European Union

UN criticises new immigration rules

Article published on the 2008-06-19 Latest update 2008-06-19 14:29 TU

Demonstrators protest against immigrant detention centres in front of the European Union Office in Madrid June 17, 2008.
(Credit: Reuters)

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour has criticised a law that aims to get tough with unauthorised immigrants passed Wednesday by the European Parliament. She said that the law lowers the standards of existing EU rules and sets a bad precedent. The new rules allow detention of unauthorised immigrants for up to 18 months prior to expulsion. If denied residency, they will be "returned" or face "removal."

"It is time that we give the equivalent protection to those who are persecuted for political reasons as well as those whose lives are under threat due to extreme poverty, famine, illness, epidemics from which they too have the right to attempt to flee from," she said.

Arbour held a press conference before the vote Wednesday, urging EU countries to drop the new norms and consider ratifying the UN convention on rights for migrant workers.

The vote was passed by 367 votes to 206 against with 109 abstentions.

People, including children, who do not leave voluntarily will be forced to leave the country and will face being banned from the EU for five years.

According to Amnesty International, the new rules do not assure that immigrants are returned to their own countries safely and in dignity.

This could have dire consequences, not only for would-be immigrants but for other countries if the people are returned to a country of transit rather than their home country.

"For example, a Congolese person returned to Morocco will most probably be detained or end up with no option but to reside there illegally," said Green Party civil liberties spokesperson Kathaljne Buitenweg in a statement.

British Labour MP Jeremy Corbin opposes the directive and believes that it is based on misconceptions as to how many asylum-seekers try to come to Europe.

"Europe actually takes a very small number, compared to the numbers taken by much smaller countries," he told RFI.

"To give the current example, that is of  Iraq, where there are four million people who are displaced, about half of those are living internally in Iraq. Another two million of them  have actually sought asylum in neighbouring countries such as Syria and Jordan that are hardly in a position to cope with people in those kind of numbers," he added.

On the other hand, a number of EU countries, led by Germany, objected to some of the language of the document that obliges the countries to provide legal aid for illegal immigrants, using up a large part of the the justice budget.

This is just one of a number of reform measures to be included in a new EU immigration pact that France will present in July when it takes over the EU presidency.