Instalment number two of our occasional service debunking migration stories in the Daily Mail, self-styled 'Last Bulwark Against The Tide Of Filth That Is Threatening To Engulf Civilisation'™
In MailWatch #1 we pointed out the the paper's claims that "would-be illegal immigrants are forming human roadblocks to force motorists passing through the French port town to stop. Travellers are then robbed at knife-point by the migrants, who are desperate for funds to help them sneak into the UK" and that the local police had issued a public statement warning "the nine million Britons a year who pass through Calais ... to keep their windows closed and doors locked until they are safely inside the ferry terminal."
Strangely, no confirmation of these claims could be found in either of the main local Calais papers, Nord Littoral or La Voix Du Nord, on the police website or anywhere on any French websites despite exhaustive searches. The local police station denied all knowledge of it and so far the Mail has failed to respond to requests for copies of the statement and their sources for the car-jacking story.
Now, the Nord Littoral itself has waded into the argument with their own article on the veracity of Mail stories, saying that Anne-Sigrid Catton, Deputy Commissioner of Police, denies the Calais police had issued any public warning to UK tourists. Nearby Coquelles detention centre is also quoted as saying that it has no records of any incidents involving migrant violence against tourists.
The Nord Littoral article also goes on to point to other occasions when the Mail also played fast and loose with the truth. On Tuesday the paper alleged that Calais migrants were now squatting empty council houses, quoting one Philippe Bouvard, the president of a Calais association of residents, as saying: "Many families in Calais are furious that homes meant for French families have been overrun with migrants." Except no one at the Office Public de l'Habitat de Calais has ever heard of this person. On top of that, they have only one empty council house on their books and they state that, even if the squatting story were true, it is impossible for the migrants to have illegally reconnecting the utilities as the Mail has claimed.
Now the paper that the Association of Chief Police Officers has in the past accused of misquoting information about immigration and warned that its "racist expressions towards asylum-seekers appear to have become common currency and 'acceptable' in a way that would never be tolerated towards any other minority group"*, likes to print at least one story a day vilifying the Calais migrants or asylum seekers in general. But that day they had two such articles, the second bemoaning the fact that tax payers money was being used to bribe migrants via the IOM assisted returns policy to return home for £1,700 and a free flight.
Another non-story. In fact, this program was originally set up in 2007 and the fact that it was receiving additional funding from the UKBA's Returns and Reintegration Fund and France's Office Français de l'Immigration et de l'Intégration had been announced back in May. Why publish a story about this now? Maybe it was because it "emerged last night that the Government is reconsidering funding joint flights with the French to take failed migrants home." Except this in fact came out of the recent Evian summit at the beginning of the month, not on Monday night.
On Wednesday the Mail took a slightly different tack in that this story was based on fact: 'Calais migrant cried rape as revenge against people smuggler who failed to get her into Britain'. Now we don't mean to minimise the seriousness of any rape allegation, however this one was in fact only 'newsworthy' in the eyes of the Mail's editor because it happened in Calais and involved migrants, conveniently provided another stick to beat them with. Had it not involved migrants, even if it had occurred outside the Mail's own offices, it would not have rated the column inches given this Calais story.
The most amazing Mail story of the week however, and not just because of its length, was 'Bloody siege of Calais: The violent new breed of migrants who will let nothing stop them coming to Britain', by one Paul Bracchi. In it he relates the story of how the Mail's very own intrepid photographer Will Leach was allegedly attacked on 22nd of July by irate migrants using lumps of concrete to smash his car windows; the Mail's reputation obviously precedes it, even amongst the migrants!
Whilst trying to get "dramatic footage" of two "would-be asylum seekers "climbing into the gap between the cab and trailer of a lorry, the sun glinting off the giant telephoto lens of our slumming-it paprazzo appears to have alerted the migrants that yet another bloody tabloid journo was on their case. So they did a Pierce Brosnan/Alec Baldwin/Lindsay Lohan/Hugh Grant/Lily Allen/Robbie Williams/Pete Doherty/Britney Spears/Kayne West/Amy Winehouse [delete as applicable] and saw him off in a less than friendly fashion.
