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This report analyses the rise of online fake job advertisements in Pakistan and their links to irregular migration, migrant smuggling, and human trafficking. Conducted under the Norwegian-funded FJA-PAK project, it combines desk research and stakeholder consultations to assess the social, political, and legal context, as well as the methods used by criminal networks.

The findings show that most fake job advertisements are designed to defraud prospective migrants rather than directly facilitate smuggling or trafficking. Scammers often request small, repeated payments to avoid suspicion and prolong exploitation. While some cases are connected to more serious crimes like trafficking, these are less frequent and typically involve more complex, transnational coordination.

Digital platforms—especially social media and messaging apps—play a key role in advertising fraudulent jobs, communicating with victims, and handling international payments. However, cash remains widely used for domestic transactions. Criminal networks are generally informal and loosely organised, though trafficking groups tend to be more structured and sophisticated.

Pakistan has recently strengthened its legal and policy frameworks, including reforms targeting smuggling, trafficking, and cybercrime. Despite this progress, challenges persist. In practice, distinguishing between smuggling and trafficking remains difficult, complicating law enforcement efforts. Additionally, broadly classifying all online crime as cybercrime risks overwhelming specialised units, weakening understanding of offline links, and potentially reducing penalties.

To address these issues, the report recommends stronger inter-agency coordination through clear procedures and joint task forces, increased investment in technology and training, and improved trust and collaboration among stakeholders.

In conclusion, while Pakistan has made important strides in promoting safe migration and combating exploitation, gaps in institutional capacity and prevention remain. Addressing these weaknesses is essential to disrupt criminal networks and better protect vulnerable migrants.

Monitoring is essential to ensuring that return procedures uphold Europe’s human rights commitments and remain accountable to public scrutiny. The FAiR Policy Brief examines how fundamental rights monitoring operates within the EU’s return systems and proposes ways to enhance its action.

Under the EU Return Directive, Member States must monitor forced return operations to safeguard migrants’ rights. With the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum and the proposed EU Return Regulation, the scope and role of monitoring are expected to expand significantly — making this an opportune moment to address existing legal and operational gaps.

Key Findings:

• Positive impact of monitoring: Fundamental rights monitoring has improved compliance with human rights standards during forced returns, notably in preventing ill-treatment, protecting vulnerable individuals, and ensuring access to medical care.
   
• Inconsistent implementation across Member States: National monitoring mechanisms vary widely in prerogatives and resources. Some are housed in Ombudsman institutions, others within government bodies or NGOs — leading to uneven access to information, detention sites, and flight monitoring.
   
• Limited scope of current monitoring: Monitoring covers only forced return operations, leaving assisted voluntary return and reintegration (AVR(R)) programmes, pre-departure administrative detention, and external border operations relatively unchecked despite rights risks.
   
• Lack of post-return monitoring: Most national mechanisms do not track migrants’ situation after return, weakening compliance with the non-refoulement principle and depriving authorities of valuable country-of-origin data.

This publication provides a regional perspective to ICMPD’s Migration Outlook 2026, delving into key current and emerging migration trends in the Mediterranean region, with a focus on countries of North Africa and the Middle East. Whilst it does not have the ambition to foretell the future or cover all relevant trends, the Mediterranean Migration Outlook aims to highlight significant scenarios to consider in 2026 based on the analysis of recent data and policy developments.

ICMPD's Pan-Africa Regional Migration Outlook identifies six key trends that are expected to shape migration dynamics and policy discourse across Sub-Saharan Africa in 2026. These trends reflect structural drivers, evolving governance responses and shifting geopolitical contexts that are likely to influence both mobility patterns and the broader narrative surrounding migration in the year ahead.

ICMPD’s Migration Outlook for the Silk Routes region presents a brief analysis of recent regional migration and policy trends and provides an outlook on developments to watch out for in 2026.

The Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EECA) Migration Outlook presents an analysis of the key events and trends that shaped migration in the EECA region in 2025. It also provides a cautious outlook into areas and issues that may affect migration and mobility to, within, and from the region in 2026.

This report examines how migration will shape the region’s demographic and socio-economic future by 2035 under two trajectories: EU Integration, marked by institutional strengthening and circular mobility, and Strategic Isolation, characterised by governance stagnation and one-way outflows.

This publication was produced in the framework of the Prague Process Migration Observatory. The Prague Process is funded by the European Union through the Migration Partnership Facility (MPF), which is implemented by the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD).

