Transcript PPT Belgium, shelter for refugees 9.03.12

Belgium: shelter for
refugees?
Interdisciplinary course North-South
UHasselt, 9/03/2011
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2007
Auteur: VWV
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Protection
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Protection
2. Reception
3. Return and detention
4. Europe
1.
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What is protection/asylum
¬
1951 Geneva Convention
¬ Individual Persecution
¬ Race, religion, nationality, political conviction,
social group
¬ Refugee status
¬
2003 European Qualification Directive
¬ death penalty, torture, armed conflict
¬ Temporary
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Article 3 European Convention Human Rights
¬ Humanitarian status
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Non-refoulement
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Some figures
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Worldwide:
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43 m refugees
¬ 83% in regions of origin
Pakistan: 2 m refugees
¬ Iran and Syria 1 m refugees
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¬ South-Africa: 220 000 asylum applictions in
2009
¬ Europe: 246 000 asylum applications in
2009
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Belgium 2010
• 19.941 applications (Kosovo, Iraq, Russia,
Afghanistan, Guinea, Serbia, Macedonia)
• Refugee status: 2107 (Guinea, Iraq,
Afghanistan, China, Russia)
• Subsidiary protection: 711 (Iraq, Afghanistan)
• 21,4% recognition rate first instance
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No protection without good procedures
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Immigration Department

Registration of asylum application
 Where?
at the border (immigration detention centre)
 on the territory (offices of ID Brussels)

 Fingerprints taken, documents handed over,
statements given regarding itinerary, origin, reasons
for application, nationality,…
 No lawyer
 Fedasil: assignment of a place in a reception centre

Preliminary examinations
 “Dublin” – is Belgium competent MS?
 Examination of multiple asylum applications: only
possible if new elements, new evidence/situation
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Commissioner General for Refugees
and Stateless Persons