This incident provoked 2,000 plus words of vituperation in response from the paper. Unfortunately, like most of the Mail's diatribes, it was shot through with prejudice and errors. After a little riff on the name of the 'Jungle', "where fights and feuds between rival factions are commonplace", "a godforsaken 'community'" more "akin to the trenches", the article mentioned "a security guard at an American owned company on [Rue des Garennes] was clubbed over the head with an iron bar a few weeks ago." This clearly refers to an incident at the Thioxide plant, also the site of a meeting that the article claims the French immigration minister Eric Besson attended "a few weeks ago to listen to the views of those who work and live near the Rue des Garennes."
The big problem with this is that the meeting actually occurred on 23th of April, with the attack on the night-watchman happening on the 16th of March. That's 14 and 19 weeks ago respectively, hardly "a few weeks" in anyone's book. But this is typical of the Mail's fast and loose way with the facts.
Here's another Mail classic from the same piece: "A single raid by the CRS in April resulted in 194 arrests of suspected people traffickers. In other words, nearly a quarter of those living in this sprawling cardboard and tarpaulin city had possible criminal links." Yes, 194 people were arrested in Calais on 21st of April in raids, which was ostensibly aimed at traffickers, many of them children. However, despite the 194 "suspected people traffickers" being dragged off to police stations in 3 nearby cities, the prosecutor's office in Boulogne-sur-Mer found no one to hold on trafficking charges and almost all were eventually released, a fact that was widely covered in the French press and even made it in to the pages of the Daily Mail!
Further on in the article, after all the babbling about police having "now stepped up patrols" (apparently "not just a story spun by the local council's public relations department." What can he mean by this, even if he and his cameraman "had seen the evidence for themselves"?) and nonsense about migrants willing to "mutilate themselves to conceal their identities" (referring to removing their fingerprints** to avoid detection, which is hardly mutilation), we get some crocodile tears.
Then, having reluctantly conceded that many of the Calais migrants are children (so they are not all money-grabbing 'economic migrants' or even people traffickers), the article tells some of the children's "pitiful stories" and says "equally tragic examples of forgotten youngsters were standing in the long, winding queue for the twice-daily soup kitchen (sic) in Quai de La Moselle". Yet more lazy journalism. The Quai de La Moselle is in fact the site of a food distribution operation at lunchtime run by Belle Etiole, one of two volunteer-run projects in Calais. The second evening distribution however is run by Salam, a completely separate humanitarian organisation, and takes place half a mile away at the Hanger Paul Devot on the Boulevard des Allies.
Now, the incident with the photographer was meant to have occurred on the 22nd, with the article being published on the 25th, but Salam stopped operations on the 17th of July to give their exhausted members their annual summer break (with Belle Etoile stopping on the 31st). So this highly paid and supposedly observant journalist does not seem to know that his "twice-daily soup kitchen" occurs in 2 separate places and that only one was still operating when his and his photographer's skirmish in the "Bloody siege of Calais" was meant to have taken place.
So what are we to conclude from all this? Good old-fashioned stupidity? Genuine mistakes? Lazy mealy-mouthed journalists trying to beat a deadline? Or just the standard yellow journalism we have come to expect from the sort of mendacious hacks that are employed by this tub-thumping right-wing anti-immigration rag? We'll leave you to make up your own minds.
* Which ACPO held was increasing the risk of "significant public disorder."
** Interestingly the Mail has consistently failed to mention one of the most common means of removing fingerprints used by the migrants, sanding them down with glass-paper. But that is far less dramatic than burning the tips of ones fingers. [See also: MailWatch #1]
Saturday, 1 August 2009
Thursday, 30 July 2009
Targetting The Most Vulnerable
In time honoured fashion the Labour Party have decided to target their first cuts at some of the most vulnerable in our society - single asylum seekers. From October single asylum seeker over the age of 25 will have their already meagre subsistence allowance cut by 20% tp £35.13 a week as part of an effort by the government to reduce the size of the 'asylum budget'. According to a parliamentary answer to Chris Huhme in January this year, it costs an average of £130 per day or £47,450 per year to keep a person in immigration detention.
