Put human
rights first
Lluis Magrina SJ, JRS International Director
The right of states to manage migration flows is subject
to their obligations to protect refugees. In fact, the 1951 UN
Refugee Convention prohibits states from penalizing refugees
simply for seeking asylum. Nevertheless arbitrary immigration
detention is seeking widely used as a migration-control tool. This
issue of Servir examines the human and social costs of policies
that restrict the movement of refugees.
When the Montagnard children fled persecution in Vietnam, they
were detained in Cambodia. The nature and structure o the closed
centres seriously curtailed the provision of education services.
Ms. Peeters discusses how confinement to restricted locations
hinders the ability to organize the range of education services
available and how the monotony of everyday life de-motivates the
students.
Detention also compromises the provision of legal services. Dr.
Camilleri highlights the difficulties lawyers face in Malta trying
to ensure that asylum seekers receive quality legal assistance.
Detention by its very nature removes asylum seekers from
main-stream society and makes it more difficult for them to gain
access to legal assistance or information about the asylum
procedure. Asylum seekers in Malta are expected to go through the
procedure without access to information on what is expected from
them.
Although often not as repressive as detention centres, indefinite
confinement in closed camps can seriously, as Ms. Rivers
illustrates, affect refugees’ mental health. This is clearly
evident in the development of anti social behaviour by the young
refugees in camps. Full awareness of the opportunities offered to
those outside the camps engenders a sense o apathy and
hopelessness in the young. Even though they receive guarantees of
food, housing and education, it is often seen as a road to
nowhere. Steps are being taken by JRS to deal with the
consequences of their confinement but unfortunately the causes are
decided elsewhere.
Yet successful action has been taken. In South Africa, Fr.
Gallagher describes how the injustice of detaining separated
children was challenged and how the court ordered the authorities
to respect always the `best interests of the child’ when making
decisions affecting them. Facing the pressure of large numbers of
spontaneous arrivals, South Africa has stood up in defense of
children’s rights. Children are to be provided with appropriate
care, not put in prisons for fleeing
poverty and persecution.
Ms.
Pike explains how human rights advocates in Australia, not able to
depend on the law, took it upon themselves to raise public
awareness of the situation faced by asylum-seeking children held
in detention for years. Presenting the human face of the costs of
detention, NGOs grabbed the attention of the public and eventually
forced a change in government policy. Children are no longer
detained on immigration grounds.
While the international community has an obligation to share
equally the responsibility of refugee protection, detention should
never be arbitrarily used as a migration control mechanism. God
created us free. Alternatives to detention are nearly always
available to respect this freedom; it is up to states to put human
rights ahead of narrow definitions of border security.
Events
Detention, as a migration - control tool
Ms.
Pike explains how human rights advocates in Australia, not able to
depend on the law, took it upon themselves to raise public
awareness of the situation faced by asylum-seeking children held
in detention for years. Presenting the human face of the costs of
detention, NGOs grabbed the attention of the public and eventually
forced a change in government policy. Children are no longer
detained on immigration grounds.