January 10-17, 2022 Mixed Migration Update

Welcome to MMU! Here—in the time it takes to read one feature—you get a global sweep of the last week's most relevant migration policy developments, & links to all the articles you need to dig deeper.

Spotlight

This week, Fenix Humanitarian Legal Aid released a report on the shortcomings of interview procedures in Lesvos for individuals seeking asylum on the basis of their sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, and/or sex characteristics. The report speaks for itself:

“…clients recounted experiences in which they felt violated during the interview process and forced to share intimate details of their private life in a highly stressful, unfamiliar context that they had no control over. Many reported feelings of discomfort and increased anxiety with having to disclose their sexuality to people in a position of authority, while others described frustration with the perceived lack of sensitivity or appreciation by the asylum authorities toward the difficulty sharing such sensitive information.

Negative interactions during interviews can also impact how a person sees or expresses themselves after the experience, including if someone receives a rejection decision that indicates in bold lettering that their stated sexual orientation or gender identity is not believed to be true.”

According to European Commission, between 2016 and 2020, EU taxpayers subsidized the Greek Asylum Service—in the form of direct financial support and of a sustained EASO deployment—to the tune of €55.71 million, in the context of an overall €3.38 billion support package. So, as you read Fenix’s report, don’t think of it just in terms of human rights—but also in terms of return on your investment.

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Asia

Post-occupation Afghanistan
Last Tuesday, UN agencies issued an appeal for $4.4 million in humanitarian aid to Afghanistan—a quarter of the Afghan GDP—to support aid programming designed to bypass authorities and reach civilians directly. | On Wednesday, Taliban Minister of Higher Education Abdul Baqi Haqqani announced that Afghan public universities would reopen shortly, with separate classrooms from men and women students. | On Sunday, Taliban security forces violently dispersed a peaceful women’s demonstrations protesting the recent killing of 2 women by security forces in Kabul. | On Monday, a women’s civil society group gathered in Kabul to demand of the international community that it unfreeze the Afghan Central Bank’s assets, and of the Taliban government that it reopen the Women’s Ministry, restart girls’ education, and include women in senior government posts.

Myanmar and its neighbors
Last Wednesday, local advocates disclosed that sustained fighting over the last 2 months had displaced ~20.000 people from the townships of Myawaddy and Kawkareik, in Myanmar’s eastern Kayin State, ~5.000 of whom have fled into Thailand. | On Thursday, local providers disclosed that just over 2.800 displaced people have encamped a festival compound in Mong Kaing Township in east-central Myanmar. | On Friday, airstrikes injured 10 displaced civilians encamped near Lay Kay Kaw, in Karen State near the border with Thailand. On the same day, Gambian Attorney General Dawda Jallow announced that the ICJ had set hearings for the last week of February in novel genocide litigation against the Burmese military, where the Junta is expected to challenge the jurisdiction of the ICJ over its conduct. Also on Friday, UK-based activists leaked an order, purportedly issued by Burmese military command, prohibiting officials from responding to summons from the ICC or from Argentina’s judiciary for litigation regarding human rights abuses against the Rohingya. | This Monday, Tatmadaw airstrikes hit Ree Khee Buu IDP camp near Hpruso, in eastern Myanmar, killing 2 teenage girls and 1 adult man.

Labor migration in Taiwan
Last Monday, Taiwanese Minister of Labor Hsu Ming-chun announced a forthcoming labor migration reform proposal, which would increase the number of labor migrant admissions over the next 3-10 years, and allow labor migrants to apply for residency after 6 years in Taiwan. | On Sunday, labor migrants in Taiwan demonstrated in downtown Taipei to demand the right to change employers within Taiwan, while protesting low pay and poor employment conditions.

Sources: Reuters, TOLOnews, AFP, Radio Free Asia, Eleven Myanmar, the Irrawadd, the Daily Star, Frontier Myanmar, Taiwan News, CNA.