As most people held in 'administrative detention', as it is euphemistically called, are there for little or no concrete reason, with many of them being held for years before ultimately being released because they cannot be 'returned' to their country of origin (nor were they ever likely to be), maybe the government would be better off closing a few detention centres to save the money rather than lining the pockets of the shareholders and friendly directors of companies that run them at such exorbitant rates?
As most people held in 'administrative detention', as it is euphemistically called, are there for little or no concrete reason, with many of them being held for years before ultimately being released because they cannot be 'returned' to their country of origin (nor were they ever likely to be), maybe the government would be better off closing a few detention centres to save the money rather than lining the pockets of the shareholders and friendly directors of companies that run them at such exorbitant rates?
Wednesday, 29 July 2009
Italy's Moroccan Slaves
Nearly 1,000 Moroccan migrants are living in what the International Organisation of Migration (IOM), a body not known for its use of strong critical language, says amounts to slavery. The IOM claim the migrants are living in abandoned buildings "eking out a living amid piles of rubbish, without running water or electricity."
The young Moroccans were travelled to Italy on tourist visas having paid up to 8,000 euros per person to a middle-man in their home country for the false promises of contracts regular seasonal labour contracts and regularisation of their status. Once there the employers did no materialize or they refused to give them contracts, leaving them open to being exploited by some of the same unscrupulous employers, who pay them between 15 and 25 euros a day for a 12-hour day labouring in nearby greenhouses and fields. Their employers often charged them for basics like transport and water, in the sweltering summer temperatures of southern Italy.
Each year, Italy sets a quota for the number of migrant workers allowed to enter the country as seasonal workers in its large agricultural sector, which also relies on cheap, illegal labour to maintain its profit margins. Official statistics showing that undocumented labour accounts for between 15.9 percent and 17.6 percent of gross domestic product, mainly in the agricultural sector.
The young Moroccans were travelled to Italy on tourist visas having paid up to 8,000 euros per person to a middle-man in their home country for the false promises of contracts regular seasonal labour contracts and regularisation of their status. Once there the employers did no materialize or they refused to give them contracts, leaving them open to being exploited by some of the same unscrupulous employers, who pay them between 15 and 25 euros a day for a 12-hour day labouring in nearby greenhouses and fields. Their employers often charged them for basics like transport and water, in the sweltering summer temperatures of southern Italy.
Each year, Italy sets a quota for the number of migrant workers allowed to enter the country as seasonal workers in its large agricultural sector, which also relies on cheap, illegal labour to maintain its profit margins. Official statistics showing that undocumented labour accounts for between 15.9 percent and 17.6 percent of gross domestic product, mainly in the agricultural sector.
Confused? So You Should Be
In an Associated Press story widely covered in the world's media it is claimed that the current 'Economic downturn stems dangerous boat migration', to use the title of the piece, especially in Spain. As proof of this the article cites 2 main factors: that unemployment in Spain is running at nearly 18 percent, with the construction and services industries particularly hard-hit, sectors that regularly employed migrants clandestinely; and that "not a single immigrant boat was intercepted off the Canary Islands, the first time that has happened in years".
Yet the same article also states that the number of arrivals dropped from 38,180 in 2006 to just 13,424 last year. Additionally, increased naval patrols mean that the Spanish Coast Guard now believed to intercept 99% of all these boats whilst still on the high seas and migrants can now be sent directly back either to their home country or to the country from which they departed because of a series of new pacts negotiated with West African states.
The article then adds further counter-evidence by saying that a similar dramatic decrease in arrivals in Italy is due to the bilateral deal with Libya that sees the Italian navy returning migrant intercepted in international waters back to Africa without first screening them for asylum claims. Greece is also cited as having had a 25% increase in migrant detentions between 2007 and 2008, although it also mentions the widely publicised slight decrease in numbers of intercepts in April and May (which could just as easily be a statistical abberation).
Another recent report show what Romanian Border Police claim to be a significant increase in the number of people caught in the first half of this year trying to cross into Hungary. According to their figures border guards caught 1,164 people trying to enter Hungary illegally in 2007. Last year, the number was 1,628 and so far this year there are said to have been about 800 people arrested.
