l’attente d’une #réinstallation (qui n’arrivera jamais ?)
►https://seenthis.net/messages/928551

Australia signs deal with Nauru to keep asylum seeker detention centre open indefinitely

Australia will continue its policy of offshore processing of asylum seekers indefinitely, with the home affairs minister signing a new agreement with Nauru to maintain “an enduring form” of offshore processing on the island state.Since 2012 – in the second iteration of the policy – all asylum seekers who arrive in Australia by boat seeking protection have faced mandatory indefinite detention and processing offshore.

There are currently about 108 people held by Australia on Nauru as part of its offshore processing regime. Most have been there more than eight years. About 125 people are still held in Papua New Guinea. No one has been sent offshore since 2014.

However, Nauru is Australia’s only remaining offshore detention centre.PNG’s Manus Island centre was forced to shut down after it was found to be unconstitutional by the PNG supreme court in 2016. Australia was forced to compensate those who had been illegally detained there, and they were forcibly moved out, mostly to Port Moresby.

But the Nauru detention facility will remain indefinitely.

In a statement on Friday, home affairs minister #Karen_Andrews said a new #memorandum_of_understanding with Nauru was a “significant step forwards” for both countries.

“Australia’s strong and successful border protection policies under #Operation_Sovereign_Borders remain and there is zero chance of settlement in Australia for anyone who arrives illegally by boat,” she said.“Anyone who attempts an illegal maritime journey to Australia will be turned back, or taken to Nauru for processing. They will never settle in Australia.”Nauru president, #Lionel_Aingimea, said the new agreement created an “enduring form” of offshore processing.

“This takes the regional processing to a new milestone.

“It is enduring in nature, as such the mechanisms are ready to deal with illegal migrants immediately upon their arrival in Nauru from Australia.”Australia’s offshore processing policy and practices have been consistently criticised by the United Nations, human rights groups, and by refugees themselves.

The UN has said Australia’s system violates the convention against tortureand the international criminal court’s prosecutor said indefinite detention offshore was “cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment” and unlawful under international law.

At least 12 people have died in the camps, including being murdered by guards, through medical neglect and by suicide. Psychiatrists sent to work in the camps have described the conditions as “inherently toxic” and akin to “torture”.In 2016, the Nauru files, published by the Guardian, exposed the Nauru detention centre’s own internal reports of systemic violence, rape, sexual abuse, self-harm and child abuse in offshore detention.

The decision to extend offshore processing indefinitely has been met with opprobrium from those who were detained there, and refugee advocates who say it is deliberately damaging to those held.

Myo Win, a human rights activist and Rohingyan refugee from Myanmar, who was formerly detained on Nauru and released in March 2021, said those who remain held within Australia’s regime on Nauru “are just so tired, separated from family, having politics played with their lives, it just makes me so upset”.

“I am out now and I still cannot live my life on a bridging visa and in lockdown, but it is 10 times better than Nauru. They should not be extending anything, they should be stopping offshore processing now. I am really worried about everyone on Nauru right now, they need to be released.

”Jana Favero from the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre said the new memorandum of understanding only extended a “failed system”.“An ‘enduring regional processing capability’ in Nauru means: enduring suffering, enduring family separation, enduring uncertainty, enduring harm and Australia’s enduring shame.

“The #Morrison government must give the men, women and children impacted by the brutality of #offshore processing a safe and permanent home. Prolonging the failure of #offshore_processing on Nauru and #PNG is not only wrong and inhumane but dangerous.”

▻https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/sep/24/australia-signs-deal-with-nauru-to-keep-asylum-seeker-detention-centre-

#Australie #Pacific_solution #asile #migrations #réfugiés #Nauru #externalisation #île #détention #emprisonnement

#Tunisie - #Blocage du #port de #Zarzis en signe de #protestation contre les #garde-côtes_libyens.

Depuis une semaine, les #pêcheurs membres de l’association #Zarzis_Le_Pêcheur - #Al_Bahar (de la ville côtière de Zarzis au sud-est de la Tunisie, à la frontière avec la Libye) bloquent leur #port_de_pêche et lancent un #appel urgent à l’aide aux autorités tunisiennes. Comme expliqué dans un communiqué, les petits pêcheurs demandent aux autorités tunisiennes de les protéger et de les secourir pour ce qu’ils décrivent comme des actes de #piraterie commis par les garde-côtes libyens dans les eaux territoriales et la zone de recherche et de sauvetage (#SAR) de la Tunisie.

Les pêcheurs de Zarzis travaillent dans les #eaux_internationales entre l’Italie, la Tunisie et la Libye. Bien avant les révolutions de 2011, ils secourent en mer les personnes migrantes parties depuis la Libye dans des bateaux surchargés et délabrés. L’#enlèvement de pêcheurs tunisiens (et autres) par divers groupes armés libyens, souvent afin d’obtenir un rançon, n’est pas un phénomène nouveau. Récemment, cependant, les #enlèvements avec armes à feu, les #détournements_de_bateaux et les demandes de #rançon ont augmenté. Depuis cet été, les garde-côtes libyens - notamment de #Zawiya, selon les pêcheurs de Zarzis - opèrent dans la zone de Sar et dans les #eaux_territoriales_tunisiennes pour intercepter et renvoyer les migrants en Libye, comme convenu avec l’Italie et l’Union européenne. Des bateaux des garde-côtes libyens ont également été repérés dans d’autres localités tunisiennes plus au nord, près de la ville de #Mahdia.

