News

2021 will be another challenging year for EU migration policy. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has not only caused a global health crisis of historic proportions but is also the event that impacted International migration in 2020 more than any other. It will continue to shape the migration year of 2021 according to the “ICMPD Migration Outlook 2021”, a landmark publication released by the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD).

Malta has been at the forefront of migration challenges in the Mediterranean for many years. As a country at the crossroads of Mediterranean cultures Malta has a unique and long-standing history related to the many aspects of migration. It has used this experience to bring the European Union and its African partners together to discuss migration issues at the Valletta Summit of 2015 and the Senior Officials’ Meeting that followed in Malta last year.

Afghanistan is second only to Syria in the number of refugees originating from within its borders in recent years. Officially, about 2.5 million refugees have left Afghanistan in the almost four decades of this country being marked by hostilities and terror. The unofficial figure for the number of people who have fled exceeds six million. The majority of them are currently in the neighbouring countries of Pakistan and Iran as well as in Türkiye. It is in this context that the first information centre for potential migrants was opened in Kabul, the Afghan capital, this week. 

To mark World Day against Trafficking in Persons 2019, this ICMPD Expert Voice article puts the spotlight on a neglected and under-reported form of human trafficking in the context of mixed migration: trafficking for forced migrant smuggling. 

The best way to understand the situation on migration routes to Europe is to listen to people who have made the journey. Our latest research study, “The Strength to Carry On - Resilience and Vulnerability to Trafficking and Other Abuses among People Travelling along Migration Routes to Europe”, analyses people’s resilience and vulnerabilities to human trafficking and other abuses in this context. The research found that understanding factors of resilience can help to prevent trafficking, and that resilience can be boosted or compromised by migration policies and practices. 

The continued increase in the proportion of the world's population living in urban areas has placed cities at the forefront for managing migration and its current challenges. Cities are now key actors and partners of choice for regional and inter-regional dialogues on migration, and taking their priorities into account could be beneficial to the migration dialogues in several ways.

This article presents some of the findings from our in-depth, multi-country research project “Study on Trafficking Resilience and Vulnerability en route to Europe (STRIVE)”. The analysis of the research findings is still ongoing, however first results are ready to be shared. 

The approach of states to managing immigration and asylum relies to a significant extent on the assignment of categories to people entering from abroad. Yet many adults and children travelling along migration routes do not fit neatly into just one of these categories. A new ICMPD Working Paper examines the challenges, and some possible ways forward, in dealing with the nexus between asylum, migrant smuggling and human trafficking in mixed migration contexts.

On 13-14 September 2018 the Austrian Ministry of Interior hosts a conference in Vienna under the auspices of its presidency of the Council of the European Union. The conference is dedicated to cooperation with third countries and is titled “Security and Migration – Promoting Partnership and Resilience”. It brings together home affairs ministers of EU member states and third countries as well as representatives of the relevant EU agencies and international organisations. 

When Nigerian migration is discussed in the European context – for example, at policy forums and research conferences, or in the media - a number of key issues are usually mentioned. These include: the experiences of Nigerian people transiting through Libya in order to reach Europe by sea; sex trafficking of Nigerian women by means of juju oaths; and the assumption of a widespread desire to migrate to Europe among the young and growing populations of the region. 

In 2018, the Joint EU-ICMPD “Migration EU Expertise” (MIEUX) Initiative celebrates its 10th anniversary. MIEUX, as a veritable pioneering capacity development global Initiative, has tremendously evolved since its inception, becoming a remarkable EU peer-to-peer expert facility with worldwide recognition. MIEUX’s transformation resonates with the opportunities and challenges that the EU and its partner countries share and corresponds to the shifts in migration governance, discourses, policies and institutions all over the globe. The 2017 Annual Report reflects this evolution by illustrating how the programme contributes to enhancing migration governance, furthering EU strategic priorities, and acting as a catalyst for knowledge exchange between migration experts. To mark the launch of the 2017 Annual Report, Oleg Chirita, Programme Coordinator of Global Initiatives, shares ten lessons learnt and their significance for the future of capacity building in the field of migration. 

Trafficking in human beings (THB) is a complex issue. At the heart of trafficking is the exploitation of one human being against their will by another, yet a large number of legal and social issues are linked with this process. As a result, trafficking can simultaneously be considered an organised crime challenge, a human rights violation, an issue linked with migration, labour market dynamics, gender or economic development. Each of these perspectives applies a different “narrative” to explain what human trafficking is and why it occurs. These different narratives sometimes present challenges for media professionals and journalists reporting on THB, and can lead to inaccurate or damaging representations of trafficking in the media.

