The 10 best articles on refugees and migration 23/2019

1. New reports from migrant detention camps in Libya

Sally Hayden wrote for Al Jazeera that Zintan detention centre was not built for people, but was previously used for storing crops. Yet 500 people have been held here since warring factions reached Tripoli.

Conditions, say the UN, are inhuman and degrading. There’s little water, food is scarce and disease is rampant.. The migrants from across Africa who are being held there are organising protests.. Channel 4 News has obtained shocking pictures from inside the camp, showing just how perilous the situation there has become.

Also from Libya is Abdul Rahman Milad, better known by the nom de guerre “Al Bija”. “Commander Bija owes a lot to Europe”, wrote Nello Scavo, as his “coast guard” has been funded and outfitted by Italy and the EU. As Nancy Porsia wrote for Open Migration, Bija has been blacklisted by the UN Security Council for his crimes against migrants.

2. Migrant workers protest in Foggia for equal rights

USB union man Aboubakar Soumahoro, always first in line for the rights of farm workers, invited Italians and migrants alike to join the protests calling for equal jobs and equal salaries for all.

Many answered the call, marching through the city streets to the Prefecture building, calling for equal salaries and proper housing.

As Tatiana Bellizzi reported, news broke out during the march of yet another street accident that killed two migrant farm workers.

We have written several reports about the harsh life of migrant farm workers in Apulia: Ilaria Romano visited the Capitanata ghettos, where the workers are paid 3 to 4 euros for 359 kilos of tomatoes.

Leone Palmieri took us to “la Fabbrica”, a former Granarolo plant, where Fula and Mandinka workers have come together to protect each other from the cutthroat reality of the agricultural market.

3. When the centre-left wins elections with an anti-immigration shift

A ban on burqas and niqabs in the streets, confiscations of valuables from refugees, and denial of citizenship for immigrants who decline to shake hands: Anna Maria Merlo wrote in Manifesto about some of the more controversial measured adopted by the outgoing Danish government, which were passed with the support of the Social Democrat opposition.

The majority of analysts agree that it was party leader Mette Frederiksen’s hardline stance on immigration that have led to the Social Democrats’ recent victory.

But discrimination cases are up and the number of racially or religiously motivated hate crimes surged in 2017 from the year before, as Jon Henley wrote in the Guardian.

Must the European left, however, really avoid a confrontation on the issue of migration, as Paolo Mieli wrote on Corriere della Sera?

4. Money Transfer, Italy is still a country of emigrants

They don’t steal jobs, they don’t cost the government money, and their contribution to the pension system is crucial. Yet the fundamental role played by foreign workers in Italy is too often obscured by anti-immigrant slogans.

Now a recent study dispels another myth on foreign workers: Italians abroad send much more money home than foreign workers in Italy do.

5. Solidarity targeted in France

From Calais to Dunkirk, those who help migrants and refugees are routinely targeted by authorities. According to Amnesty, between November 2017 and June 2018 there have been  646 separate instances of police abuse against volunteers.

Intimidation also comes in the form of judicial rulings, like the one issued by a court in Boulogne-sur-Mer against the 37-year-old Iranian imam of a mosque outside Rouen, who received a jail sentence of 2 years for helping migrants cross the Channel on a rubber boat.

6. Deaths in the Mediterranean have increased tenfold over the last 2 years

Almost 700 people have left the coast of Libya in recent days, only 5% of whom were intercepted by the Libyan coastguard and sent back to detention centres. Forty per cent arrived in Malta and 11% in Italy; it is not known what happened to the others.. Read the article by Lorenzo Tondo in the Guardian, with UNHCR spokeswoman Carlotta Sami quoted as saying, “If we do not intervene soon, there will be a sea of blood.”

Without rescue ships in the area, the death toll might rise even more dramatically.

According to the latest report by Medu-Medici per i diritti umani, the likelihood of dying at sea while trying to reach Europe has increased tenfold.

Speaking of tragedies in the Mediterranean, hearings began today in Rome for the Libra trial, on the delays and omissions which led to a shipwreck in 2013, causing more than 300 fatalities.

7. The only way out for migrants detained in Libya is through Niger

Since November 2017, 1,248 have been transferred from Niger to safe countries such as Belgium, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK and the USA. It’s a paltry number if one thinks that, according to the UNHCR, there are still at least 57,000 refugees in Libya, but one that for many spelled the end of torture and imprisonment in Libyan camps.

Annalisa Camilli wrote in Internazionale about the transit centre of Hamdallaye, the only one in Africa to allow emergency transfer of refugees imprisoned in Libya.

8. Safe humanitarian corridors in Italy

Nearly 1,500 have safely arrived in Italy, thanks to the humanitarian corridors setup by Comunità di Sant’Egidio, the Federation of Evangelical Churches of Italy and the Waldensian Church.

58 people flew in directly from Lebanon, and landed in Fiumicino on June 4. Among those reunited –  Anna Ditta wrote in The Post internazionale about Simon and Rodima, reunited after 2 years – were Mohammad, Wafa, Ibrahim, Osama and Ahmed, whom Eleonora Camilli and Federica Mameli met in Beirut shortly before leaving.

9. Orders against sea rescue, three prosecutors are investigating Salvini

New developments in the story of the Sea Watch, which on May 15 disembarked 65 migrants on Lampedusa, despite being refused a landing port:  according to a report by Avvenire, the Agrigento prosecutors are investigating the orders issued by the ministry to refuse the German NGO ship permission to dock in Italian ports.

++ Esclusiva Avvenire Procura di Palermo apre inchiesta e acquisisce atti Viminale su direttive contro le Ong ++ Il documento. Tre procure indagano su Salvini e gli ordini contro i soccorsi in mare@nelloscavo @avvenire_nei https://t.co/CGqsqnzukE

— nello scavo (@nelloscavo) June 6, 2019

As Fanpage reported, the ongoing investigation was disclosed not by the interior ministry, but the general command of port authorities, in response to a request filed on May 21 by attorney Alessandra Ballerini on behalf of Associazione Diritti e frontiere (ADIF). They explained that they could not provide the requested documents, as the events in question are being investigated in the Palermo court, which restricts access to the documents.

On its part, Scavo continues, the interior ministry has denied this version: they are not aware of any investigation by the Palermo prosecutors into the ministry’s dealing with the Sea Watch 3.

Whether the ports be closed or open, the boats keep coming: 300 new arrivals over the last few days, wrote Claudio Del Frate in Corriere della Sera.

10. The story of Karamoko: from a Libyan prison to playing soccer with Padova

Violence in Guinea, the deaths of his family, prison in Libya and then the crossing on a rubber boat and the shipwreck. Cherif Karamolo’s odyssey found a happy ending in a reception centre and a much-longed for debut in serie B with the Padova soccer team: “When I started training with the team, everyone was kind to me; they were giving me shoes and jerseys and treating me like a brother. I saw that a pair of shoes they gifted me was 150 euros, and I thought about how I used to mend my old ones with a knife.” Read his incredible story in Giulio Di Feo’s interview for Gazzetta dello Sport.

Cover photo by:  Bruce van Zyl