À la suite de ces attaques, les pêcheurs hésitent de plus en plus à divulguer leur emplacement pour signaler les bateaux en difficulté, de peur d’être également kidnappés à l’arrivée des soi-disant garde-côtes libyens. Les pêcheurs demandent l’aide des ONG pour porter secours en Méditerranée et la protection de l’Etat tunisien. Nous publions ci-dessous le communiqué de l’Association Zarzis Le Pêcheur - Al Bahar, traduit par Issameddinn Gammoudi et Valentina Zagaria.

Pêcheurs de Zarzis : le secteur de la pêche est en train de mourir à cause d’un #accord_international injuste et de l’absence d’une politique nationale

Les pêcheurs de Zarzis souffrent constamment, non seulement en raison de l’insuffisance des infrastructures portuaires, de la faiblesse de l’assistance, des répercussions de la situation politique dans les pays voisins, de la dégradation de l’environnement et de son impact sur la vie marine, mais aussi en raison des récentes opérations de piraterie et des #menaces armées contre les pêcheurs tunisiens dans les #eaux_territoriales_tunisiennes, commises par des hommes armés se réclamant des garde-côtes libyens. Ces pratiques sont devenues fréquentes, notamment l’enlèvement de personnes, la saisie illégale de bateaux et la négociation de rançons.
En tant qu’association qui défend les intérêts professionnels légitimes et communs des pêcheurs, nous lançons un appel aux autorités, sous la direction de la Présidence de la République, pour qu’elles interviennent d’urgence et résolvent cette crise qui non seulement menace la continuité de la pêche mais s’est transformée en une violation de la souveraineté nationale :

– Nous considérons les structures du ministère de l’agriculture, du ministère des affaires étrangères, du ministère de la défense et de la présidence du gouvernement pour responsables de la situation catastrophique produite par l’accord signé entre l’Union européenne, Malte, la Tunisie et la Libye. Nous considérons également que cet accord constitue une violation de la souveraineté nationale de l’État tunisien sur son territoire maritime, qui a imposé des restrictions injustes aux pêcheurs tunisiens, contrairement à leurs homologues des pays voisins.
– Nous demandons à la marine tunisienne et à la garde maritime nationale tunisienne de jouer leur rôle en protégeant les navires de pêche tunisiens qui ont également été attaqués dans les eaux territoriales tunisiennes par des groupes se réclamant des garde-côtes libyens.
– Nous considérons les structures étatiques en charge du contrôle de la pêche aveugle et interdite responsables de la faible rentabilité et exigeons le respect du droit à une vie digne des pêcheurs tunisiens du sud-est du pays.
– Nous appelons à une action urgente de toutes les autorités concernées pour protéger les bateaux tunisiens et les marins tunisiens dans le territoire maritime tunisien, une protection qui devrait être la composante la plus fondamentale de l’autorité de l’État sur son territoire.

La crise mondiale et ses répercussions s’ajoutent à toutes ces circonstances, qui ont contribué à la détérioration de l’activité de pêche dans la région et nous obligent à lancer un appel à l’aide pour tenter de préserver la durabilité du secteur à Zarzis et dans tout le sud-est du pays.

Association Zarzis Le Pêcheur - Al Bahar pour le développement et l’environnement
Slaheddine Mcharek, Président

Version originale en italien :
▻https://www.globalproject.info/it/mondi/tunisia-blocco-del-porto-di-zarzis-in-protesta-contro-la-guardia-costiera-libica/23667

–-> traduction reçu via la mailing-list Migreurop, le 15.09.2021

#migrations #asile #réfugiés #externalisation #frontières #Italie #UE #EU #contrôles_frontaliers

ping @rhoumour @isskein @_kg_

Why these detained Egyptian citizens in #Tripoli are being deported back to #Egypt wearing @GDFGuardia di Finanza (#Italy Customs Police) uniforms ?

https://i.imgur.com/o9pEcyK.png

►https://www.facebook.com/moi.gov.ly/posts/4313991792030813

Images postées sur FB sur le site du Ministère de l’intérieur libyen le 12 septembre à 19h10 :

https://i.imgur.com/1CtVJbW.png

#renvois #expulsions #Libye #Egypte #réfugiés_égyptiens #guardia_di_finanza #Italie #externalisation #asile #migrations #réfugiés

ping @isskein

#métaliste des pays qui ont accepté d’accueillir des #réfugiés_afghans sur demande des #Etats-Unis (#USA) et dans l’attente d’une #réinstallation (qui n’arrivera jamais ?)

