Refugees, Migrants and Displaced Persons

Pope Francis observed the sixth anniversary of his pastoral visit to Lampedusa. He spoke powerfully of the vulnerability and exploitation that migrants face. In doing so he implicitly underlined the critical need to foreground the moral responsibility.

1. Introduction

During the past month or so the world has witnessed again the vulnerabilities, dangers and horrific conditions that migrants face as they try to escape from a myriad of overwhelming social pathologies. The photograph of the drowned Salvadorian migrants, Alberto Ramirez and his two year old daughter Valeria, clinging to each other in death, has again spoken powerfully to the consciences of people around the world, and prompted a renewed awareness of the deep, systemic crises in migration policies in the USA and beyond.1 Pope Francis added his lament to other voices of grief and ire at yet another drowning,2 and the US Episcopal Conference issued one of its strongest statements to date. On 3rd July a detention centre for migrants east of Tripoli in Libya was bombed, killing 44 migrants and injuring 130. The United Nations called this act, credibly blamed on General Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army as part of their fight to control the area, “a war crime and an odious bloody carnage.” 3 According to the NGO Médecins Sans Frontières, there are around 3 100 migrants in that camp, and an estimated 600 000 to 1 million migrants in Libya as a whole. 4 They all hope to cross the Mediterranean to begin a new life in Europe.

2. The Church’s Response

The US Bishops’ statement pointed out that the Ramirez tragedy showed ‘the failure to find just solutions to the migration crises.’ It should be noted, too, that this tragedy followed revelations about overcrowding at migrant facilities on the border with Mexico, the separation of children from their families, proof of children being caged in holding facilities, and the manipulation of the law by the Trump administration.5 A close reading of the US Bishops’ statement is instructive particularly because it shows a receptiveness to the shifts in Church thinking around issues to do with displaced persons. Their language shows an openness to the right of people to migrate beyond the strict grounds that justify the movement of bona fide refugees as articulated in the 1951 UN Refugee Convention, especially with regard to people fleeing domestic and other forms of abuse, gang violence, the activities of drug cartels and poverty. There is a move from understanding the driving factors of poverty and the desire for a dignified life, not merely as a question of ‘better opportunities’ but as a more fundamental matter of sheer survival. In the light of this paradigm shift, the Bishops’ statement emphasised that the USA – and by implication all nations – should be places of refuge for those fleeing violence, persecution and poverty. Indeed, flight from poverty is becoming increasingly established in Catholic Social Thought as a legitimate ground for crossing borders. Secondly, the statement reiterates the right of all people, irrespective of status, to be treated with dignity and respect. This is of fundamental importance as many states are wont to normalisebad treatment on the basis of the status of displaced persons. This increasingly includes the withdrawal of protection against arbitrary detention and similar punitive measures. The Bishops also appealed for ‘humane policies’ for migrants, including an increase in the budget to provide social support for them and especially for unaccompanied minors. They urged bipartisan action in this regard, this amid President Trump’s placing blame for the deaths at the door of the Democratic Party by claiming that such things happen because the Democrats ‘want open borders and open borders means crime and people drowning in rivers.’6 This principle of protection and support for all displaced persons was clearly articulated in church teaching already in the early 1960s in magisterial documents such as Pacem in Terris and Mater et Magistra, where it is clearly stated (for example in Pacem in Terris #30) that there is a responsibility to support people in accessing their basic human rights irrespective of how they came to be in their situation of need or vulnerability.7

3. The Urgency of the Problem

The issue of migration and the protection of migrants is a high priority, given that at present 258 million people live outside of their countries of origin, constituting 3% of the world’s population. In many cases this migration is the result of various degrees of compulsion. 8 There is something deeply sinister when vulnerable groups become pawns in local political skirmishes. It also speaks to the failure of states to provide the necessary measures of protection for displaced persons. Most of the migrants affected by the Libyan bombing had already endured tremendous hardship and cruelty on the way to Libya. Reports of rape are common, as are theft and exploitation. Reacting to this bombing Pope Francis said “today’s world is increasingly becoming more elitist and cruel towards the excluded”. The Holy Father went on to condemn the “complicit silence” of so many and urged for fewer “calculations” and more “solidarity and mercy” when responding to today’s phenomenon of migration. The Pope also appealed for the evacuation of the remaining migrants in various camps in Libya.9 UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric articulated the crucial point well: “This incident underscores the urgency to provide all refugeesand migrants with safe shelter until their asylum claims can be processed or they can be safely repatriated.” 10 Pope Francis reiterated his deep concern at the Sunday Angelus on 7th July, warning that the international community cannot ignore such grave concerns.11 It is also worth noting that the Pope mentioned it together with references to the recent massacres in Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso and Afghanistan. This leans to the understanding that all massacres are wrong, all fatal political skirmishes are morally unacceptable, and that the common practice of cherry-picking human tragedies, especially for political expediency, is an abhorrent practice. While it is clear that not every migrant is necessarily vulnerable, the UN Human Rights Commission reports that “migrants in an irregular situation tend to be disproportionately vulnerable to discrimination, exploitation and marginalization, often living and working in the shadows, afraid to complain, and denied their human rights and fundamental freedoms.” 

