Over their seven decades as a large-scale refugee population, the Palestinians have been remarkably consistent in collectively opposing resettlement as a durable solution to their plight. Both the grass roots and later the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) have repudiated any…
When it became clear in 1945, at the end of the second world war, that the Polish forces and refugees abroad would not be able to return to their homeland, the British government took on responsibility for them. The first…
Resettlement is an area of refugee policy that too often escapes scrutiny. It is often viewed as inherently benevolent and serves as a means for distant countries and progressive members of civil society to believe that they are ‘making a…
People whose application for asylum has been refused are vulnerable when they are subsequently deported to their country of origin. In some places, simply claiming asylum in another country is viewed as an act of treason and exposes the applicant…
Over the past nine years, the United Kingdom (UK) has forcibly removed[1] back to Afghanistan 2,018 young Afghan men who came to the UK as unaccompanied asylum-seeking children and spent their formative teenage years in the UK care system. They…
While Uganda is often hailed as a source of stability in a troubled region, human rights violations are rife, ranging from violent arrests of opposition leaders and detention of journalists to torture of civilians at the hands of security agents.[1]…
On 18th March 2016, Turkey and the European Union (EU) made a joint statement. Political leaders agreed to the return to Turkey of people who had crossed to the Greek islands through irregular channels and also agreed to prevent the…
“I didn’t come from poverty, I wasn’t hungry. I am only fleeing because of war. … We aren’t all here just to eat. We want to do more with our lives.” (Hisham, from Syria, 25 years old) Germany has witnessed…
Child-rights and migration and asylum agencies in the European Union (EU) are now working actively together to redress the acknowledged lack of child focus and gender mainstreaming in the initial responses to a steep rise in the number of children…
On 1st February 2014, a revised asylum law came into force in Switzerland, abolishing the right for recognised refugees to receive a permanent residence permit. This permanent permit is the most attractive residence permit that Swiss law provides for foreigners,…