On 20 May, ICMPD Türkiye and Western Balkans Regional Coordination Office hosted an international webinar on “Cooperation with Civil Society and Municipalities in Migration Management in Türkiye and the Netherlands”. The webinar brought together representatives of public authorities, civil society organisations (CSOs) and local administrations from the Netherlands and Türkiye to discuss best practices in cooperation in the field of migration management.

On 26 May 2021, ICMPD, in the framework of the project Libya’s Migration Technical Assistance Facility (LIBMITAF), took part in a mission to the southern city of Sabha, Libya. The mission was organised by the World Food Programme (WFP) Libya in order to discuss the needs and priorities of the Municipality together with Libyan and international stakeholders, including the mayor of Sabha, the EU Ambassador to Libya, and several UN representatives.

On 26 May, the EUROMED Migration V Programme (EMM5) organised an online Technical Briefing on the New EU Agenda for the Mediterranean. The event was attended by over 50 representatives of 22 EMM5 participating countries and by representatives of international organisations and European agencies.

As the pandemic reaches different stages in different countries, its longer-term impacts on the migration and employment landscape, as well as economic recovery, will become increasingly pressing priorities to address – and ones that will necessitate revisiting cooperation on labour migration schemes. In this context, the Republic of Malta and ICMPD, through its Member States Programme, organised an expert discussion on 27 May 2021 that explored the future of legal migration policies, with a focus on enhanced cooperation and partnerships that are responsive to the post-COVID-19 reality.

On 23 – 27 May, representatives nominated by the Jordanian Borders and Residency  Department (BRD), the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands as donor and ICMPD  gathered for the first basic training on document security. The event was organised at the Forensic Science Training Center in Amman.

On 13 May, the Ombudsman Office of the Republic of Moldova issued an order to appoint its Torture Prevention Directorate in charge of monitoring forced-returns. For the first time in the country’s history, it formally assigned a dedicated team of forced-return monitors. The act of appointment comes as a result of a series of earlier activities carried out within the framework of the project “Development of a Forced-Return Monitoring System in the Republic of Moldova” (FReMM). Those include a workshop with Moldovan stakeholders on sharing the EU good practices on forced-return monitoring and a meeting on agreeing the standard monitor’s profile for Moldova.

On 19 – 20 May, a meeting organised in Abuja under the auspices of the Working Group on Return and Reintegration (WGRR), chaired by the National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons of Nigeria (NCFRMI), gathered 33 participants from government institutions and civil society organisations from around the country, National Agency for Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) as well as international organisations.

On 17 May 2021, ICMPD within the EU-funded project "EU Support to Strengthening Integrated Border Management in Ukraine (EU4IBM)" launched the pilot initiative on prevention of cross-border crime at the green border between Ukraine and Romania. The pilot includes elements of technical re-equipment as well as joint capacity building and anti-corruption trainings implemented on the basis of the new infrastructure.

On 27 May, representatives of the European Union Delegation to Lebanon, Lebanese and international academics in the field of maritime governance, local practitioners in the shipping industry, and representatives of ICMPD held a 2-hour webinar as a first activity in a series of webinars on Lebanon’s maritime domain.

On 28 May 28 2021, ICMPD’s SUPREME project held an online conference on Türkiye’s Priorities on Irregular Migration and Return. Constituting SUPREME’s final project activity, the conference brought together crucial national and international stakeholders in the field of irregular migration.

On 2 June 2021, ICMPD held a virtual senior expert roundtable to discuss means of addressing irregular migration along migration routes. The meeting brought together senior experts from EU and ICMPD Member States, international organisations, EU institutions and other relevant bodies. Participants zoomed in on ways that partnerships and policies can better address irregular migration by looking along entire migration routes and considering the perspectives of countries of origin, transit and destination.

The Counsellors at the Migrant Resource Centre (MRC) in Kabul, operated jointly by ICMPD and the Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation funded by the European Union, have seen a significant rise in migration related inquiries since the beginning of 2021. Currently, the MRC team counsel about 1,000 Afghans on a monthly basis, in-person, by phone and over message services. This is how they assess the current migration situation in Afghanistan.

On 19 June, Michael Spindelegger, ICMPD Director General, attended the Antalya Diplomacy Forum and took part in the high-level panel “Humanitarian Approach towards Refugees and Migrants”. On the panel, he was joined by Mr Antonio Vitorino (IOM Director General), Dr. Kerem Kinik (Red Crescent/IFRC) and Dr. Savaş Ünlü (Director DGMM Türkiye). Andrea Sanke moderated the panel.