Craig Barnett

 

London to become 'Olympic City of Sanctuary' for 2012

London joined 11 other UK cities in a making the commitment to become a 'City of Sanctuary' for people claiming refuge in the UK with a launch event at St Martin-in-the-Fields last week.

Sheffield became the first official City of Sanctuary in September 2007,with the support of Sheffield City Council and over 70 local organisations. Since then, the idea has spread rapidly, with new groups of local volunteers setting up in cities including Bristol, Swansea, Oxford, Leicester and Bradford.

London is the latest city to form its own group, with the ambitious aim of building a grassroots, city-wide movement of support for people seeking sanctuary in the capital. Alexandra Feachem, from the London City of Sanctuary group, said, "Our ambition is to see thousands of London  organisations, from top businesses, football clubs and cultural institutions, to community groups and residents associations, all pledging their support for declaring London as an Olympic City of Sanctuary. Then for the Mayor and the GLA to take up the idea, so that by 2012 we see refugees at the heart of the Olympic Celebrations."

At the meeting on 12th November, human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell spoke in support of the new movement from his own experience of supporting a refugee doctor who had been targeted by a death squad in Iraq for his sexuality. Neil Gerrard MP, also welcomed the initiative, as a way of bringing sanctuary for people who are persecuted back into the mainstream of British culture.

Craig Barnett, the national co-ordinator for the City of Sanctuary movement, encouraged Londoners to seize the opportunity to make a difference to the way the UK treats people in need of safety. "Cities are powerful," he said, "a whole city which is committed to offering sanctuary can't be ignored as just another lobby group. By building a network of Cities of Sanctuary across the country we can change the whole debate about refugees, and transform what is politically possible to improve the way we offer them safety and welcome."

Further information about the City of Sanctuary movement at: www.cityofsanctuary.org

 

 

 

One man's experience of the UK asylum system, as told to openDemocracy at Sheffield's City of Sanctuary, as part of Refugee Week 2008.

When I came out of Afghanistan it was during the Taliban, and I think all people know about this difficult time for our country.

We people over there in Asia, especially in countries like Afghanistan, we are talking about Europe - not only UK but Europe - as democratic countries, as countries where you receive fair treatment. And so when I came here I was expecting that "they will listen to my story, and they know about our problems - especially the problems of Afghanistan - and I will be definitely granted indefinite leave to remain and I can stay there and improve my life".

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Robert Spooner

Asylum Seeker Support Initiative - Short-Term (Assist) is a Sheffield-based charity dedicated to helping destitute asylum seekers in the area. Coordinator Robert Spooner explains why the group was formed, and details some of their current work.

I work for Assist, Asylum Seeker Support Initiative - Short-Term, because we didn't think it was going to be long-term, but it obviously is now. Its been 5 years since the initial meeting which grew out of a conversation club, and the discovery of injustices happening to people being refused by the Home Office when they had very good reason for not going back home. This small group met, and within about 3 months we had got enough money to start helping those who are entirely destitute without money or anywhere to live and with reduced access to health services. So since that time we've been telling people - I myself am a local preacher in the Methodist church - as part of my preaching telling people what was really happening and people responded by giving us money.

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Rosemary Bechler

Thank you - all the MigrantVoice authors and bloggers for writing at short notice with passion and point. In a week we have moved beyond the shy introductions stage to 'pleased to meet you' and opened up a conversation on some of the big issues which has provided much food for thought. This excellent introduction will remain open not only for newcomers to browse, but for comment and addition.

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Sara Mojtehedzadeh

The Edge of Heaven, directed by Fatih Akin, is a carefully crafted, tender account of six interwoven lives. Ali is a effervescent Turkish expatriate living in Germany with his bookish son Nejat. The film begins with Ali inviting Yeter, a Turkish prostitute, to become his live-in girlfriend - much to Nejat's dismay. Yet Nejat quickly gains respect for the grim but kind hearted Yeter and after her sudden death, he returns to Turkey to search for her daughter Ayten. Ayten meanwhile, is a defiant political activist desperately refuge in Germany after an encounter with the Turkish police. Penniless and homeless, she is taken in by a German student named Lotte and her disapproving mother. When Ayten's asylum plea is rejected, Lotte follows Ayten to Istanbul to help secure her release from prison.

