Canada’s Bar on Refugee Arrivals by Land Faces Legal Challenge
An asylum seeker from El Salvador is challenging Canada’s bar on refugees arriving in the country by land. The test case centers on the Safe Third Country Agreement (STCA) between Canada and the United States.
The woman was rebuffed after arriving at the Canadian border but has been allowed to remain, along with her family, while the constitutional challenge proceeds. The plaintiff, known only as “E,” has personified a struggle against the STCA that is months in the making – with a number of leading refugee groups in Canada backing the case.
Influential voices such as the Canadian Council for Refugees, Amnesty International and the Canadian Council of Churches have argued that the U.S. is no longer a safe third country, especially since Donald Trump took office.
Canada’s immigration and refugee minister Ahmed Hussen, himself a former refugee, maintains that the agreement makes for “orderly” processing of refugees and that its neighbor remains a safe country.
“There is no change to our government’s position,” said government spokesman Bernie Derible.
Italy Announces New Funding to Limit Migrant Flows In and Out of Libya
Italy has announced $34 million in new funding to reduce migrant sea crossings.
The funding pledge came at the end of a meeting of European Union interior ministers at which pressure was put on search-and-rescue missions in the central Mediterranean.
Several years of promises to reduce migrant flows from Libya into Italy have so far failed to reduce sea crossings or lower the death toll. A new action plan, agreed at the meeting, made the top priority a new code of conduct for NGOs operating rescue missions off Libya.
Italian prosecutors have unsuccessfully sought to link rescue missions to smuggling gangs and now ministers seem intent on imposing new controls on how the NGOs operate. The code of conduct – which has yet to be drafted – has been criticized by aid groups as unnecessary.
E.U. ministers keen to show restive voters that they have migration under control want to beef up the Libyan coast guard and reduce the number of boats making it to international waters in the Mediterranean. The rescue missions, including German-based Sea Watch, have pointed out that they are already governed by the law of the seas. It is not clear with what authority a new code of conduct could be enforced.
Lebanese Mother Lauded for Opening Son’s Grave for Syrian Toddler
A Lebanese woman who made space for a Syrian boy in her own son’s grave has attracted praise. Pictures of the woman, who allowed her child’s grave to be dug up to enable the burial of a refugee toddler, have gone viral.
The photographs were posted on the Facebook page of activist group Refugees Without Borders, with the caption: “Lebanese woman opens the grave of her son, who died a year ago and buried a Syrian boy who died yesterday due to the fire that broke out at a refugee camp in the Bekaa Valley, after all villages refused to bury him in their tombs.”
It is unclear why the two-year-old Syrian could not be buried elsewhere but many cemeteries are limited to Lebanese nationals. Some 1.5 million Syrians are hosted in Lebanon. Many people posted praise of the woman in response to the pictures, along with criticism of anti-refugee sentiment. “This woman deserves all the respect and appreciation. Shame on those who refused to bury the child. This is the dark side of racism in Lebanon against Syrian refugees,” was one comment.
Recommended Reads
- The London Review of Books: Should We Build a Wall Around North Wales?
- Foreign Affairs: Making Syria Safe for Refugees
- The Washington Post: How the Russian Revolution Turned Refugees Into Political Pawns
- Quartz: Japan Has a Labor Crisis That Refugees Could Fix – if Only Its Government Would Let Them