Hearing
 Examination application, first in relation to Geneva
Convention, then subsidiary protection
 Presence of asylum seeker, interpreter, lawyer
Lawyer can be present
Not contradictionary
Burden of proof
Access to database country of origin information?
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Aliens Litigation Council
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Newly created in 2006
Appeal within 30 days
Petition: Written and very formal procedure –
hearing
Specialised court, but not suitable for asylum
procedure
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Dublin Regulation
Determines which member state is competent for
determination of asylum application
¬ Principle: only 1 member state is competent
¬ Different criteria:
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¬ Family members
¬ Issuance of residence permits or visa
¬ Illegal entry or stay
¬…
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Humanitarian or sovereignty clause
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Eurodac (finger prints)
¬ Problematic: Greece
¬ Important role European Court Human Rights
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MSS v Belgium and Greece
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ECHR Case MSS vs. Belgium and Greece
¬ 21 January 2001: Afghan asylum seeker
through Greece to Belgium (February 2009),
transfer despite urgent petition with Aliens
Litigation Council, detention and street in
Greece, no processing of asylum claim
¬
ECHR condemns Belgium and Greece
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Dublin Regulation
¬
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Consequences for Belgium
¬ Dublin-transfers to Greece violation article 3 ECHR
¬ Immigration Department and Aliens Litigation
Council should hear objections to transfer decision
¬ Minister suspended all transfers to Greece on 20
October 2010. Confirmed his decision.
¬ Aliens Litigation Council procedure should be
reformed
Consequences for EU
¬ Dublin-transfers to Greece violation article 3 ECHR
¬ Reform Dublin regulation?
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Reception crisis. Asylum crisis?
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Reception of asylum seekers
¬
¬
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Right to reception for every asylum seeker: “in
conformity with human dignity”
What?
¬ “Material assistance”: housing, food, clothing,
counselling, voluntary return support
Who?
¬ Asylum seekers in procedure (appeal included)
¬ Non-accompanied minors
¬ Families in irregular stay with minor children
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Reception of asylum seekers
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¬
Who gives reception?
¬ Fedasil: coordinating administration and operational
(running ‘federal’ collective centres)
¬ Partners of Fedasil (conventions): Red Cross and other
NGOs, local Public Services for Social Welfare in cities
and towns (individual housing)
¬ Total: around 20.000 places (“emergency” places
included)
Two phases
¬ 1st: collective centre
¬ 2nd: after 4 months option to apply for transfer to
individual housing
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Reception crisis
Since May 2008, structural lack of reception
places. Many asylum seekers do not get a
reception place.
1. July 2009: emergency measures
¬ Hotels: no counselling (asylum procedure frozen,
but “de-frozen” now), also non-accompanied
minors
2. October 2009: official decisions of “nonallocation”
¬ Fedasil: saturation of reception network and
transfer to Local Public Services for Social Welfare,
for financial support
¬ Many Public Services for Social Welfare refuse
¬ Asylum seekers on the street
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3. Legal reform
¬ No right to reception from 3rd asylum application
¬ Shorter delay to leave reception after negative
asylum application
4. Public support for protection of asylum seekers
disappears
¬ Reception in hotels: wrong perception
¬ Judges impose penalties on government: every day
asylum seeker has no reception, government owes
€500
¬ Pull-factor: increase in asylum applications, has
increased burden on Commissioner General
¬ Discussion on Common European Asylum Policy, or
race to the bottom?
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Asylum crisis?
¬ Increase applications started 2008
¬ 12.252 in 2008
¬ 17.186 in 2009
¬ 19.941 in 2010
¬ Before 2009: increase due to multiple asylum
applications. Now decreasing again.
¬ From 2009: increase due to first applications from
Serbia and Macedonia (after liberalisation visaregime)
¬ Response Belgian government: official
“preventive” missions, priority to applications
from Balkan, reform appeal procedure
¬ Albania?
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Return and detention
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Voluntary return (Fedasil, Social
Integration)
Return counselling in reception centres is limited
Social assistance
Information on programmes of assisted voluntary return
No psychosocial counselling on return
Different reception partners, different methodologies
After negative asylum application
Order to leave the country and the reception centre within
5 days
No time to work on return
Put on the streets, end up in illegality
Lack of coordination with Immigration Department
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Forced removal (Immigration
Department)
1. Detention in closed immigration detention centres
¬ Rejected asylum seekers who end up on the streets
without counselling, eventually arrested and detained
¬ Detention is not a measure of last resort in Belgium
¬ 6 detention centres (capacity 568)
¬ Maximum 2 months, 2 months prolongation by
Immigration, 1 months prolongation by Minister (but
counting back from 0 if no cooperation with forced
removal operation)
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Forced removal (Immigration
Department)
2. “Return houses” for families with minor children
¬ First alternative to detention in Belgium, since 2008
¬ Open, individual housing and intensive counselling by
coaches of the Immigration Department
¬ Until January 2011 (129 families)
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¬
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55 families return (43%)
29 families absconded (22%)
44 families released (34%)
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And meanwhile in Europe?
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Common European Asylum policy?
Initial objective of EU Member States cooperation=
prevent asylum shopping between them and
ensure that only one Member State is responsible
for asylum application
- Minimum standards (definition, procedures,
reception,…). Further harmonisation is very
difficult.
- 2010? 2012?
- Practical cooperation
-
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Outcomes
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Very low standards (e.g: accelerated procedures,
safe third countries, restrictions to access legal
assistance, etc)
Member States enjoy high levels of discretion
‘Protection lottery’: 2007 recognition rate for
Iraqis, around 90% in Sweden/0% in Greece
Reception conditions differ widely among the
Member States
Different rights for the beneficiaries of
refugee/subsidiary protection statuses
Dublin: more pressure in Member States with
external borders, detention, separation of families,
obstacles to access asylum procedures, system
costly and inefficient
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¬
Solidarity within EU?
¬ Financial solidarity
¬ Physical solidarity
Dublin
¬ Re-allocation
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¬ Practical cooperation
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The access challenge
¬
Greece
¬ Control of land border with Turkey
¬ Frontex / Rabit operation
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Libya
¬ Both EU and Italy collaborated with Libya in
order to prevent access the EU territority
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Key unanswered questions
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What are states’ protection obligations when
intercepting boats in the High Seas or waters of a
third country?
To what extent can one invoke a states’
responsibilities when it is acting extraterritorially?
How do Frontex operations impact access to
protection for asylum seekers?
What is the role of ILOs and ALOs posted abroad?
How could asylum seekers be better identified at
the borders?
How could legal access to Europe be facilitated for
refugees?
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Resettlement
¬
In 2009 Belgium resettled 47 refugees
¬ Single Iraqi women in Syria and Jordan
¬ Palestinian families from refugee camps in
Iraq and Syria
¬ Selected as refugees by UNHCR
¬ Receive refugee status in Belgium
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Gaucheretstraat 164
1030 Brussels
Tel.: 0032 (0)2 274 00 20
Fax: 0032 (0)2 201 03 76
www.vluchtelingenwerk.be
Kathelijne Houben, Policy Officer
[email protected]
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Auteur: VWV
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