#réfugiés #asile #migrations #transit #pays_de_transit #externalisation #Afghanistan

Deux décisions qui donnent pouvoir à #Frontex pour négocier des #accords_de_travail avec le #Niger (parmi d’autres pays hors UE) et avec #Eucap_Sahel au Niger (ainsi qu’en Libye) :

1. Management Board Decision 36/2021 authorising the Executive Director to negotiate working arrangements with selected third countries (2021) :
▻https://frontex.europa.eu/assets/Key_Documents/MB_Decision/2021/MB_Decision_36_2021_authorising_the_ED_to_negotiate_working_arrangeme

2. Management Board Decision 37/2021 authorising the Executive Director to negotiate working arrangements with selected EU entities (2021) :
▻https://frontex.europa.eu/assets/Key_Documents/MB_Decision/2021/MB_Decision_37_2021_authorising_the_ED_to_negotiate_working_arrangeme

#externalisation #asile #migrations #réfugiés #frontières

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ajouté à la métaliste sur l’externalisation des frontières :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/731749
et plus précisément ici :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/731749#message765325

ping @isskein @karine4 @rhoumour @_kg_

UK plans #offshore_asylum_centres in other countries for Afghans

Defence secretary says processing #hubs will be used for those Britain has ‘an obligation to’.

Britain plans to establish offshore asylum centres for Afghan refugees in countries such as Pakistan and Turkey, as ministers admit that the UK will not be able to rescue those eligible for resettlement before troops leave Kabul.

The defence secretary, Ben Wallace, said in a newspaper article on Sunday that the UK planned to establish a series of #processing_hubs across the region outside Afghanistan, for Afghans it had “an obligation to”.

At least 1,429 Afghans have been evacuated from Kabul since last Friday, as part of the #Arap_relocation_scheme designed to help interpreters and others who have helped the British during their 20 years in Afghanistan.

But it is estimated that a similar number – or more – remain in the country. The emergency airlift was continuing on Sunday, with RAF flights operating despite a crush at the airport gates as desperate Afghans try to flee.

Nato believes 20 people have died around the airport in the last week, but Britain’s armed forces minister, James Heappey, said the flow outside the airport had improved because the Taliban were “marshalling people into separate queues for the US evacuation and the UK evacuation”.

A total of 1,721 people – Britons, Afghans and people from allied countries – had been evacuated from Kabul on eight flights in the past 24 hours, Heappey said, with the RAF receiving help from its Australian counterpart in getting people to safety.

But British officials already acknowledge that it is virtually impossible to evacuate people coming from outside Kabul, although Afghans with a claim have told charity workers they would risk crossing the country if they knew they had a flight.

The new proposal was born out of the emergency, Wallace said, in an article in the Mail on Sunday. “The [Arap] scheme is not time-limited. We shall stand by our obligations and are investigating now how to process people from third countries and refugee camps,” he wrote.

However, there were signs that the asylum plan had not been very far developed on Sunday night, when Turkey said it had not been approached and would reject any approach that was made.

The names of countries had been briefed out by UK officials as examples of where processing centres might be established.

A scheme to establish an offshore immigration centre was included as part of the Home Office’s nationality and borders bill, published in the early summer, before the western-backed government in Afghanistan collapsed.

It was controversial because the intention was to allow the UK to send people to a third country to allow their claims to be processed. Officials had begun talks with Denmark about creating a processing centre in Africa – but how it will link together to the emergency centres is unclear.

Britain has also agreed to take 20,000 Afghan refugees in a separate scheme announced on Tuesday, 5,000 of which will be in the first year. Priority will be given to groups who are most at risk of human rights abuses, such as women, girls and those from religious minorities.

Ministers are also debating how to respond to the Taliban, with the home secretary, Priti Patel, understood to be exploring with security officials whether they should be proscribed as a terrorist organisation alongside the likes of Isis.

But the prime minister, Boris Johnson, and other government departments have been holding out the possibility of recognising the Taliban government in Kabul, arguing the regime should be judged by “actions not words”.

▻https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/aug/22/uk-plans-offshore-asylum-centres-in-pakistan-and-turkey-for-afghans

#réfugiés_afghans #asile #migrations #réfugiés #externalisation #UK #Angleterre #Pakistan #Turquie #procédure_d'asile #réinstallation #interprètes #interprètes_afghans #évacuation

Comme dit l’article :

A scheme to establish an offshore immigration centre was included as part of the Home Office’s nationality and borders bill, published in the early summer, before the western-backed government in Afghanistan collapsed.

–-> voir ici le fil de discussion sur ce sujet (qui concerne le Royaume-Uni et le Danemark) :
#Priti_Patel ’opens talks with Denmark to open new centre in AFRICA to process asylum seekers who want to come to UK’
►https://seenthis.net/messages/918427

–—

Pour rappel, les #USA ont apparemment signé un accord avec 4 pays pour un accueil temporaire (?) des réfugiés afghans, en attente d’un visa états-uniens : #Albanie, #Kosovo, #Macédoine_du_Nord et #Ouganda :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/926161

ping @isskein @karine4 @_kg_

Albania, Kosovo say ready to temporarily house Afghan refugees

Albania and Kosovohave accepted a U.S. request to temporarily take in Afghan refugees seeking visas to enter the United States, the country two countries said on Sunday.

In Tirana, Prime Minister Edi Rama Rama said U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration had asked fellow NATO member Albania to assess whether it could serve as a transit country for a number of Afghan refugees whose final destination is the United States.

“We will not say ’No’, not just because our great allies ask us to, but because we are Albania,” Rama said on Facebook.

Sources had told Reuters that Biden’s administration had held discussions with such countries as Kosovo and Albania about protecting U.S.-affiliated Afghans from Taliban reprisals until they completed the process of approval of their U.S. visas.