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Marie Lyse Numuhoza

I came to the UK seven years ago as a young refugee from Rwanda. Eager to integrate, I joined a local refugee community. I coordinated activities that brought together young refugees. They enabled them to meet and share ideas, learn from one another as they settled into the society. On the other hand though, the media at the time was not portraying a positive image of refugees and asylum seekers. So much was said about them being bogus, that they were here to take over all jobs and take benefits that the British people had worked for for so many years.

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Rosemary Bechler

Sonja Linden started out writing 'verbatim plays' and I like many others can testify to the 'palpable effect' these first hand accounts of detention and forced removal have had on her audiences. The Darfuris or Rwandans whose words and experiences she drew on thank her, however, in particular, for making their characters feisty and rounded - not just victims, however innocent. It's a moving account.

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My name is Nora Hussein I would like to provide a slightly different account on the topics of refuge, belonging and integration, as I believe the issues are very closely linked.

I am a second generation British Somali female, currently living in London. My father first came to the UK in the early sixties as a migrant worker and was later joined by my mother in the early seventies. I consider myself to be British born and bred, and yet I have a strong affinity and link to my ‘home' country Somalia: a country that I have only visited for barely two weeks in my entire thirty years - a country, which ever since I have been old enough to comprehend, has been embroiled in turmoil and civil war. And yet when I was there in 1999, although amenities were very basic, and life in general on a completely different par to what I was accustomed to, I encountered a strange sense of belonging.

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Craig Barnett

I just heard from a good friend of mine that his wife and daughter have been refused permission to return to their home in Britain. My friend, who writes a blog under the pen-name ‘Jeremiah', is married to an African woman who was refused asylum in the UK. They have a two year-old daughter together, but the UK government wouldn't allow Jeremiah's wife to stay unless she went back to her own country to apply for a visa. Under the threat of arrest and deportation she finally agreed, after arranging a safe house where she and her daughter can stay in relative anonymity, as it is still unsafe for her to be recognized there. Mother and daughter have spent the last four months in hiding, waiting to get the necessary documents and then an appointment with the British embassy. And then they refused her.

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Zrinka Bralo

"The trouble with the world is not that people know too little, but that they know so many things that aren't so" said Mark Twain and it rings very true to me when I think about the migration debate all around the world. Last week I read a very bizarre story in the Sun about 12 people who lived in the attic of an empty house in the Midlands, and how  Read the rest of this post...

Jenny Allsopp

"Ok, now give me youthful enthusiasm!"

We all beam up at the camera as the local journalist takes photos of us preparing banners for Refugee Week; balloons, laughter and colourful paint. ‘Maybe we could paint ‘Refugee Week' on one of your faces?' The irony kills me; reluctant for a foreign face to appear in relation with this issue unless they are a criminal or footballer, a pretty white face is a lovely stage. For one day only it will be me, the lucky one to be branded with the colourful stamp of ‘refugee' while I hold a balloon next to me to represent a whole sub-population of faceless individuals. And why is this the case? Firstly, for many misguided people my face seems to fit the image of community in a way that of a foreigner does not. Furthermore, refugees themselves are often reluctant to come forward in the public eye and challenge this, and who can blame them given the public backlash these issues often face: it is a vicious circle...

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Grace Davies

On Tuesday this week, London's Trafalgar square was transformed into a temporary "refugee camp" by the UNHCR in an awareness raising initiative to highlight the ongoing situation in Darfur, which saw similar scenes in 20 countries across the world. Zrinka blogged earlier this week about her own unexpected reaction to the exhibition. The hope is that the day-long camp had an impact on those who know nothing about Darfur, the UNHCR or refugees in general, the "absent majority" as Jenny put it in an earlier post.

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Jenny Allsopp

Rosemary and Zrinka have raised some extremely important questions - not only ‘who cares for who', but what makes us care, and how we choose to express it. I would like to try and shed some light on the second two questions in light of my experience campaigning on asylum issues.

