Court rejects government appeal over fast-track detention of asylum seekers
Government hopes of quickly restarting the detention of asylum seekers under its fast-track process have been dealt a serious blow by the loss of a court of appeal challenge brought by the justice secretary, Michael Gove.
Ministers have disclosed that more than 320 asylum seekers have so far been released from immigration detention centres – three times the number originally expected – as a result of a high court ruling earlier this month that the fast-track system was unlawful because it was "structurally unfair".
The immigration minister, James Brokenshire, told MPs on 2 July that the "detained fast-track" under which 800 asylum seekers were held in centres such as Yarl's Wood was being suspended for several weeks while every case was urgently reviewed.
A written answer published on Tuesday revealed that 323 asylum seekers have already been released as a result of the system being found unlawful. They include 61 asylum seekers who were awaiting a decision, 70 who had received a decision but were awaiting an appeal and 131 whose appeal rights had been exhausted.
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By failing to help refugees Europe fails itself
Most citizens view legal migration positively, but border chaos fuels populism, writes George Soros
As many as 400,000 people will make dangerous journeys to reach Europe this year, about half of them fleeing the civil war in Syria or brutal government repression in Eritrea. By the time they reach the west, they will have had to risk their lives twice: once in fleeing their countries, and again in entering ours.
The victims of many previous conflicts have had better luck. After the 1956 Soviet invasion, 200,000 Hungarians fled to Austria and Yugoslavia; within months almost all had been resettled in countries as far flung as the US, Australia, Brazil and Tunisia. A generation later, when war scattered millions in Indochina, the international community resettled 1.3m. In the 1990s, the Balkan conflicts displaced almost 4m people, and again the world helped.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/b6108088-3212-11e5-91ac-a5e17d9b4cff.html#axzz3hgif94NZ
Plight of desperate migrants should concern us all
We are all Africans. Our distant ancestors who settled in Europe would not have looked too dissimilar from the thousands of migrants risking their lives to cross the Mediterranean today.
For tens of thousands of years, people have moved from north Africa and the Middle East into mainland Europe, some willingly, some fleeing wars or political oppression.
Migration has come in waves. After the Second World War there was mass migration from north Africa, including millions from Algeria and Morocco who settled in France, Spain and Germany. More recent unrest in Iraq, particularly during the Saddam Hussein regime, forced thousands of ethnic minorities and Christians to flee their homes and travel to Europe.
In Ireland, migration is nothing new. Millions have left this island, fleeing poverty, hunger and unemployment. Migration into the island is a more recent, and at times difficult, process. Yet we understand that our own migrants desperately need help, that without the assistance of governments, churches, friends, relatives and more established Irish communities, many new young Irish migrants to Britain, Australia and the US, would have struggled to settle.
For the last few months, pictures of refugees fleeing their countries in flimsy and overcrowded boats, many of them the victim of unscrupulous traffickers, have appeared in our newspapers almost daily. Last week, a baby girl called Destiny was born on board the LÉ Niamh Irish Naval ship during a rescue operation in the Mediterranean. Destiny's mother was one of 14 pregnant women taken on board the ship the day before the birth.
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Immigration detention is inhumane. But for pregnant women, it's trauma
Every day, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) locks up thousands of men, women and children in a sprawling network of more than 200 facilities, many of them for no other reason than they were seeking protection at the US border. And according to ICE statistics for just six detention facilities, at least 559 of the women detained between 2012 and 2014 were pregnant.
The uncertainty of whether and when they may be released – or if they will have a baby in detention – creates a trauma and stress on their minds and bodies. I know this, because I was pregnant and detained for three months and 17 days at the Eloy Detention Center in Arizona.
This happens despite ICE policy that pregnant women should not be detained "absent extraordinary circumstances or the requirements of mandatory detention." In November 2014, along with announcing expanded protections for some immigrants, the Department of Homeland Security reiterated the directive not to detain pregnant women and other vulnerable populations. Yet at the Eloy Detention Center, a private facility contracted to the Corrections Corporation of America, there were many pregnant women in my pod. Many of us in ICE custody are held for unconscionably long periods, in often terrible conditions, and with little respect or attention to our health status or legal circumstances. Aside from attorneys and human rights advocates, the recent upward spike in the numbers of detained pregnant women seems to go unnoticed.
More:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/27/immigration-detention-pregnant-women-conditions
A FORMER hotel owner has been sent to prison for three years after trafficking workers from Bangladesh.
Shamsul Arefin, 47, carried out his crimes between 2008 and 2010 when he was the owner of the Stewart Hotel near Appin in Argyll.
He was found guilty of breaching the Asylum and Immigration Act by recruiting his victims from his native Bangladesh, and offering them jobs as chefs at his hotel.
The victims, who were working on low wages in Bangladesh, were promised employment and a salary which they saw as an opportunity to improve their lives.
They were told that they would need to pay Arefin substantial sums of money in return for the employment which, at trial, was described by the accused as a "deposit" to be returned if the victims remained in his employment for five years.
Sudanese refugee accuses UK of complicity in human rights abuses
Rights lawyer who fled his home country brings legal challenge over British government's decision to provide support and training to Sudan's armed forces
The UK government has been accused of complicity in human rights abuses inSudan, because it provides military support and training.
In the high court in London on Wednesday, Ali Agab Nour, a Sudanese human rights lawyer who fled the country and is now a refugee in the UK, is challenging the government's actions.
Nour, 47, claims that the decision-making process that led to the provision of military support was unlawful and in breach of the government's overseas security and justice assistance policy, which lays down certain criteria that must be met before military assistance can be provided.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) insists that risk assessments were carried out correctly before military training and support was provided to Sudan.
Sudan repression continues after Omar al-Bashir election win, says rights group
Read more
Nour said: "I believe that any assistance to the [Sudanese] military that strengthens their capacity will allow them to commit more human rights abuses. It is a twisted logic that by giving advanced knowledge and training to the perpetrators of human rights abuses in Sudan, you protect human rights there."
http://www.theguardian.com/law/2015/jul/15/sudanese-refugee-accuses-uk-complicity-rights-abuses
Posted by: migrant Cause <migrantcause@gmail.com>
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