In Kosovo, President Vjosa Osmani said the government had been in contact with the U.S. authorities about housing Afghan refugees since mid-July.

“Without any hesitation and ... conditioning I gave my consent to that humanitarian operation,” Osmani said on her Facebook account.

Osmani said Afghan refugees would be vetted by the U.S. security authorities, and added they would stay in Kosovo until their documentation for U.S. immigration visas was arranged.

Hundreds of U.S. troops are still stationed in Kosovo as peacekeepers more than two decades after the 1998-99 war with the then-Yugoslav security forces.

▻https://www.reuters.com/world/albania-ready-temporarily-house-afghan-refugees-pm-rama-says-2021-08-15

#Albanie #Kosovo #réfugiés_afghans #anti-chambre #asile #migrations #réfugiés #réinstallation #dans_l'attente_d'un_visa (qui probablement n’arrivera pas?) #externalisation #USA #Etats-Unis #transit

ping @isskein @karine4

Mediterranean carcerality and acts of escape

In recent years, migrants seeking refuge in Europe have faced capture and containment in the Mediterranean – the result of experimentation by EU institutions and member states.

About two years ago, in June 2019, a group of 75 people found themselves stranded in the central Mediterranean Sea. The migrant group had tried to escape from Libya in order to reach Europe but was adrift at sea after running out of fuel. Monitored by European aerial assets, they saw a vessel on the horizon slowly moving toward them. When they were eventually rescued by the Maridive 601, an offshore supply vessel, they did not know that it would become their floating prison for nearly three weeks. Malta and Italy refused to allocate a port of safety in Europe, and, at first, the Tunisian authorities were equally unwilling to allow them to land.

Over 19 days, the supply vessel turned from a floating refuge into an offshore carceral space in which the situation for the rescued deteriorated over time. Food and water were scarce, untreated injuries worsened, scabies spread, as did the desperation on board. The 75 people, among them 64 Bangladeshi migrants and dozens of minors, staged a protest on board, chanting: “We don’t need food, we don’t want to stay here, we want to go to Europe.”

Reaching Europe, however, seemed increasingly unlikely, with Italy and Malta rejecting any responsibility for their disembarkation. Instead, the Tunisian authorities, the Bangladeshi embassy, and the #International_Organisation_for_Migration (#IOM) arranged not only their landing in Tunisia, but also the removal of most of them to their countries of origin. Shortly after disembarkation in the harbour of Zarzis, dozens of the migrants were taken to the runways of Tunis airport and flown out.

In a recently published article in the journal Political Geography, I have traced the story of this particular migrant group and their zig-zagging trajectories that led many from remote Bangladeshi villages, via Dubai, Istanbul or Alexandria, to Libya, and eventually onto a supply vessel off the Tunisian coast. Although their situation was certainly unique, it also exemplified the ways in which the Mediterranean has turned into a ‘carceral seascape’, a space where people precariously on the move are to be captured and contained in order to prevent them from reaching European shores.

While forms of migrant capture and containment have, of course, a much longer history in the European context, the past ten years have seen particularly dramatic transformations in the central Mediterranean Sea. When the Arab Uprisings ‘re-opened’ this maritime corridor in and after 2011, crossings started to increase significantly – about 156,000 people crossed to Europe on average every year between 2014 and 2017. Since then, crossings have dropped sharply. The annual average between 2018 and 2020 was around 25,000 people – a figure resembling annual arrivals in the period before the Arab Uprisings.

One significant reason for this steep decrease in arrivals is the refoulement industry that EU institutions and member states have created, together with third-country allies. The capture of people seeking to escape to Europe has become a cruel trade, of which a range of actors profit. Although ‘refouling’ people on the move – thus returning them to places where they are at risk of facing torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment – violates international human rights laws and refugee conventions, these practices have become systemic and largely normalised, not least as the COVID pandemic has come to serve as a suitable justification to deter potential ‘Corona-spreaders’ and keep them contained elsewhere.

That migrants face capture and containment in the Mediterranean is the result of years of experimentation on part of EU institutions and member states. Especially since 2018, Europe has largely withdrawn maritime assets from the deadliest areas but reinforced its aerial presence instead, including through the recent deployment of drones. In this way, European assets do not face the ‘risk’ of being forced into rescue operations any longer but can still monitor the sea from above and guide North African, in particular Libyan, speed boats to chase after escaping migrant boats. In consequence, tens of thousands have faced violent returns to places they sought to flee from.

Just in 2021 alone, about 16,000 people have been caught at sea and forcibly returned to Libya in this way, already more than in the whole of 2020. In mid-June, a ‘push-back by proxy’ occurred, when the merchant vessel Vos Triton handed over 170 migrants to a Libyan coastguard vessel that then returned them to Tripoli, where they were imprisoned in a camp known for its horrendous conditions.

The refoulment industry, and Mediterranean carcerality more generally, are underpinned by a constant flow of finances, technologies, equipment, discourses, and know-how, which entangles European and Libyan actors to a degree that it might make more sense to think of them as a collective Euro-Libyan border force.

