| UN rights expert calls for longer-term planning for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh. Speaking at the end of a 10-day visit to Bangladesh, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, Yanghee Lee, said the government of Myanmar had made no progress in dismantling discriminatory laws or making northern Rakhine state safe. “The Rohingya refugees will not be returning to Myanmar in the near future,” she said. “There must therefore be a shift to medium- and long-term planning in Cox’s Bazar.” She said the priorities should be improving access to education and meaningful livelihood opportunities for the refugees and allowing them greater freedom of movement. During his visit to Kutapalong refugee settlement last week, UNHCR chief Filippo Grandi also stressed the need to shift from an emergency response to a more sustainable one with greater investments in education, health care and infrastructure. | | |
| Bosnia emerges as key new route into Europe. More than 7,600 refugees and migrants have arrived in Bosnia since the start of the year, compared to 218 in all of 2017. Most enter from Serbia and hope to reach northern Europe via neighbouring Croatia. Public Radio International reports that the country has limited capacity to support the new arrivals, with only two official reception centres that can accommodate up to 350 people. In the small town of Bihać, near the Croatian border, a decrepit former student dormitory has become an unofficial way station for those preparing to attempt the crossing. Speaking to the BBC from Bihać, UNHCR’s deputy regional representative in Bosnia, Francesca Bonelli, said there was a lack of proper services to provide the new arrivals with dignified conditions. “There are families, children, elderly people, pregnant ladies; they need immediate support. They are fleeing conflict, looking for protection – and we need to provide for their urgent needs,” she said. | | |
| Italy blocks commercial vessel from bringing refugees and migrants ashore. Reuters reports that the ship, which supplies oil platforms off the coast of Libya, rescued 66 people on Monday but despite flying an Italian flag was told it could not bring them to Italy. Transport Minister Danilo Toninelli said the passengers had been transferred to an Italian coast guard vessel on Tuesday. It’s not yet clear where they will be taken. | | |
| Judge rejects US government request for long-term detention of children. The AP reports that a California federal judge on Monday said the government had failed to present new evidence to support revising a court order that limits detaining for extended periods children who cross the border irregularly. The Department of Justice had asked the judge to alter a 1997 settlement, known as the Flores agreement, to allow the government to detain families together for longer periods after the practice of separating children from their parents at the border sparked a public outcry. The ruling came on the same day that the government acknowledged it would not be able to meet a Tuesday deadline set by a San Diego federal judge for reuniting separated children under five with their families. The Justice Department said that only 54 of 100 children covered by the order would be reunited on time. | | |
| Why the Jordan Compact is failing women refugees. The 2016 agreement, which allows Syrian refugees in Jordan to work in exchange for international investment, has been described as a “paradigm shift” in refugee response, but only 4 per cent of the refugee work permits issued so far have gone to women. Most Syrian women in Jordan had been stay-at-home mothers or had worked on family farms in Syria. Progress in getting them into jobs in garment factories has been slow, with many of the women saying they would prefer to work near or from home. In this piece for Refugees Deeply, Laura Buffoni, UNHCR’s senior livelihoods officer in Jordan, calls more consideration of social norms and refugees’ skills and aspirations before designing future livelihoods programmes. | | |
| British university opens doors to asylum-seekers. The Compass Project, run by Birkbeck, University of London, is fully funding 20 asylum-seekers to complete a foundation year that gives them the qualifications they need to access undergraduate courses elsewhere. With the first group of students graduating this week, the Guardian reports that the project is filling an important gap , as most asylum-seekers are excluded from tertiary education by high international student fees and the difficulty of proving prior educational attainment. Birkbeck has developed its own admissions system that doesn’t rely on qualifications and entry levels, but rather evidence of commitment to the subject. | | |
| The Austrian news magazine Biber is offering journalism training to asylum-seekers and refugees with past media experience or a strong interest in journalism. At the end of the course, the students’ work is published in a special edition of the magazine. Their trainer, Amar Rajkovic, who works at Biber as a journalist, is a former refugee from Bosnia-Herzegovina himself. He trains the students on top of his editorial duties because “I can see myself sitting here”. | | |
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