Viewpoints and Advocacy

Themes and Issues

Human Rights

Commission on Human Rights - 57th Session, March-April 2001, Geneva

Special Debate on Tolerance and Respect Contribution under the "Migration" theme delivered on 26 March 2001
by Mariette Grange, ICMC Advocacy Officer

I speak on behalf of the International Catholic Migration Commission (ICMC), in consultative status with ECOSOC since 1952, and a member of the Steering Committee for the Global Campaign for Ratification of the Convention on Migrants Rights.

For the first time in the history of humanity, through the creation of the United Nations, the peoples of the world have been elaborating an impressive and far reaching body of treaties universally acknowledging the inherent dignity of all members of the human family.

As millions of words were put forth, negotiated, amended, "square bracketed", deleted or adopted, millions of men, women and children were also in movement, inside their own borders or crossing them, fleeing from violence, persecution, discrimination, abject poverty, unjust distribution of wealth, man-made and natural disasters. Here too, words were used, old ones and also new ones being coined, to refer to these people in movement. Some were called migrants; others came to be known as refugees, asylum seekers, internally displaced persons. Some are even called "illegals". Who decides on the legality of a life? Has this to do with intolerance? Has this to do with the denial of dignity and respect?

Are we not, by immigration and asylum policies that criminalize "irregular" movement, fostering a climate of intolerance?

Has the rise in discrimination, ostracism, xenophobia something to do with closed doors policies, fortress mentality, zero immigration programmes? Has the upsurge in trafficking in human beings with all its abject consequences to do with the closing of legal avenues for migration and weakening of agreed upon standards of refugee protection? Has the amalgamation of migration and trafficking to do with distorted media portrayals and hostile attitude in national populations? Has the refusal to ratify and implement internationally agreed conventions for the protection of the rights of migrants something to do with the vulnerability of millions of men, women and children? Has the absence of political will something to do with creating breeding grounds for the rise in intolerance, neo-nazism, and religious fundamentalism.

In the absence of political will and in a prevailing atmosphere of political amnesia with respect to universally agreed norms of tolerance and respect, forced migrants are caught in the vicious circle of fleeing one set of evils, only to be faced with denials of their human rights at the end of their painful journey.

Yet, migrants come with many positive contributions for the societies that welcome them. For many societies, migrants are a much-needed labour force. They keep ageing societies dynamic and contribute to the cultural richness of societies. Migrants contribute to the economies of receiving and sending countries.

As elements for a recipe to overcome intolerance, we recommend that:

• migrants with a number of years of residence in countries of reception be allowed to take part in local elections;
  
• appropriate structures be put in place at the national levels for participation of migrants in decision-making affecting them;
  
• representatives of migrant communities be included in national Commissions of Human Rights;
  
• education programmes be put in place that acknowledge the positive elements in other traditions and cultures;
  
• States and civil society avail themselves of the opportunity afforded by the 18 December International Migrants Day to highlight that migrants' rights are human rights; with particular emphasis on the protection needs of undocumented migrants;
  
• States adopt coherent, transparent and just legal immigration frameworks;
  
• States ratify the 1990 International Convention on the Rights of All Migrants and Members of their Families and related ILO conventions;
  
• The WCAR Plan of Action contain a separate section on measures for the promotion and protection of the rights of migrants.

But words have to be fertilized by action. Let 2001 not be remembered by our children as the "International Year of Empty Words", but as the "International Year of Political Will".