To legitimise war-torn and politically divided Libya as a ‘competent’ sovereign actor, able to govern the maritime expanse outside its territorial waters, the European Commission funded, and the Italian coastguard implemented, a feasibility study in 2017 to assess “the Libyan capacity in the area of Search and Rescue” (SAR). Shortly after, the Libyan ‘unity government’ declared its extensive Libyan SAR zone, a zone over which it would hold ‘geographical competence’. When the Libyan authorities briefly suspended the establishment of its SAR zone, given its inability to operate a Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC), an Italian navy vessel was stationed within Tripoli harbour, carrying out the functions of the Libyan MRCC.

Since 2017, €57.2m from the EU Trust Fund for Africa has funded Libya’s ‘integrated border management’, on top of which hundreds of millions of euros were transferred by EU member states to Libyan authorities through bilateral agreements. Besides such financial support, EU member states have donated speed boats and surveillance technologies to control the Libyan SAR zone while officers from EU military project Operation Sophia and from European Border Agency Frontex have repeatedly provided training to the Libyan coastguards. When out to search for escaping migrants, the Libyan speed boats have relied on Europe’s ‘eyes in the sky’, the aerial assets of Frontex and EU member states. Migrant sightings from the sky would then be relayed to the Libyan assets at sea, also via WhatsApp chats in which Frontex personnel and Libyan officers exchange.

Thinking of the Mediterranean as a carceral space highlights these myriad Euro-Libyan entanglements that often take place with impunity and little public scrutiny. It also shows how maritime carcerality is “often underscored by mobilities”. Indeed, systematic forms of migrant capture depend on the collaboration of a range of mobile actors at sea, on land, and in the sky. Despite their incessant movements and the fact that surveillance and interception operations are predominantly characterised as rescue operations, thousands of people have lost their lives at sea over recent years. Many have been left abandoned even in situations where their whereabouts were long known to European and North African authorities, often in cases when migrant boats were already adrift and thus unable to reach Europe on their own accord.

At the same time, even in the violent and carceral Mediterranean Sea, a range of interventions have occurred that have prevented both deaths at sea and the smooth operation of the refoulment industry. NGO rescuers, activists, fishermen and, at times, merchant vessel crews have conducted mass rescues over recent years, despite being harassed, threatened and criminalised by Euro-Libyan authorities at every turn. Through their presence, they have documented and repeatedly ruptured the operations of the Euro-Libyan border force, shedding light on what is meant to remain hidden.

Maybe most importantly, the Mediterranean’s carceral condition has not erased the possibility of migratory acts of escape. Indeed, tactics of border subversion adapt to changing carceral techniques, with many migrant boats seeking to cross the sea without being detected and to reach European coasts autonomously. As the UNHCR notes in reference to the maritime arrival of 34,000 people in Italy and Malta in 2020: “Only approximately 4,500 of those arriving by sea in 2020 had been rescued by authorities or NGOs on the high seas: the others were intercepted by the authorities close to shore or arrived undetected.”

While most of those stuck on the Maridive supply vessel off Tunisia’s coast in 2019 were returned to countries of origin, some tried to cross again and eventually escaped Mediterranean carcerality. Despite Euro-North African attempts to capture and contain them, they moved on stubbornly, and landed their boats in Lampedusa.

▻https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/mediterranean-carcerality-and-acts-escape

#enfermement #Méditerranée #mer_Méditerranée #migrations #asile #réfugiés #frontières #expérimentation #OIM #Tunisie #Zarzis #externalisation #migrerrance #carcéralité #refoulement #push-backs #Libye #Vos_Triton #EU_Trust_Fund_for_Africa #Trust_Fund #carceral_space

via @isskein

UK to block #visas for countries refusing to take back asylum seekers

Bill would give home secretary power to take action against citizens of countries deemed not to be cooperating.

The UK will block visas for visitors from countries the home secretary believes are refusing to cooperate in taking back rejected asylum seekers or offenders.

In proposed legislation published on Tuesday, #Priti_Patel and future home secretaries would have the power to suspend or delay the processing of applications from countries that do no “cooperate with the UK government in relation to the removal from the United Kingdom of nationals of that country who require leave to enter or remain in the United Kingdom but do not have it”.

The clause in the nationality and borders bill also allows for the home secretary to impose additional financial requirements for visa applications – that is, an increase in fees – if countries do not cooperate.

The proposals mirror US legislation that allows officials to withdraw visa routes from countries that refuse to take back undocumented migrants. It is understood that countries such as Iraq, Iran, Eritrea and Sudan are reluctant to cooperate with the UK on such matters.

The change is one of many in the bill, described as “the biggest overhaul of the UK’s asylum system in decades” by Patel, which includes measures such as:

- Asylum seekers deemed to have arrived in the UK illegally will no longer have the same entitlements as those who arrive in the country via legal routes. Even if their claim is successful, they will be granted temporary refugee status and face the prospect of being indefinitely liable for removal.

- Asylum seekers will be able to be removed from the UK while their asylum claim or appeal is pending, which opens the door to offshore asylum processing.

- For those deemed to have arrived illegally, access to benefits and family reunion rights could be limited.

– The appeals and judicial process will be changed to speed up the removal of those whose claims are refused.

- The home secretary will be able to offer protection to vulnerable people in “immediate danger and at risk in their home country” in exceptional circumstances. It is thought this will be used to help a small number of people.

– The system will be made “much harder for people to be granted refugee status based on unsubstantiated claims” and will include “rigorous age assessments” to stop adults pretending to be children. The government is considering the use of bone scanners to determine age.