Sub-Saharan Africa

Ethiopia’s civil war
Last Monday, UN officials in Tigray disclosed that they had just 7.000 liters of fuel left, far short of the 60.000 it needs to distribute humanitarian aid throughout the region, and only enough food stocks for 200.000, out of an at-need population of 5.2 million. | On Tuesday, an airstrike hit the northern Tigrayan town of Mai Tserbi, killing at least 17 civilians and wounding several dozen. | On Saturday, doctors pleaded with Ethiopian authorities to allow insulin shipments to be airlifted into Tigray, deploring that the region’s supply is down to 1 week’s worth.

Conflict-borne displacement in the Sahel
Last Tuesday, a fire destroyed 1.500 homes in the Galileo IDP camp in Alindao, in southern CAR, leaving just over 4.800 IDPs without shelter. | On Wednesday, an opposition politician and soldier were killed in Cameroon’s conflicted anglophone western region, in separate attacks believed to have been carried out by separatist groups. | On Friday, UN officials lamented that the last decade’s conflicts in the Sahel have pushed the number of displaced people in the region from ~213.000 in 2013 to ~2.5 million nowadays, with an increase of over 500.000 last year alone.

Displacement and return in central and southern Africa
Last Friday, authorities in Borno State officially closed the Maiduguri teacher’s village camp, which hosted just over 18.000 IDPs. On the same day, Namibian authorities reported that thousands of Angolan agriculturalists, displaced into Namibia by drought, have begun returning to Angola, drawn back by fresh rains. | On Saturday, Tanzanian Home Ministry officials called for Burundian refugees to return to Burundi, assessing that conditions have stabilized to the point that safe returns are possible.

Sources: the Guardian, Reuters, Agenzia Fides, UN News, the Cable, VOA, IPPmedia.

Middle East and North Africa

Displacement in Yemen and Syria, labor migration in Lebanon
Last Wednesday, UN officials disclosed that escalating fighting in Yemen has displaced ~150.000 people over the last month, and killed or injured ~350 civilians. On the same day, a medic was shot dead in the al Hol displacement camp in northeastern Syria, hosting families displaced by ISIS as well as IS fighters, as Kurdish authorities plead with foreign governments to repatriate their nationals from among the encamped. | On Friday, Middle East Eye reported that ~20 Kenyan migrant workers have encamped the street in front of Kenya’s consulate in Beirut, demanding to be repatriated as Lebanon’s economic collapse has cost them their livelihoods and left them unable to afford return fare.

Refugee reception and rejection in Turkey
Last Thursday, Turkish police detained 8 individuals suspected of having murdered a Syrian refugee while he was sleeping at home Monday prior, highlighting a sustained increase in hostility against Syrian refugees in Turkey. | On Friday, Turkish authorities identified 81 asylum seekers stranded in Eastern Thrace near the border with Greece, accusing Greek authorities of mistreating them before pushing them back into Turkey. | On Sunday, Turkish police announced they had detained 313 asylum seekers intending to enter Greece irregularly, and arrested 2 smugglers facilitating the attempted crossing. On the same day, Yeni Şafak reported that Turkey’s Supreme Court had upheld a criminal conviction of nearly 48 years’ imprisonment against the inexperienced pilot of a dinghy, who had been offered a lower priced passage in exchange for piloting, ultimately losing 2 passengers in rough waters. | This Monday, Turkish opposition leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu announced that, should the CHP take power in upcoming elections, it will return Syrian refugees from Turkey within 2 years.

Sources: AP, the National, Middle East Eye, al Jazeera, Daily Sabah, Yeni Şafak, Hürriyet.

Maritime Migration to & through Europe & North America

Central and western Mediterranean
Last Monday, port authorities in Trapani sanctioned the Ocean Viking following inspection, on what SOS Méditerranée describes as arbitrarily strict standards, docking the ship and reducing search-and-rescue capacity in the Central Mediterranean until further notice.

The English Channel
Last Monday, 96 asylum seekers arrived autonomously to UK soil, with French authorities preventing another 56 from crossing the English Channel. | On Thursday, French authorities rescued 30 asylum seekers from a vessel that capsized in the English Channel in the early morning, and retrieved the lifeless body of a Sudanese asylum seeker who succumbed to hypothermia. On the same day, 271 asylum seekers reached the UK in 10 small boats, while French authorities rescued another 75 attempting the same crossing.

