Christian leaders outside Perth Court, Australia. Photo: Louise Coghill
On 22 March, the United Nation High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) announced that they would be withdrawing from refugee ‘hotspots’ in Greece. Their announcement followed the signing of a deal between the European Union and Turkey to return asylum seekers from Greece to Turkey. Explaining their decision, the MSF head of mission in Greece stated that to continue to operate in these sites would make MSF ‘complicit in a system we consider to be both unfair and inhumane … [W]e refuse to be part of a system that has no regard for the humanitarian or protection needs of asylum seekers and migrants’.
Their decision raises questions about the role of organisations, as well as individuals, working at the border. It compels us to consider: when does care become complicity in human rights abuses? And what is the responsibility of organisations and individuals to refuse to cooperate in abusive, but legal, systems?