- Life sentences will be brought in as a maximum penalty for people-smugglers.

- Foreign criminals who breach deportation orders and return to the UK could be jailed for up to five years instead of the current six months.

– A new one-stop legal process is proposed so that asylum, human rights claims and any other protection matters are made and considered together before appeal hearings.

Campaigners have dubbed the proposed legislation the “anti-refugee bill”, claiming it will penalise those who need help the most.

Analysis of Home Office data by the Refugee Council suggests 9,000 people who would be accepted as refugees under current rules – those confirmed to have fled war or persecution following official checks – may no longer be given safety in the UK due to their means of arrival under the changes.

The charity’s chief executive, Enver Solomon, said that for decades people had taken “extraordinary measures to flee oppression”, but had gone on to become “law-abiding citizens playing by the rules and paying their taxes as proud Britons”.

Steve Valdez-Symonds, refugee and migrants rights programme director at Amnesty International UK, branded the bill “legislative vandalism”, claimed it could “fatally undermine the right to asylum” and accused Patel of a “shameful dereliction of duty”, adding: “This reckless and deeply unjust bill is set to bring shame on Britain’s international reputation.”

Sonya Sceats, chief executive of Freedom from Torture, described the plans as “dripping with cruelty” and an “affront to the caring people in this country who want a kinder, fairer approach to refugees”.

More than 250 organisations – including the Refugee Council, the British Red Cross, Freedom from Torture, Refugee Action and Asylum Matters – have joined to form the coalition Together with Refugees to call for a more effective, fair and humane approach to asylum in the UK.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/jul/06/uk-to-block-visas-from-countries-refusing-to-take-back-undocumented-mig

#asile #migrations #réfugiés #chantage #visas #UK #Angleterre

La loi comprend aussi une disposition concernant l’#externalisation des #procédures_d'asile :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/918427

Une des dispositions rappelle la loi de l’#excision_territoriale (#Australie) :

Asylum seekers deemed to have arrived in the UK illegally will no longer have the same entitlements as those who arrive in the country via legal routes. Even if their claim is successful, they will be granted temporary refugee status and face the prospect of being indefinitely liable for removal.

voir :
https://seenthis.net/messages/901628#message901630
►https://seenthis.net/messages/416996
#modèle_australien

#offshore_asylum_processing
#Irak #Iran #Erythrée #Sudan #réfugiés_irakiens #réfugiés_iraniens #réfugiés_soudanais #réfugiés_érythréens #réfugiés_soudanais #regroupement_familial #aide_sociale #procédure_d'asile #recours #mineurs #âge #tests_osseux #criminels_étrangers #rétention #détention_administrative #anti-refugee_bill

ping @isskein @karine4

MIGRANTI : “AUMENTANO DI NUOVO I FONDI ITALIANI ALLA GUARDIA COSTIERA LIBICA”

Crescono di mezzo milione di euro i finanziamenti destinati al blocco dei flussi migratori: passati da 10 milioni nel 2020 a 10,5 nel 2021. In totale 32,6 milioni destinati alla Guardia Costiera libica dal 2017.
Impennata delle risorse destinate alle missioni navali che non prevedono il salvataggio dei migranti in mare. Dall’inizio dell’anno, oltre 720 vittime lungo la rotta del Mediterraneo centrale, almeno 7.135 dalla firma dell’accordo tra Italia e Libia. Oltre 13 mila i migranti riportati in Libia.

Continuano ad aumentare gli stanziamenti italiani alla Guardia Costiera libica. Il Governo ha infatti deciso di destinare 500 mila euro in più nel 2021 per sostenerne le attività, per un totale di 32,6 milioni di euro spesi dal 2017, anno dell’accordo Italia-Libia. Sale anche a 960 milioni il costo sostenuto dai contribuenti italiani per le missioni navali nel Mediterraneo, (nessuna delle quali ha compiti di ricerca e soccorso in mare) e nel paese nord africano, con un aumento di 17 milioni rispetto al 2020 per la missione Mare Sicuro e 15 milioni per Irini.

Tutto ciò, nonostante si continui a morire lungo la rotta del Mediterraneo centrale – con oltre 720 vittime dall’inizio dell’anno – e siano oramai ben note le modalità di intervento della cosiddetta Guardia Costiera libica, come testimoniato dal video diffuso in questi giorni da Sea-Watch.

È l’allarme lanciato da Oxfam, alla vigilia del dibattito parlamentare sul rinnovo delle missioni militari italiane. In un anno che vede il record di persone intercettate e riportate in Libia: più di 13.000. Dato che non ha suggerito evidentemente al Governo, né una profonda riflessione sul destino dei migranti, tra cui donne e bambini, che una volta rientrati nel paese nord-africano sono destinati ad essere vittime di abusi e torture sistematiche dalle quali stavano scappando, finendo nei centri di detenzione ufficiali e in altri luoghi di prigionia clandestini. Né tantomeno si è attuata una revisione dello stesso accordo con le autorità libiche, nonostante numerose inchieste e testimonianze abbiano confermato il coinvolgimento della Guardia Costiera libica nel traffico di esseri umani.