Caribbean Sea
Last Monday, U.S. Coast Guard officers rescued 176 asylum seekers from a vessel in waters off Key Largo. | On Thursday, the U.S. Coast Guard repatriated 33 Cuban asylum seekers, retrieved mid-sea off the Key Islands over the week prior.

Ruta Canaria
Last Tuesday, Salvamento Marítimo rescued 57 asylum seekers, including 20 women and 2 children, from waters ~110 kilometers southeast of Gran Canaria. | On Friday, Moroccan authorities rescued 177 asylum seekers, including 52 women and 20 children, from a distressed ship in waters off of southern Morocco. | On Sunday, Spanish authorities rescued 74 asylum seekers from a distressed vessel in rough seas south of Gran Canaria. On the same day, Caminando Fronteras denounced that 43 asylum seekers, including 3 infants, had drowned off the coast of Morocco after the vessel in which they were traveling capsized, with just 10 passengers rescued by Moroccan authorities.

Aegean Sea
Last Thursday, Aegean Boat Report released an unusually thorough report documenting the forcible return of 25 asylum seekers from Lesvos to Turkish waters on the Sunday prior. | On Monday, Turkish authorities announced they had rescued 123 asylum seekers in multiple operations across Turkey’s Aegean coast, including 4 vessels carrying 70 asylum seekers whom they believe were returned from European waters.

Sources: Euractiv, BBC, Reuters, the Guardian, CBS Miami, FLKeysNews, EFE, Morocco World News, InfoMigrants.

Europe

EU migration deterrence and border control
Last Monday, Lighthouse Reports released an in-depth investigation of Europol’s data collection and storage practices, revealing that the European Data Protection Supervisor has ordered Europol to delete data stored for more than 6 months and refine its criteria for which data it can collect, including data harvested from asylum seekers’ digital identities often without their consent or knowledge. On the same day, Europol announced that, on December 14 prior, Spanish police had arrested 24 individuals suspected of smuggling drugs, asylum seekers, and contraband into Europe. | On Wednesday, EU Home Affairs Commission Ylva Johansson spoke out against Polish, Lithuanian, and Latvian authorities over their response to irregular arrivals from Belarus, admonishing them for lacking legislation prohibiting pushbacks, but falling short of calling for corrective sanctions. | This Monday, Polish authorities announced the arrest of multiple smugglers charging €3000 per person to facilitate irregular migration from Belarus across Poland, believing the operation has netted more than €8,5 million in total.

Migration management and refugee resettlement at Europe’s periphery
Last Wednesday, Portugal and Morocco signed an immigration deal that will provide for regular labor migration from Morocco to Portugal, intended to reduce incentives for irregular crossings to southern Portugal, while relieving labor shortages in the Portuguese economy. On the same day, Italy’s Constitutional Court ruled that migrants with a 6-month residency permit would henceforth be offered access to family-oriented financial support, including a payment for newborn children and monthly family allowances—benefits hereto now limited to Italian nationals and long-term residents. | On Friday, authorities in Iceland approved the resettlement of 35-70 Afghan refugees this spring, after resettling 78 Afghan refugees last fall.