Now is it just me or is this yet another case of the facts not supporting the conclusions, of lazy journalism and official spin making a mountain out of a molehill? About 800 people in 6 months if continued at the same rate would mean about 1,628 in a year i.e. neither an increase nor a decrease.
Interestingly, Romania acceded to the EU in January 2007 and Hungary also became a member of the Schengen zone in December of the same year. So the fact that both countries had built a large number of new border posts on their common border (as Romania had also done on its frontiers with non-EU countries like Moldova and Ukraine) to coincide with their new status completely changed the dynamics of 'illegal' migration over that period, making it both more difficult to enter Romania and more likely that clandestine border-crossers would be caught. So who can in fact tell whether the statistics prove anything at all?
Yet the same article also states that the number of arrivals dropped from 38,180 in 2006 to just 13,424 last year. Additionally, increased naval patrols mean that the Spanish Coast Guard now believed to intercept 99% of all these boats whilst still on the high seas and migrants can now be sent directly back either to their home country or to the country from which they departed because of a series of new pacts negotiated with West African states.
The article then adds further counter-evidence by saying that a similar dramatic decrease in arrivals in Italy is due to the bilateral deal with Libya that sees the Italian navy returning migrant intercepted in international waters back to Africa without first screening them for asylum claims. Greece is also cited as having had a 25% increase in migrant detentions between 2007 and 2008, although it also mentions the widely publicised slight decrease in numbers of intercepts in April and May (which could just as easily be a statistical abberation).
Another recent report show what Romanian Border Police claim to be a significant increase in the number of people caught in the first half of this year trying to cross into Hungary. According to their figures border guards caught 1,164 people trying to enter Hungary illegally in 2007. Last year, the number was 1,628 and so far this year there are said to have been about 800 people arrested.
Now is it just me or is this yet another case of the facts not supporting the conclusions, of lazy journalism and official spin making a mountain out of a molehill? About 800 people in 6 months if continued at the same rate would mean about 1,628 in a year i.e. neither an increase nor a decrease.
Interestingly, Romania acceded to the EU in January 2007 and Hungary also became a member of the Schengen zone in December of the same year. So the fact that both countries had built a large number of new border posts on their common border (as Romania had also done on its frontiers with non-EU countries like Moldova and Ukraine) to coincide with their new status completely changed the dynamics of 'illegal' migration over that period, making it both more difficult to enter Romania and more likely that clandestine border-crossers would be caught. So who can in fact tell whether the statistics prove anything at all?
Tuesday, 28 July 2009
Greece: One Way & It's Out
Human Rights Watch (HRW) has called on the European Union to "hold Greece accountable for acts contrary to international and European human rights and refugee law" and said that "it needs to act fast, as the lives of many are at risk." Bill Frelick, the Director of HRW's Refugee Policy Program also said, "It appears Greece is doing everything it can to close the door on persons who seek protection in Europe, no matter how vulnerable they are."
HRW has been documenting the on-going policy of the Greek state to systematically denying migrants access to Internationally agreed asylum rights and of illegally expelling them to third countries. (See: 'Stuck in a Revolving Door' for a previous HRW Report on 'pushbacks') The same organisation has also documented the routine miscategorisation of unaccompanied children as adults, allowing them to be detained in conditions that would be considered to inhumane and degrading, if they had been correctly identified as children, prior to deportation.
In the wake of the far right anti-immigration parties gains in the EU elections last month and an impending general election, likely to take place next year, the Greek government are desperate to occupy some of the moral low-ground and increase anti-immigration repression in order to stay in power.
In addition to an immigration policy that already refuses all but a handful of asylum applications (recent figures show only about 1.3% of applications are accepted*), the government has abolished any meaningful means of appeal against asylum decisions, causing the UNHCR to pull out its previous cooperation in implementing the process, as well as increasing the maximum length of administrative detention for migrants from 6 months to 12 months, and certain circumstances up to 18 months.