It seems to be a question of proximity, both in terms of coming into contact with the issues and our ability to act. People are more willing to deal with refugee and asylum issues when it is a question of isolated acts of human kindness; we find it easier to perceive an asylum seeker as a charity case than a dignified human being with ‘political baggage'. The same difficulty is encountered with many other social issues, especially homelessness: however complicated the problem is, a small donation is a concrete step towards a simple (and deserving) end, whilst interacting with the system is an up-hill struggle which rarely boasts such direct rewards.

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MigrantVoice roundtable

In 2002, the government made it illegal for people claiming asylum to work. In April 2008, the Refugee Council and TUC launched a joint campaign, Let Them Work campaigning for the right to work for asylum seekers, as a fundamental human right. On our own discussions and interviews with refugees and asylum seekers, together with campaigners and activists, work was often identified as the most important policy change that would improve the lives of asylum seekers in the UK.

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Jonathan Cox

"Politically correct brigade strikes over word ‘asylum'" screamed the headline in the Sun following the Independent Asylum Commission's first report of conclusions and recommendations, Saving Sanctuary, in May. "Should we ban the word ‘asylum'?" the BBC asked.

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Rosemary Bechler

On one of the many earlier occasions when desperately provoked people broke out of Campsfield or some other detention centre, the message to the British people was not to approach them on any account because... the implication was.... or was it? ... let's say the suggestion ... that they were violent criminals of an indeterminate but horrendous kind.

No-one would expect a coffee-table book tete-a-tete. But 'Arresting Aram' and some of the other comments made this week about the 'surprising' pleasure and interest some of us have had in meeting the people involved - confirm my earlier suspicion that a much more 'dangerous' outcome, for the authorities at least, and for the militarisation of immigration and asylum which is under way, might be the formation of the kind of bridges that Jenny talks about in her last post: the bridge between the people behind bars and the people who don't know how innocent most of them are.

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Amy Merone

"Me and my husband had good jobs in Uganda and a nice house with four bedrooms and a compound. I had money in my country. That is not why I came here" - Mary, destitute asylum seeker.

I picked Mary out from the crowds of people gathered in the gardens where we arranged to meet without knowing what she looked like or where she would be. There was something about her that was different to the swarms of lively, animated people around her. She stared straight ahead, with a look of bewilderment and loss fixed upon her face, in only a way somebody can when they have no idea of what their future will bring.

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Suren Khachaturyan

My name is Suren Khachaturyan. I'm 37 years old from Armenia. I have been living in Great Britain for 7 years now.

As the Home Office describes - I'm a "failed asylum seeker" who does not belong to any group or category of people in the UK. I'm married to a British woman and living together with her and her 10 year old son in Wales.

I don't want to take your time or to waste mine to explain why it is I came to this country, and how I'm getting on with my life - even if it's interesting for you. That is because, I would like you not to concentrate on my asylum case or anyone's case and where they came from.

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Rosemary Bechler

Another reason why many of us look away is simply because the scale of what we are up against is so huge and so daunting. At the opposite end of the problem from the individual moral dilemmas with which we are increasingly familiar - there are the coordinated actions of countries, at the UN or the EU.

Take the news from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees this week. Here are some of the headlines from UNHCR's Global Trends report:

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Craig Barnett

When the doorbell rang at 6am Kate, my wife, went to answer it while I stayed upstairs with the children. Even before she got to the door she knew it was Immigration. There were four immigration officers and two policemen, come for our friend Aram, who had been living with us for several months. He had applied for refugee status in the UK and been refused, so he was homeless and couldn't work or claim any State support.

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Rosemary Bechler

Who cares for whom in this world? - is the question that Zrinka asks in today's article, 'Insult and injury' - to which Jenny replies, "For the people locked up in Campsfield (for what?) - not enough people." This is a very uncomfortable exchange for those of us in the middle ground or the silent majority. In her piece later this week Sonja Linden mentions some caring professionals that have inspired a character in her play, Crocodile Seeking Refuge, who ruin some aspects of their lives when they "step over the professional line in their dedication to their [asylum seeking] clients." But in the course of her work with the Migrant and Refugee Communities Forum, Zrinka's encounter is with another type of professional, as she puts it:

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Jenny Allsopp

On Monday night I left Oxford Town Hall after a Refugee Week event totally distressed by the stories I had heard; Margerie and Innocent Empi, two refugees from Uganda and the DRC, journalists Melanie McFadyean and Melissa Benn, and Tariq Ali had all spoken about how we treat those seeking asylum in the UK. I was angry, ashamed and driven to act. I thought, if only everyone had heard what I have heard tonight; if only everyone could feel what I am feeling...

