By Judi McLeod ——Bio and Archives--December 2, 2018
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"The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration was agreed at the United Nations in July following 18 months of negotiations and will be formally adopted at a conference in Marrakesh on December 10 and 11." (Rappler)
"Since then, Australia, Israel, Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Austria, Switzerland and Bulgaria have either publicly disavowed the pact or notified the United Nations that they are withdrawing. (Rappler) "The pact promoting cooperation to deal with the world's growing migrant flows has been targeted by right-wing politicians who denounce it as an affront to their countries' national sovereignty. "Some politicians, as it turned out, would say something like 'migration is a bad thing'," Louise Arbour, the UN special envoy for international migration, said."
"Ahmed Hussen is Canada's Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship. Marie-Claude Bibeau is Canada's Minister of International Development. Jean-Nicolas Beuze is the representative in Canada of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). "There are few moments in history where the world comes together to devise a new plan that holds the promise of improving the lives of millions of people. The Global Compact on Refugees--which has now been released after two years of consultations with member states, intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations, and refugees themselves, and will be formally adopted by the UN General Assembly in the next couple of months--has the potential to be one of these moments. "The starting premise of the Compact is that caring for those forced to flee their home is a shared responsibility that must be borne more equitably and predictably. As stated by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau: "Millions of people around the world are fleeing their homes because of conflict and persecution. "The international community must come together to address their immediate needs and to help rebuild their lives." The Compact and its renewed commitment toward refugees and the countries and communities that host them is a moment of truth, as it calls upon all players--development actors, the private sector, non-governmental and faith-based organizations, and states--to contribute and to share responsibilities in a fairer manner.
"Canada was actively involved in the drafting of the Compact. With input from domestic NGOs, Canada was one of the first countries to offer concrete suggestions in the early days of the consultations around issues that the Compact should highlight and address, from the benefits of refugees' economic inclusion, to the imperative of increasing political and financial support for frontline hosting countries, to ways to increase pathways to durable solutions in third countries, and to the specific vulnerabilities faced by refugee women and girls. And as the chair of UNHCR's executive committee in 2017, Canada took an active role in convening partners on several issues in particular related to gender and education. "So Canada is committed to the task of leading and encouraging other partners to realize its ambitious goals, to ensure that action breathes life into the words of the Compact."Canada's leading role in the Migration pact with Trudeau in the driver's seat should come as no surprise. For decades the UN has been peopled by Canadians from the late former Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, Canadian Maurice Strong, all the way to his protege Louise Arbour, currently UN Envoy for International Migration who shepherded the UN Migration pact. Yesterday the Voice of Europe is sounding the alarm bells that the UN's Refugee Pac is even worse than its Migration Pact--and that both--will be signed in December. "In parallel with the highly criticised migration pact, the UN has also prepared a refugee pact. Both these treaties are intended to be signed at the conference in Morocco on 10-11 December. (Voice of Europe, Nov. 30, 2018)
"Even if the pact is not legally binding, it refers to obligations. Thus, a kind of soft laws that restrict the sovereignty of the countries. Some of the points included in the refugee pact are as follows:
Heads up to President Donald Trump, it's not just southward and at the D.C. swamp that you should be looking for saboteurs, but northward to the world's largest undefended border."It is not only the UN that works actively to bring about changes in migration issues, but also the EU and other actors. A relevant element is the EU document which concerns the promotion of relocation of refugees within the Member States. "The document uses terms like "compulsory measure", "legal instrument" and "hard sell", which suggests a binding character and that the authors of the document have recognised the difficulty of convincing the public of the proposals. "In this document, the EU has also calculated the maximum absorption capacity of each country and concluded that, for example, Germany is estimated to have a capacity of 274 million people and Sweden of 440 million (Table 12). "The treaty text of the UN refugee pact can be read in its entirety here."
- The refugee concept is extended to people affected by climate change and environmental destruction (paragraph 12).
- Every four years starting in 2019, a global refugee forum will check and produce an index for how each country has lived up to the agreement's obligations (paragraphs 17-19).
- A global academic network with universities, academic associations and research institutes will be established to create opportunities for refugees for education, research and scholarships (paragraph 43).
- Promote a positive attitude towards refugees being transferred from one country to another (paragraph 90).
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