“Mentre lungo la rotta del Mediterraneo centrale si continua a morire, come dimostrano i continui naufragi di queste settimane, con l’ennesima tragedia avvenuta a Lampedusa pochi giorni fa, – sottolinea Paolo Pezzati, policy advisor per le emergenze umanitarie di Oxfam Italia – il Governo Draghi sta agendo in perfetta continuità con gli esecutivi precedenti sulle politiche migratorie, come dimostrano anche le recenti richieste al Consiglio europeo per un maggior coinvolgimento dell’Unione nel rafforzamento degli accordi con le autorità libiche. In sostanza si va avanti nella stessa direzione, in un paese dove “l’industria del contrabbando e tratta” è stata in parte convertita in “industria della detenzione” con abusi e violenze oramai note a tutti, anche grazie a questo considerevole flusso di denaro”.

L’appello all’Italia

“A pochi giorni dalla discussione parlamentare sul rinnovo delle missioni militari italiane all’estero, – conclude Pezzati – chiediamo perciò ai partiti di maggioranza di interrompere immediatamente gli stanziamenti per il 2021 diretti alla Guardia Costiera libica, che solo quest’anno ha intercettato e riportato in un paese non sicuro il triplo dei migranti, rispetto allo stesso periodo dello scorso anno. Assieme è necessaria una revisione delle missioni che contengono iniziative legate alla sua formazione e al suo supporto. Quello che serve è un cambio deciso di approccio, una gestione diretta dei flussi e non la mera chiusura delle frontiere delegata a paesi come la Libia o la Turchia”.

https://www.oxfamitalia.org/aumentano-i-fondi-italiani-alla-guardia-costiera-libica

#gardes-côtes_libyens #Libye #Italie #financement #complexe_militaro-industriel #business #externalisation #asile #migrations #réfugiés #frontières #budget #2021 #2020

Abstention : l’explication par Adrexo
▻https://www.arretsurimages.net/chroniques/le-matinaute/abstention-lexplication-par-adrexo

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E4B82wFVUAAbizY.jpg

La faute aux sondeurs ? La faute aux éditocrates ? La faute aux politiques ? La faute à tout le monde ? La flagellation collective de la petite bande médiatico-politique est une incontournable consolation des soirées télé électorales avec forte abstention. En vedette dimanche soir, alors que les deux tiers des électeurs se sont abstenus lors des élections régionales et départementales, Laurent Delahousse, qui a successivement incriminé ses invités incapables de se laisser parler, et les rédactions ""qui ne sont plus dirigées par des journalistes"". Très bien. Excellente analyse, que je ne vais pas contredire ici.

Mais si je peux me permettre, il faudrait aussi examiner une autre explication. Un nombre encore indéterminé d’électeurs n’ont tout simplement pas reçu les professions de foi des candidats. Indéterminé, mais tout indique qu’il est élevé (confidence : j’en suis). La raison : pour la première fois, la distribution des professions de foi avait été « externalisée » par le gouvernement, dans sept régions sur quinze, à une société privée, Adrexo. Cette société de 25 000 salariés, basée à Aix-en-Provence, est spécialisée dans la distribution de brochures publicitaires. Sans adresses, donc. Ces derniers jours, plusieurs élus et candidats ont alerté sur les retards dans la distribution des professions de foi, avec à l’appui des photos parlantes. Dans la presse nationale, seul le « Huffington Post » y a consacré un article d’ensemble (et pourtant, même la presse de droite, me semble-t-il, devrait être sensible aux questions de distribution du courrier).

Le problème n’est-il apparu que ces tout derniers jours ? Pas du tout. Une rapide recherche « Adrexo » sur mon moteur préféré fait apparaître un intéressant incident, remontant au mois dernier : le 25 mai dernier, des employés de la petite ville d’Hérimoncourt (Doubs) découvrent à la lisière d’une forêt des enveloppes, dont certaines détruites ou incendiées. Elles contiennent les professions de foi du sénateur Cédric Perrin (LR) pour les élections départementales. Selon « L’Est Républicain », un intérimaire de 21 ans, employé par Adrexo, arrêté le lendemain, a avoué s’être débarrassé des enveloppes, faute de temps suffisant pour la distribution.

Interpellé par le sénateur Jean-Louis Masson (tête de liste RN aux départementales en Moselle), le ministère de l’Intérieur de Gérald Darmanin a fait la réponse suivante : ""Il semblerait totalement anachronique d’empêcher l’État d’externaliser la distribution de la propagande jusqu’aux boîtes aux lettres des électeurs, secteur qui est aujourd’hui ouvert à la concurrence, alors même que l’État s’efforce d’optimiser ses ressources dans le cadre d’une politique générale de meilleure gestion des deniers publics.""

Sur les conditions de travail au sein d’Adrexo, une autre affaire jette un éclairage intéressant. Après sept ans de procédure, un couple de l’Orne a obtenu d’Adrexo un rattrapage de salaires de 139 469 euros. Ils avaient décidé de rompre leur contrat à temps partiel, contrat qui ne comportait aucun horaire, et leur imposait de se tenir à la disposition de la société. Récit de l’un d’eux : ""On attendait qu’on nous contacte pour pouvoir nous organiser, classer les publicités, parfois jusqu’à six, et les distribuer. On utilisait notre voiture personnelle. Quand nous étions prévenus à la dernière minute, nous devions faire vite. On pouvait commencer à 4 heures du matin et on ne savait pas quand on terminait.""