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by Stephanie

My life is a daily struggle. Since I sought asylum, I have had to learn to survive on nothing. I am not allowed to work, and have no source of income. I have to rely on vouchers that I receive every week. These are worth £70; I have to spend them on food for me and my son. That is £5 a day for each of us. I must be very meticulous if I want us to survive on these vouchers till the following week.

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Mary Keniger

The treatment of asylum seekers in this country is entirely inappropriate, and in many cases inhumane. Both vote-hungry politicians and a targeted media campaign fuel the demonization of asylum seekers- and there is no sector in which this is more apparent than healthcare.

When I think about asylum seekers and health there are two main issues that concern me; access to care and continuity of care.

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Tabassam Yasin

My name is Tabassam Yasin. I was born and raised in Sheffield, and I'm a student at Sheffield Hallam University studying business and finance. I got involved with a volunteering project, Football Unites, this year. There are six or seven student volunteers with a project coordinator. It involved thirty or so refugees from the Northern Refugee Centre, and we had a 5-a-side football tournament.

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Zrinka Bralo

I went to the mock refugee camp in Trafalgar square this morning. The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has set up these for one day only in 20 major cities in the world to highlight the plight of people in Darfur.

I arranged to meet a newspaper journalist there who wanted to write about Refugee Week. I thought it would be good for him to see it. I completely forgot that it might not be so good for me to see it. I suddenly remembered the plastic sheets with the UNHCR logo on them all over my windows in Sarajevo. The glass on all our windows had shattered from shelling within weeks of the war starting and as the winter set in, these plastic sheets became the main feature in the city. They were part of our humanitarian aid. I did not think that the sight of plastic sheets with a logo in Trafalgar square could bring back nasty memories so fast and that I could still be affected so strongly. But I was.

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Rosemary Bechler

One of the contributors to the MigrantVoice roundtable last week asked where were the writers and commentators who could make an impact on this debate on sanctuary or refuge - "There is no-one to speak with confidence and charisma on immigration and asylum issues. Very, very rarely does it happen." 

Today's MigrantVoice authors - Philippe Legrain and Irshad Manji - might well qualify. I was particularly struck by Philippe's question: "Since governments conspire to deny people the right to cross borders freely, is pretending to be a refugee really so terrible?" and by Irshad's thought that perhaps the Statue of Liberty should be sent back to France.

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MigrantVoice roundtable

Continuing our roundtable debate, participants discuss integration. What does it mean, and how can it be achieved? Who is responsible and what more can be done to help those who want to be integrated?

Ms B, a refugee from Bosnia, Mr P, a refugee from Eritrea, Mr A, a refugee from Afghanistan, Mrs S, a refugee from Somalia, Mr A, a refugee from Somalia and Ms N, a worker on mentoring schemes, take up the issue.

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Jenny Allsopp

‘I love spring fruits.'

‘Yeah me too, but I miss fresh fruit here, and plantain!'

‘What's plantain?'

‘Ah, OK, you're in for a treat - see here, just left of the Co-op, up the street outside Salvation Army, the best plantain you'll get outside Jamaica, innit. Tell her I sent you.'

The man winks up at me, marking a thick X on the map which he has penned of Bletchley Town Centre. It sits next to a poem we have written together, juxtaposing our different visions of spring to reveal an assortment of diverse experiences and creative minds. We are three Oxford University students and four detainees in Campsfield House from Turkey, Nigeria, Pakistan and Jamaica, and this is our shared experience of spring:

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Zrinka Bralo

My name is Zrinka Bralo, and I am Executive Director of Migrant and Refugee Communities Forum in London. Yesterday, I spent a day at the South Bank with many of my colleagues and fellow Londoners at the launch of Refugee Week 2008.

I often say that I have refugee week every week, not only because a long time ago I was a refugee, but also because I do support work with refugees on a daily basis. However, this week is special because The United Nations General Assembly designated 20 June as World Refugee Day to recognize and celebrate the contribution of refugees throughout the world. And that is what we did on Sunday.

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