Another Faustian week in UK migration management
Last Tuesday, the Independent revealed that, between July and December of last year, 20 unaccompanied minors hosted by the Home Office in hotel accommodation went missing, only half of whom were recovered into the system after absconding from it. On the same day, the Home Office confirmed it would extend its use of Napier Barracks as an asylum seeker accommodation site at least through 2025. | On Wednesday, the Office for National Statistics issued demographic estimates whereby it projects the UK population to grow from 67.1 million in the mid-2020s to 69.2 million in the mid-2030s, with that population growth driven almost exclusively by immigration, with deaths expected to exceed births by 59.000 over the next decade. | On Thursday, the Guardian revealed that over the last year, the Home Office has attempted to both decline and revoke asylum to nationals of Yemen and Afghanistan, assessing that two individual claimants would not be at risk if returned to either country—on the heels of another such denial to a Syrian national, revealed by the press the week prior and reversed shortly thereafter. | On Friday, 5 special rapporteurs across the UN Human Rights Council issued an open letter blasting the Nationality and Borders Bill, admonishing that it will visit harm on vulnerable people and make it more difficult to combat human trafficking. On the same day, the Home Office issued a rule allowing asylum seekers whose case has been pending for over a year to work in care homes, noting that the rule is temporary and driven by public health emergency. Also on Friday, the Home Office issued new guidance instructing asylum officers to treat as presumptive adults, pending a para-scientific age assessment, arriving asylum seekers whose age is indeterminable but appear older than 18—reducing the threshold from 25. | On Sunday, the Independent reported that, in recent months, aid groups have identified hundreds of asylum seeker minors whose ages had been wrongfully assessed and who had placed in group accommodation with adults, compromising their security and safeguarding. On the same day, the Independent also reported that UK authorities have been found to be prosecuting arriving asylum seekers for crimes of illegal entry that do not yet exist under UK law, as the Nationality and Borders Bill is not in force. | This Monday, UK authorities leaked that they are considering granting the Royal Navy operational command over the entire irregular migration response in the English Channel.

Migration policy reforms & restorative justice in Germany
Last Tuesday, German Economy Minister Robert Habeck announced that, with labor shortages projected to grow from ~390.000 unfilled positions to as much as 1 million in coming years, increased migration will be necessary to sustain German economic growth. | On Wednesday, a regional court in Koblenz completed judicial proceedings against Answar Raslan, a Syrian refugee believed to have committed torture and other crimes against humanity, and overseen the murder of at least 58 people, while operating an intelligence branch within the al Khatib prison in Damascus before defecting and fleeing Syria in 2011 and reaching Germany in 2014. | On Thursday, Raslan was imprisoned for life on 27 counts of murder and 4.000 counts of torture, in the first judicial conviction of an official working for the Assad regime in Syria.

Sources: the Guardian, InfoMigrants, AP, euronews, ANSA, Iceland Review, the Independent, UN OHCHR, the Telegraph, the National.

The Americas

U.S. migration policymaking
Last Tuesday, the State Department announced the restart of refugee resettlement to the U.S., concluding a pause in mid-November to accommodate Afghan evacuee arrivals. | On Thursday, the Washington Post disclosed that, in a January 7 court filing, the Justice Department argues that victims of the preceding Administration’s family separation are not entitled to compensation, reversing its prior positioning and contradicting U.S. President Joe Biden’s public statements to the matter. On the same day, a local court ruled that an individual arrest conducted under Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star violated the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution by interfering with the detainee’s right to file asylum petitions, potentially setting a precedent applicable to future such arrests. Also on Thursday, the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse issued a report finding that the vast majority of asylum seekers shifted into an expedited Dedicated Docket, intended to clear backlogs by adjudicating cases within 300 days, lack access to legal representation, compromising their ability to present viable asylum claims (see TRAC’s full report here). | On Friday, ICE disclosed that there are currently 1.766 immigration detention inmates being monitored with COVID-19 symptoms, a 6-fold increase since the beginning of the year.

Irregular migration in Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean
On Thursday, Guatemalan authorities reported the arrival of 3 repatriation flights, 1 from Mexico and the other 2 from the U.S., returning 332 asylum seekers to Guatemala. | On the same day, Mexico’s Instituto Nacional de Migración disclosed that it was conducting internal affairs investigations against 105 agents suspected of corruption. | On Friday, Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei announced his intention to crack down on irregular migration and increase sentences for human smuggling to between 10 and 30 years, from the current 2-5 years. | On Saturday, Guatemalan security forces formed up near the border with Honduras to prevent the passage of an asylum seeker caravan, formed in San Pedro Sula in the week prior. | On Sunday, Guatemalan authorities announced that they had detained 300 asylum seekers—roughly half of the participants in the recently formed caravan—whom they would shortly begin repatriating. On the same day, Mexican authorities announced they had found 359 asylum seekers in the container of a cargo truck in Veracruz state.

Sources: CNN, the Washington Post, ABC News, Border Report, CBS News, Prensa Libre, AP, Deutsche-Welle, AFP.