MIGRATION

A young man from Gambia who had been living in Italy for two years has committed suicide. The Babele association, a refugee support group, said that his asylum request had been rejected and that ”he wanted to go back to Africa but he was afraid that he would be seen as a failure and was ashamed. He thought he had …

Migrant agricultural workers in some parts of southern Italy are “enduring extreme levels of labour exploitation and coercion, and inhumane working and living conditions,” the UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, Urmila Bhoola, said after a 10-day visit to Italy. The rapporteur said that she was concerned about the fact that the basic needs of workers for water, …

Germany’s statistics office has published new figures for net migration to the country in 2017 with some surprise findings. The figures show more Germans are returning to the country and staying put. In 2017, net migration to Germany dropped by around one-fifth year-on-year to about 416,000, the Federal Office for Statistics (Destatis) said on Monday. The agency noted that net …

The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has announced that no fewer than 10,000 Nigerians, have voluntarily returned from Libya between April 2017 and October 2018. The South West Zonal Coordinator of NEMA, Yakubu Suleiman, made this disclosure while receiving a new batch of 161 returnees, who arrived Lagos on Friday (12 October). Suleiman said the Nigerians were assisted back in …

Federal Interior Minister Horst Seehofer has reportedly indicated a drop in irregular migration numbers. He had made a tough stance on irregular migration a hallmark of his Interior Ministry. German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer last week said he does not expect Germany to see as many irregular migrants and refugees this year as projected. Earlier reports estimated that up to …

Italy has warned Germany not to deport asylum-seekers back to Italy. Reports say the German state of Bavaria is preparing to send asylum-seekers back to Italy, insisting that the cases must be processed at the point of entry. Shamil Shams reports. German news agency DPA has learnt that authorities in the southern German state of Bavaria were planning to start …

The Organization for Migration (IOM) has released new statistics on migrant crossings to Europe via the Atlantic Ocean. So far, 1,741 people have died trying to make it to Europe through the Mediterranean. The UN agency said that a total of 82,100 migrants and refugees have reached Europe by sea in 2018 as of September 30. Spain saw the largest …

A group of Nigerian migrants held captive inside a detention centre in Libya have been rescued after releasing a video taken on their phones. The footage went viral on social media and caught the attention of the authorities. Sertan Sanderson of InfoMigrants reports. The migrants held in Zawiya in Libya reportedly risked their lives to shoot the video, which shows …

The coalition partners in the federal government have agreed on new laws that will prioritize education, age and financial security in admitting new migrants to Germany. The laws are based on the Canadian model. Germany’s coalition government announced in the early hours of Tuesday (2 October) that they had agreed on new immigration laws after several months of back and …

Morocco’s navy on Tuesday (25 September) fired on a speedboat carrying migrants, leaving a young woman dead and three other people injured. Naval authorities said the boat had refused to respond to orders. A total of 25 people were on the boat travelling in waters off the Moroccan region of M’diq-Fnideq. A local official said they were lying down and …

Against the backdrop of fighting among militia groups in Tripoli, Vincent Cochetel, the UN Refugee Agency’s special envoy for the Central Mediterranean route, told Italian press agency ANSA in an interview that the situation in Libya has become ‘extremely critical,’ and that the agency no longer has access to official detention centres. Vincent Cochetel told ANSA that as of the …

The number of migrant arrivals to Italy has dropped significantly, while the number of migrants arriving in Spain have doubled, making it now the top port for migrant arrivals, followed by Greece. Migrant reception centres on Greece’s Aegean Islands are experiencing alarming rates of overcrowding, at a nearly record-breaking rate of 20,000 migrants. Brussels is pushing the Greek government to …

More than 100 people, including 20 children, died in early September when their rubber boats were wrecked off the coast of Libya, according to the aid agency Doctors Without Borders. Only two bodies have been recovered thus far. Sertan Sanderson/InfoMigrants reports on the latest tragedy in the Mediterranean. According to Doctors Without Borders (known by the French initials MSF), hundreds …

Amnesty International has spoken out against Moroccan authorities’ treatment of thousands of sub-Saharan migrants and refugees, saying that its ”relentless crackdown” is ”cruel and unlawful”. Amnesty International released a statement on Friday excoriating Moroccan authorities’ treatment of sub-Saharan migrants and refugees. ”The Moroccan authorities’ large-scale crackdown on thousands of sub-Saharan migrants, asylum seekers and refugees without due process is cruel …

The risk of death at sea for people crossing the Mediterranean continues to increase as the EU and member states attempt to stamp out refugee flows from Libya. A report by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) out on Monday (3 September) says that while the number of arrivals from Libya has dropped, the proportion of people lost at sea has …

Almost 20,000 people have marched through Berlin and Hamburg demanding that Germany take in more migrants stranded at sea. Sunday’s marches were organized in response to the violent anti-migrant protests in Chemnitz. Up to 16,000 people marched through the northern German city of Hamburg on Sunday, urging officials to open up the city’s ports to stranded migrant rescue ships in …

Protests by some residents in a Paris neighbourhood resulted in the postponement of the opening of a migrant reception centre for hundreds of migrants in the French capital. The Paris prefecture has postponed the opening of a migrant reception centre for hundreds of migrants in Paris in the arrondissement of Montmartre, after residents staged a protest. Residents said they were …

President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday warned Nigerians who continue to migrate from the country through illegal routes, despite the inherent dangers, that they are on their own. He said such people make the uncertain trips at their own risk. Buhari said this during a joint press conference he had with the visiting German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, at the Presidential Villa, …

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s open-door policy has seen over a million migrants enter Germany in the past three years. But the vast majority have been unable to find work. Current figures show that just over a quarter of these new arrivals feature on a payroll. Meanwhile, for those who are employed, migration policy has become stricter. Several companies are now calling …

A group of migrants recently held a ground-breaking protest in Libya. The protesters, most of whom were Ethiopian or Eritrean, forced open the doors of a detention centre, where they were being held, and marched towards the capital, Tripoli, which is about 20 kilometres away. They demanded help from the United Nations as well as human rights organisations. Since they …