MIGRATION

France has called an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council over slave-trading in Libya as President Emmanuel Macron condemned the auctioning of Africans as a crime against humanity. “France decided this morning to ask for an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council to discuss this issue,” Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told parliament on Wednesday (22 November). …

Deportees from Libya reveal the horrors of the migrant slave trade as they arrive home. Ivorian migrants returning from Libyan detention centres have confirmed the sale of slaves in the North African country. A total of 155 returned to Abidjan on Monday night, each with a tale to tell. Trying to make their way to a new life in Europe, …

Organisations of people of African descent have called for a public protest against the trade in sub-Saharan migrants in Libya on Saturday, 25 November. The event, named ‘Demonstration to End the Enslavement, Rape, Torture and Killings of Blacks in Libya’, will take place in front of the Libyan Embassy in Berlin. Organised by, among other organisations, Black Community Hamburg, Lampedusa …

Legendary Ivorian reggae musician, Alpha Blondy, known in private life as Seydou Kone, has waded into the debate for sub-Saharan African leaders to help protect their citizens wherever they find themselves. His recent call is on the African Union and the West African regional bloc, ECOWAS, to take decisive action on migrant abuse in the North African country of Libya, …

CNN report showing trade in sub-Saharan migrants in Libya has sparked outrage in Africa and the global Black community, Sola Jolaoso reports. A grainy cell phone video showing unidentified African men being sold in an auction in Libya was obtained by CNN last month. One of the ‘slaves’ being sold is a Nigerian, whom the American news channel estimated to …

Italy’s southern city of Salerno held a mass funeral on Friday for 26 young women from Nigeria who drowned earlier this month trying to cross the Mediterranean. Twenty-six coffins were laid out in Salerno’s Monumental Cemetery on Friday morning, watched by a military guard, local politicians, rescue workers and journalists. A Catholic archbishop and a Muslim imam both said prayers. …

The Federal Statistical Office has revealed that 2 percent of the people who lived in Germany at the end of 2016 had lodged asylum applications. That’s more than double the figure for 2014. Ben Knight reports. On Friday, the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) revealed that 1.6 million people were officially registered as “seeking protection for humanitarian reasons” in Germany at …

Edo State gets tough on people smuggling as increasing numbers of its indigenes drown in the Mediterranean. The government of Edo State, Nigeria, has announced its intention to make a law criminalizing human trafficking. The intention of the legislation, according to the state’s commissioner for justice, Prof. Yinka Omorogbe, is to curb the activities of persons engaged in the irregular …

Two men, one of them an Egyptian and the other a Libyan, have been arrested and charged in Italy as investigators look into the deaths of 26 Nigerian women and girls, who are suspected to have been murdered while attempting to cross the Mediterranean. The bodies of the women were brought to the southern Italian port of Salerno by the …

The remains of 26 Nigerian women believed to be migrants have been recovered from a Spanish warship in the Italian coast city of Salerno. A report by the British Broadcasting Corporation on Monday said a Spanish warship, Cantabria, which docked in the city, was found to be carrying 375 rescued migrants and the dead women. According to the report, 23 …

What happens when officials refuse an applicant’s request for asylum? In Germany, applicants have recourse to administrative courts and can even approach the European Court of Human Rights. Here is a short explanation. Types of rejection The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees or BAMF can reject applications for asylum if its officials believe that the individual concerned does not …

The German government has admitted that it does not always know the whereabouts of rejected asylum seekers, but argues that the number doesn’t tell the whole truth. The government’s asylum agency faces a file backlog. Ben Knight reports. Around 30,000 rejected asylum seekers have simply disappeared from Germany’s records, a German newspaper has claimed, though the government and refugee organizations …

There is currently a humanitarian crisis in Libya where between 800,000 and 1 million migrants are trapped. Most of them are waiting to embark on the perilous journey across the Mediterranean to Europe. With new measures adopted by the Libyan government and other similar developments, the chances of the overwhelming majority of the migrants reaching Europe are almost foreclosed. Most …

Requests for asylum in Switzerland dropped by a third in September, bringing the total for the first nine months of 2017 to just under 14,000, the lowest since 2010, government data showed. A drop since mid-July in the number of would-be refugees trying to reach Europe via the Mediterranean played a role, the State Secretariat for Migration has said, adding …

While praising Germany’s openness toward refugees, the UN refugee agency UNHCR has called on newly elected German lawmakers to further improve the situation and prospects for refugees, reports Ashutosh Pandey. The German office of the UN refugee agency UNHCR has urged the newly elected members of the Bundestag, which will hold its first session on Tuesday, to provide the right …

This is the moving story of Mohamed, a Cameroonian, about his 3-year journey through North Africa in his attempt to reach Europe. It’s a story of ordeal and suffering and encounters with death, which made the young man to finally decide to return home. “I left Cameroon back in 2013 to find work elsewhere. I spent a year and a …

Success rates for asylum applications in Germany vary widely from state to state, according to a new report by Funke Mediengruppe. But the varying rates raise questions over how Germany processes asylum requests. Iraqis much more likely to get asylum in Bremen than in Berlin, official figures show. For example, the protection rate for Iraqi refugees in Bremen during the …

Prince Wale Soniyiki, a refugee from Nigeria, says his own story shows how migrants can find their place in Croatia – if the country gives them a chance. In Croatia, just 30 refugees have jobs. Prince Wale Soniyiki wants to change that. He found work via a TV show and a former army leader, now he wants to help other …

The death rate among migrants attempting to cross the Mediterranean to reach Europe almost doubled this year, although fewer migrants made the journey, according to a new report released by the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The number of migrants who crossed the Mediterranean to reach Europe in 2017 has decreased compared to the same period last year. However, the …

A woman from Ghana gave birth to a baby girl on Wednesday morning (6 September) onboard a Spanish NGO vessel immediately after she was rescued trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea from Libya to Italy. Despite a lack of sterile hospital conditions, the on-board doctor, with the help of crew members, successfully delivered the baby girl before returning to harbour, …