Tag Archives: Refugees
15 July 2013
According to UNHCR, Australia’s off-shore asylum processing centre on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea does not meet international standards. Harsh living conditions, a restricted legal regime, slow processing and restrictions on the freedom of movement amounting to open-ended and arbitrary detention were cited by the UN refugee agency as continued and worrying shortcomings.
The report released in Canberra on Friday also notes positive developments including progress towards the establishment of a legal framework for processing, but according to a UNHCR spokesperson, the existing conditions still do not meet international standards nor the terms of the bilateral agreement between Australia and Papua New Guinea concerning the processing of asylum-seekers.
Source: UN News Centre | Despite progress, UN finds faults with Australia's off-shore asylum processing centre
25 March 2013
The German Federal Ministry of the Interior has announced that it will receive some 5,000 refugees from Syria. The first refugees should arrive in Germany by June. According to the official statement, the German Ministry of Interior intends to promote a coordinated European response together with UNHCR to protect refugees from Syria. The Minister will meet the UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres in April, when he will launch a resettlement appeal to the EU.
Source: Bundesministerium des Innern | Nachrichten | Flüchtlinge aus Syrien (in German only)
14 June 2012
Amnesty International published a report on 13 June 2012, urging the European Union (EU) and its member states, especially Italy, to protect the rights of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers ‘according to international standards’.
According to Amnesty, human rights are violated as a result of migration control policies and practices, such as outsourcing border security. An online petition was opened in order to urge members of the European Parliament to hold institutions of the EU and national governments accountable for the way migrants are treated.
Source: Newsday | Amnesty International: Europe endangers migrants
2 March 2012
Ministers for Home Affairs of European Union countries will next week approve an increase in the compensation Member States receive from the EU budget for allowing refugees from outside the Union to settle in their territory. They will also endorse a pilot scheme under which each Member State is to indicate by 1 May how many refugees it plans to resettle in 2013, and from which groups designated by the EU as priorities. The ministers will meet in Brussels on Thursday 8 March.
Source: European Voice | EU member states to get more money for receiving refugees
7 November 2011
Germany paid officials of other States such as Sierra Leone to issue identity documents for asylum seekers that arrive in Germany without any indication of their countries of origin. The lack of identity documents is a very frequent phenomenon among persons that flee from places of persecution.
Source: www.sueddeutsche.de