Ryn Shane-Armstrong's List: Migration / Immigration

• South Africa's poorest have increasingly come to blame migrants from Zimbabwe and other African countries for domestic problems such as crime and unemployment.
• The number sheltering at police stations, churches and other makeshift camps for those displaced by the violence has swelled to 25,000, and officials were setting up tent cities for them, a sign the crisis was not expected to ease soon.

• Going home is not a viable alternative for many Zimbabweans, who number about 3 million in South Africa.

  Zimbabwe's economy has collapsed, with inflation so high staples are out of reach for many.
• While South Africa is doing better than its neighbors, many link the violence against foreigners to impatience among the poorest of the poor, who have feel left behind as a minority of blacks take advantage of opportunities created since the end of apartheid.

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• There are now several dozen websites of international, national and local   organizations that include relevant information, documents and activity   listings. As it is impossible to list these, two main websites which include   links to most other relevant sites are included here:
• http://www.december18.net
• http://www.migrantsrights.org

• http://www.oneworld.org/patp/pap_migration.html

   

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• The most immediate challenge facing societies worldwide is the appalling rise in violence against migrants and
    restrictive government measures that undermine the fundamental basic human rights of millions of migrants and their families.

• According to UN estimates, over 190 million people are now living permanently or temporarily outside their countries of origin. One out of every 35 people worldwide is currently an international migrant.  This vast number includes migrant workers and their families, refugees, asylum seekers and immigrants. However, this does not take into account those of irregular or undocumented status, for which there are no reliable estimates.

   
• These migrants often become universal “scapegoats,” targeted for violence and excluded from legal protections in many places due to their immigration status or nationality. The increased designation of migrants as “illegal,” further aggravates the deprivation of rights entitled to everyone under international human rights law. 

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• Non-Governmental Organizations

   
   
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    Asian Migrant Centre
     
   
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    Asian Partnership on International Migration
     
   
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    Canadaimmigrants.com
     
   
  • Crosspoint Anti Racism
   
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    December 18
     
   
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    European Network Against Racism
     
   
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    Global Community Forum on Migration, Development and Human Rights
     
   
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    Human Rights Watch (HRW)
     
   
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    International Catholic Migration Commission (ICMC)
     
   
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    International Commission of Jurists (ICJ)
     
   
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    International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU)
     
   
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    International Movement Against all forms of Discrimination and Racism (IMADR)
     
   
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    Joint Committee for Migrant Workers in Korea (JCMK) (only in Korean)
     
   
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    Migrant Forum in Asia (MFA)
     
   
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    Migration Policy Group
     
   
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    National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (based in the USA)
     
   
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    Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM)
     
   
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    Public Services International (PSI)
     
   
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    Southern Africa Migration Project
     
   
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    World Council of Churches (WCC)
     
   
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    Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF)
     
   
   

  Inter-Governmental Organizations:

   
   
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    International Labour Office
     
   
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    International Organization on Migration
     
   
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    International Migration Policy Program
     
   
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    UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
     
   
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    UN Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees

• Based in Hong Kong, the Asian Migrant Centre (AMC) operates as a monitoring, research, information, publishing, training, support and action center dedicated to the promotion of the human rights and empowerment of migrant workers and their families in Asia.
• AMC’s primary goal is to promote the human rights, dignity and empowerment of migrant workers and their families in Asia, so that they are able to assert and defend their rights and interests, and become partners in sustainable, just and gender-fair social development.

• In the process of seeking each person on the list, Ms. Mack said, agents often encountered friends, family members and others who had violated immigration laws.

  “Agents may come to a house looking for a target, and someone answers the door, or there are other people in the house who have also violated immigration laws,” she said.
• In addition to the 495 of those found, 410 people were taken into custody on charges of violating immigration laws, he said. Other violations included returning after being deported, overstaying a visa, or living in the country without any legal documentation, Ms. Mack said. Over half of all arrested this month have been deported.

• Sichuan is China's second most populous province and one of its poorest. Its biggest export is migrant workers - 11 million of them, or 13 percent of its 87.5 million population. They provide much of the muscle for China's economic transformation, filling jobs in manufacturing, construction, and coal mines around the country.

• When Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping, a native of Sichuan, promoted the country's economic development in the 1990s during his famous southern tour, the government loosened up restrictions on travel, encouraging people from farms and rural areas to move to big cities and coastal areas to work at factories and construction sites.

  An estimated 140 million took heed, according to government figures.

• Dubai's astonishing building boom, which has made it one of the world's fastest growing cities, has been fueled by the labor of about 700,000 immigrants - almost all from poor villages in India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
• Human rights groups have for years decried the harsh conditions of foreign laborers in Dubai and the rest of the United Arab Emirates and oil-rich Persian Gulf. But the problem only drew widespread attention after strikes by thousands of workers this year and last. Some recent protests turned violent; in mid-March, police arrested at least 500 South Asian workers who smashed office windows and set cars ablaze in the small, neighboring emirate of Sharjah.

• The Associated Press found in interviews with government officials and two dozen workers and visits to employer-provided housing:

  -Many South Asian workers are essentially indentured servants, borrowing heavily to pay recruitment agents for jobs. They can spend several years paying back debts that can run $3,000 or more, while earning between $150 and $300 a month, lately weakened by a falling dollar and Dubai's double-digit inflation.

  -They work a 60-hour week, with one day off or even just half a day.

  -Employers often confiscate their passports, in violation of Dubai law, and withhold pay for two or three months to stop workers from quitting.

  -Many have no medical insurance and work outdoors in summer heat of 120 degrees Fahrenheit and stifling humidity.

  -Employer-provided housing often means bare, crowded trailers behind barbed wire or on Dubai's desert fringes. Some are not connected to water or sewage grids.

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