""En janvier", rappelle Public Sénat, « la section CGT de La Poste s’était interrogée sur les capacités de l’opérateur privé à remplir sa mission, avec seulement 17 000 distributeurs, contre quatre fois plus de facteurs pour La Poste »".

Dans le Titanic électoral de dimanche, Adrexo n’est pas seulement un prestataire défaillant. C’est aussi le symptôme d’un État obsédé « d’externalisations », laissant crever ses propres services publics, jusqu’à se révéler incapable d’organiser des élections. Dans un univers politique normal, Gérald Darmanin aurait présenté sa démission hier soir. Dans un univers médiatique normal, Adrexo devrait être le sujet principal de la campagne du second tour. Jusqu’ici, combien d’émissions de Pascal Praud ont été consacrées à ce saccage de la démocratie ? Et combien d’enquêtes au « 20 Heures » de Laurent Delahousse ?

#privatisation #abstention #externalisation #élections

Danish lawmakers approve plan to locate asylum center abroad

Danish lawmakers voted Thursday in favor of Denmark establishing a refugee reception center in a third country that is likely to be in Africa, a move that could be a first step toward moving the country’s asylum screening process outside of Europe.

Legislation approved on a 70-24 vote with no abstentions and 85 lawmakers absent authorizes the Danish government to, when a deal in in place, transfer asylum-seekers “to the third country in question for the purpose of substantive processing of asylum applications and any subsequent protection in compliance with Denmark’s international obligations.”

The United Nations high commissioner for refugees, the European Union and and several international organizations have criticized the plan, saying it would undermine international cooperation and lacks details on how human rights would be protected.

Immigration Minister Mattias Tesfaye has said the Danish government needed a legal framework for a new asylum system before details could be presented. The center-right opposition has been backing the Social Democratic minority government and voted in favor of the law approved Thursday.

“This is insane, this is absurd,” Michala C. Bendixen, a spokesperson for advocacy and legal aid organization Refugees Welcome, told The Associated Press. “What it’s all about is that Denmark wants to get rid of refugees. The plan is to scare people away from seeking asylum in Denmark.”

The European Union’s executive commission expressed concern about the vote and its implications, saying that any move to outsource asylum claims is not compatible with the laws of the 27-nation bloc. Denmark is an EU member.

“External processing of asylum claims raises fundamental questions about both the access to asylum procedures and effective access to protection. It is not possible under existing EU rules,” European Commission spokesperson Adalbert Jahnz said.

He said such an approach was not part of the commission’s proposals for reforming the EU’s asylum system, which was overwhelmed by the arrival into Europe of more than 1 million people in 2015, many of them from Syria.

The Social Democrats have for a few years floated the idea of basing a refugee refugee center abroad. In January, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen reiterated an election campaign vision of having “zero asylum-seekers.”

The Social Democrats argue their approach would prevent people from attempting the dangerous journey across the Mediterranean Sea to reach Europe and undermine migrant traffickers who exploit desperate asylum-seekers. Since 2014, more than 20,000 migrants and refugees have died while trying to cross the sea.

When people realize they will be sent out of Europe, “they will stop going to Denmark, and that will mean that they will stop putting themselves in a dangerous situation on the Mediterranean Sea and they will stop wasting a lot of money paying like they pay to these smugglers,” Rasmus Stoklund, a Social Democratic lawmaker and member of Parliament’s Immigration and Integration Committee, told The Associated Press.

Bendixen of Refugees Welcome said the government’s argument is “nonsense” because asylum-seekers still would have to get to Denmark. Under the government’s plan, they would not be able to apply directly at a reception center outside the country since that only can be done at a Danish border. Instead, those who reach Denmark would be sent to a third country while their applications are processed.

In April, the Danish government said it had signed a memorandum of understanding with Rwanda. The government has kept a low profile with the memorandum, which is not legally binding and sets the framework for future negotiations and cooperation between the two countries.

Danish daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten reported that Denmark also has been in dialogue with Tunisia, Ethiopia and Egypt.

Tesfaye has promised lawmakers that any agreement with another country will be presented to parliament before the government can “adopt a model or send someone to a reception center,” legislator Mads Fuglede of the opposition Liberal Party told Jyllands-Posten.

The immigration stance of the Social Democratic government resembles the positions that right-wing nationalists took when mass migration to Europe peaked in 2015. Denmark recently made headlines for declaring parts of Syria “safe” and revoking the residency permits of some Syrian refugees.

In 2016, the Social Democrats supported a law that allowed Danish authorities to seize jewelry and other assets from refugees to help finance their housing and other services. Human rights groups denounced the law, proposed by the center-right government leading Denmark at the time, though in practice it has been implemented only a handful of times.

The Social Democrats also voted to put rejected asylum-seekers and foreigners convicted of crimes on a tiny island that formerly housed facilities for researching contagious animal diseases. That plan was eventually dropped.

▻https://apnews.com/article/united-nations-africa-europe-migration-government-and-politics-a199bb4b99906

#Danemark #asile #migrations #réfugiés #Afrique
#offshore_asylum_processing
–—
voir métaliste sur l’#externalisation de la #procédure_d'asile dans des #pays_tiers :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/900122

ping @isskein @karine4 @rhoumour @_kg_