By Phil Orchard The recent deaths of asylum seekers attempting to reach European shores have prompted ongoing calls for action...
By Phil Orchard
The recent
deaths of asylum seekers attempting to reach European shores have prompted
ongoing calls for action. But, given the scale of the issue, only a
comprehensive, global program can go some way to solving the crisis.
The UN High
Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) notes that more than 366,000 refugees have
arrived in Europe by sea so far in 2015. And 80% have come from the world’s top
ten refugee-producing countries, including half from Syria.
This can be a
deadly voyage. The International Organisation for Migration reports that at
least 2373 migrants have already died trying to reach Europe this year.
This reflects
the immensity of the crisis created by the Syrian conflict. More than 4 million
refugees are now in the countries bordering Syria – Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan
– while an estimated 7.6 million are internally displaced within Syria.
An individual
country response?
Individual
countries have begun to show leadership. This began with German Chancellor
Angela Merkel’s commitment that Germany would begin processing all asylum
seekers who applied on its territory. In so doing, she waived the European
Union’s (EU) Dublin Regulation, which establishes that asylum seekers must
lodge their claim in the first EU country they enter.
Merkel’s plan
may lead to Germany taking up to 800,000 refugees this year. She laid out her
country’s response in stark moral terms. She argued that:
"Germany is a
strong country, we will manage … If Europe fails on the question of refugees,
then it won’t be the Europe we wished for."
The UK has
reversed its previous position. Prime Minister David Cameron said:
"We will do
more in providing resettlement for thousands more Syrian refugees."
Prime Minister
Tony Abbott has announced that Australia will take a “significant” number of
Syrian refugees beyond the 4500 that it has already pledged to accept.
However, the
scale of the crisis means that no single country can deal with it alone.
Germany’s plan would involve direct EU responsibility for registering and
looking after newly arrived refugees in Greece and Italy, as well as creating a
common policy on safe countries of origin.
The UNHCR has
argued that Europe cannot respond to this crisis “with a piecemeal or
incremental approach”. Instead, it has recommended a mass relocation program
with 200,000 places, coupled with improved reception capacities – especially in
Greece.
But neither
Germany’s nor the UNHCR’s plan would deal with the main issue: refugees would
still have to risk death crossing the Mediterranean Sea to reach Europe to
access these programs.
A regional
response?
Others argue
for a regional response. One suggestion is the creation of a safe zone, which
would allow Syrians to remain within the country. Australian Foreign Minister
Julie Bishop has echoed this call.
Ethicist Peter
Singer has argued that the affluent countries need to provide much more support
to the countries supporting large numbers of refugees. Singer also said that
sending asylum seekers to safe refugee camps supported by the developed world
would eliminate people smuggling.
But these
proposals reflect the flipside of the problem: that the world needs to respond
to the refugees crossing the Mediterranean and also assist the countries
harbouring the bulk of the 4 million Syrian refugees.
The UNHCR has
announced that its budget this year will be 10% less than last year’s, while
the World Food Programme (WFP) has had to cut the rations being provided to the
refugees. The most vulnerable refugees in Lebanon will have only US$13 per
month to spend on food, and the WFP may need to cut all assistance to refugees
in Jordan.
What’s really
needed?
What is
needed, therefore, is a comprehensive, global program. This would include three
elements:
- Increased humanitarian assistance to the countries around Syria
- Safe processing centres in Turkey and in either Libya or Tunisia to process asylum claims
- A global resettlement scheme for refugees and provisions for safe returns for those denied claims.
With respect
to humanitarian assistance, the UN Syria Regional Refugee Response Appeal is requesting
US$4.5 billion to respond to the situation in Syria and neighbouring countries,
but has received only 37% of that total.
This shortfall
has been the case since the Syrian conflict began. Most yearly appeals have
received only around 50% of the request funding. This has placed immense
pressure on both the international aid agencies responding to the conflict and
on the refugee host countries themselves.
A safe
processing centre model would serve to deter refugees from crossing the
Mediterranean and have the advantage of centrally co-ordinating the processing
of individual refugee claims. This, in turn, could:
"… enable a
fairer distribution of responsibilities among states for providing protection
and assistance to refugees."
The UNHCR has
noted that such centres could be legal under international law if they clearly
reflect the international legal standards – including the UN Refugee Convention
and the principle of non-refoulement – and have formal authorisation from host
nations. The UNHCR would be the obvious organisation to run the refugee
determination process within these centres.
Critically,
the centres would need to be safe and agreements would need to be made with the
individual host countries. Turkey would likely support such an initiative.
Given the current insecurity in Libya, however, a centre would either need
international protection – such as peacekeepers – even with government consent,
or alternatively could be established along the border in Tunisia.
But these
centres would not work without a clear onward path for processed refugees. The
EU is now discussing possible resettlement numbers. Other than the UNHCR’s
proposed 200,000 figure, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has
suggested that individual EU states resettle 120,000 asylum seekers who are
currently in Hungary, Greece and Italy. Others have suggested higher figures.
Global commitments
to take 400,000 refugees – 10% of the Syrian total – from these processing
centres are not unreachable. The model here is the Comprehensive Plan of Action,
negotiated in 1989 to respond to the Indochinese boat people. The plan included
regional screening for refugees and, while not perfect, resulted in the
resettlement of more than 500,000 refugees over six years.
A resettlement
scheme could also be combined with a temporary admission process. The EU
already has a temporary protection directive created after the war in Kosovo.
That directive allows for refugees to be granted temporary protection in
accordance with the Refugee Convention for a period of one year, which can be
extended.
Given the
nature of the Syrian war, a longer protection period would be warranted.
By combining
these three approaches, individual countries would have the opportunity either
to commit to refugee resettlement or to fund the centres’ humanitarian
operation and costs – or both. Most importantly, these approaches would
significantly increase the burden-sharing between the refugee-hosting countries
near Syria and the rest of the developed world.
About The Author:
Phil Orchard is Senior
Lecturer in Peace and Conflict Studies and International Relations; Research
Director at the Asia-Pacific Centre for the Responsibility to Protect at The
University of Queensland
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