Rather than an exceptional measure, regularisation is a frequent response to resolve situations of longer term, protracted irregularity. This handbook argues that regularisation should be considered a standard element of the migration policy toolbox, providing a structured route for irregular migrants to regularise their status when other options, such as return, are not feasible. Irregular migration should be understood as a structural feature of contemporary societies, arising from ongoing labour demand, family and social networks, individual migration aspirations, and restrictive entry and residence policies. This handbook provides practical, evidence-based guidance on the design, implementation, and evaluation of regularisation policies, highlighting their impacts on labour markets, social cohesion, and migrant rights. Drawing on experiences from Europe, North America, and other world regions, it examines how different policy approaches operate, how key actors shape outcomes, and how procedural design affects accessibility, inclusivity, and legitimacy. It underscores that regularisation, when carefully implemented, can reduce informality, enhance integration, and strengthen fiscal and social contributions.

MIrreM Factsheet, September 2025 - MIrreM examines estimates and statistical indicators on the irregular migrant population in Europe as well as related policies, including the regularisation of migrants in irregular situations.

ICMPD’s Migration Outlook presents a brief analysis of recent migration and policy trends and provides an outlook on developments and events to watch out for in 2026. It does not claim to foretell the future or to cover all relevant trends. It aims to use past experience and highlight what might happen, as well as what is important to consider.

Das Ziel der LOCALIZE-Studie war es, ein besseres Verständnis für die lebensweltlichen Realitäten und Dynamiken des Zusammenlebens verschiedener Bevölkerungsgruppen in städtischen Räumen zu gewinnen, die stark von sozialer Vielfalt und Zuwanderung geprägt sind. Zudem sollten Ansatzpunkte für Maßnahmen zur Förderung integrativer Dynamiken identifiziert werden. Dabei wurden drei zentrale Perspektiven betrachtet: die Lebenswelt der Anrainer:innen, die Dynamiken des Zusammenlebens sowie der integrationspolitische Kontext auf Stadt- und Stadtteilebene. Ziel war es, mögliche Zusammenhänge zwischen (halb-)öffentlichen Räumen, Integrationserfahrungen und sozialem Miteinander einerseits und der Relevanz integrationspolitischer Maßnahmen für das Zusammenleben andererseits zu beleuchten.

Die Feldforschung von LOCALIZE untersuchte daher zentrale Aspekte sozialer Integration in den drei Stadtteilen Salzburg-Lehen, Graz-Gries und Wien-Favoriten. Mithilfe der im Projekt entwickelten Untersuchungsinstrumente wurden diese systematisch beobachtet und hinsichtlich ihrer integrativen und desintegrativen Wirkungen analysiert.

Soziale Integration wurde dabei in Bezug auf zwei Dimensionen verstanden: (1) als der Grad der Einbeziehung von Individuen oder Gruppen in die soziale Ordnung vor Ort und (2) als die Art der Beziehungen, die diese Individuen und Gruppen miteinander aufbauen und pflegen. Die Untersuchung bezog sich auf alle Bewohner:innen und Anrainer:innen der drei Stadtteile und nicht ausschließlich auf bestimmte Untergruppen wie beispielsweise Migrant:innen.

This study explores the challenges and opportunities surrounding the ratification and popularisation of the African Union Free Movement Protocol (AU FMP). Drawing on lessons from the European Union and Africa’s Regional Economic Communities (RECs), it responds to the growing recognition among African Union (AU) Member States and RECs that the continent’s aspiration for deeper regional integration and socio-economic transformation cannot be fully realised without the free movement of persons. While political will to enhance mobility exists, practical implementation remains constrained by security concerns, socio-economic issues, and limited institutional and technical capacity.

This guide is designed as a comprehensive resource supporting trainers in the delivery of engaging training sessions and modules as part of the ‘Migration in Africa – Myths and Realities: A Trainers’ Manual on Migration Governance for Media Practitioners and Communication Specialists in CSOs/NGOs’ (for short: communicators). As trainers, pay particular attention to the fact that while these target groups work in similar ways, they partially have different needs when communicating about migration as part of their professions.

This Trainers’ Manual on Migration Governance for Media Practitioners and Communication Specialists in CSO/NGOs is in response to a need by journalists and civil society in Africa, some of whom work in the migration sector, but also have the potential to play a critical advocacy role.