4. The Duty to Protect

Pope Francis has several times spoken of protection as a moral duty. He has explained it thus: “Protecting these brothers and sisters is a moral imperative which translates into adopting juridical instruments, both international and national, that must be clear and relevant; implementing just and farreaching political choices; prioritising constructive processes, which perhaps are slower, over immediate results of consensus; implementing timely and humane programmes in the fight against ‘the trafficking of human flesh’ which profits off others’ misfortune; co-ordinating the efforts of all actors, among which, you may be assured will always be the Church.” 13 In the church’s teaching, contrary to the direction of most political practices in this regard, protection is afforded on the basis of every person’s dignity and not firstly on their status as illegals, asylum seekers or any variation thereof. 14 This is a very different starting point for any discussion of protection. Pope Francis articulated this clearly in a comment on unaccompaniedchildren trying to cross the border into the USA from Mexico. He said, “this humanitarian emergency requires, as a first urgent measure, that these children be welcomed and protected.”15 The Pope’s words point to one of the key protections which should be enshrined in national policies: that everyone, including migrants, should be protected from arbitrary detention, especially arbitrary immigration detention. There should be no room in legislation for provisions for the detention of migrant children because of their or their parent’s migration status. In the light of practices to the contrary around the world, this form of protection needs special vigilance.16 Closely linked to this is another area of protection especially close to the faith community’s pastoral concerns. This is the need to ensure protection for the family unity of migrant families and to facilitate family reunification.17

5. Protecting the Protectors

Another area of protection is the need to respect and support the activities of human rights defenders who protect and promote the human rights of migrants.18 This has become particularly necessary seen against the current trend of criminalising the humanitarian responses of activists and aid workers in this sector. The number of cases of people being charged criminally or being investigated for assisting migrants and refugees has grown substantially over the past decade. Such cases have been reported in Spain, France, Germany, Italy, Denmark and Greece. There have also been reports of legislation designed to deter human traffickers being used against humanitarian actors.19 Two rescue ships carrying shipwrecked migrants that sought safe landing along the Italian coast near Lampedusa were refused landing, but the captains docked against the instructions. They faced a $57 000 fine for the captain, owner and operator and a jail sentence for the captain. The captain of the one vessel, Carola Rackele, was detained but later freed by an Italian judge. This is another instance of the criminalising of humanitarian help.

6. International Obligations

The decree of the Italian Interior Minister prohibiting the Lampedusa landing went against the provisions of the Dublin Rules, which stipulate that asylum requests be handled by the first place of entry. In fact it appears that many nations conveniently ignore the obligations and responsibilities that accrue from the various international Human Rights Conventions and Protocols. The protections offered in these documents are also based on the fundamental concepts of human dignity.20 It seems that several countries which now seek to deny or offer protection only on the basis of the ‘refugee status’ of the applicant might well be in contravention of protocols to which they are signatories.21 One of the very obvious advocacy tasks for those working in the policy domain is thus to ensure the harmonisation of domestic policies with international obligations. There is an increasing, almost silent, creeping capture of that space, to the disadvantage of the displaced persons.22 This applies to government offices, law enforcement agencies, and the administrative machinery of the state. One of the troubling features of these exclusionary narratives is that the paradigm foregrounded by the Church – that of recognising a wide range of driving factors behind migration, not just the traditional causes such as war and political oppression – is already present in many civil discourses and international protocols on the subject.

7. Conclusion

Recently Pope Francis observed the sixth anniversary of his pastoral visit to Lampedusa. He spoke powerfully of the vulnerability and exploitation that migrants face. In doing so he implicitly underlined the critical need to foreground the moral responsibility of providing protection. He said: “These least ones are abandoned and cheated into dying in the desert; these least ones are tortured, abused and violated in detention camps; these least ones face the waves of an unforgiving sea; these least ones are left in reception camps too long for them to be called temporary. These are only some of the least ones who Jesus asks us to love and raise up. Unfortunately the existential peripheries of our cities are densely populated with persons who have been thrown away, marginalized, oppressed, discriminated against, abused, exploited, abandoned, poor and suffering. In 4 BP 481 Refugees, Migrants and Displaced Persons the spirit of the Beatitudes we are called to comfort them in their affliction and offer them mercy; to state their hunger and thirst for justice; to let them experience God’s caring fatherliness; to show them the way to the Kingdom of Heaven. They are persons; these are not mere social or migrant issues! This is not just about migrants, in the twofold sense that migrants are first of all human persons, and that they are the symbol of all those rejected by today’s globalized society.” 23