Since mid July, the Greek authorities have significantly increased their operations against migrants and asylum seekers. The Patras camp has been destroyed and many of its occupants arrested, leaving numerous migrant children who managed to escape the clutches of the Greek police in hiding in abysmal conditions under constant fear of being detained. Numerous ex-army bases have been opened up as detention centres and large numbers of detainees have been moved from major cities and islands in the south and east to camps in the north prior to illegal expulsion to Turkey.
However not all Greeks are content to stand by as the government ramp up the repression. On 23 July activists blockaded the ferry from Lesvos, the venue for a No Border camp at the end of next month, preventing the transfer of 63 migrants to camps in the north. There have also been numerous solidarity demonstrations in Athens, Thessaloniki and other Greek cities with people defending the migrant communities against the numerous vicious attacks from state-sponsored fascist thugs.
In separate news, Arivan Abdullah Osman, a 29 year old Kurdish migrant who had been in a coma since 3 April, died in hospital on Monday. Arivan had been brutally beaten by Hellenic Coast Guard officers after he tried to board a ferry in Igoumenitsa bound for Italy. According to eyewitnesses he had previously been turned away from the port but returned only to be arrested and have his head repeatedly bounced off the cement at the port, causing internal bleeding from which he never recovered.
* Last year only 379 people were granted asylum out of nearly 29,080 applications. The same Eurosat figures showed that Greece had the EU's fifth highest number of applications (the 4th highest relative to population size), with France top with 41,800 asylum applications and the UK second with 30,500 (figure for new applicants only).
HRW has been documenting the on-going policy of the Greek state to systematically denying migrants access to Internationally agreed asylum rights and of illegally expelling them to third countries. (See: 'Stuck in a Revolving Door' for a previous HRW Report on 'pushbacks') The same organisation has also documented the routine miscategorisation of unaccompanied children as adults, allowing them to be detained in conditions that would be considered to inhumane and degrading, if they had been correctly identified as children, prior to deportation.
In the wake of the far right anti-immigration parties gains in the EU elections last month and an impending general election, likely to take place next year, the Greek government are desperate to occupy some of the moral low-ground and increase anti-immigration repression in order to stay in power.
In addition to an immigration policy that already refuses all but a handful of asylum applications (recent figures show only about 1.3% of applications are accepted*), the government has abolished any meaningful means of appeal against asylum decisions, causing the UNHCR to pull out its previous cooperation in implementing the process, as well as increasing the maximum length of administrative detention for migrants from 6 months to 12 months, and certain circumstances up to 18 months.
Since mid July, the Greek authorities have significantly increased their operations against migrants and asylum seekers. The Patras camp has been destroyed and many of its occupants arrested, leaving numerous migrant children who managed to escape the clutches of the Greek police in hiding in abysmal conditions under constant fear of being detained. Numerous ex-army bases have been opened up as detention centres and large numbers of detainees have been moved from major cities and islands in the south and east to camps in the north prior to illegal expulsion to Turkey.
However not all Greeks are content to stand by as the government ramp up the repression. On 23 July activists blockaded the ferry from Lesvos, the venue for a No Border camp at the end of next month, preventing the transfer of 63 migrants to camps in the north. There have also been numerous solidarity demonstrations in Athens, Thessaloniki and other Greek cities with people defending the migrant communities against the numerous vicious attacks from state-sponsored fascist thugs.
In separate news, Arivan Abdullah Osman, a 29 year old Kurdish migrant who had been in a coma since 3 April, died in hospital on Monday. Arivan had been brutally beaten by Hellenic Coast Guard officers after he tried to board a ferry in Igoumenitsa bound for Italy. According to eyewitnesses he had previously been turned away from the port but returned only to be arrested and have his head repeatedly bounced off the cement at the port, causing internal bleeding from which he never recovered.
* Last year only 379 people were granted asylum out of nearly 29,080 applications. The same Eurosat figures showed that Greece had the EU's fifth highest number of applications (the 4th highest relative to population size), with France top with 41,800 asylum applications and the UK second with 30,500 (figure for new applicants only).
Thursday, 23 July 2009
MailWatch #1
The first of an occasional service debunking migration stories in the Daily Mail, self-styled 'Last Bulwark Against The Tide Of Filth That Is Threatening To Engulf Civilisation'™ i.e. those filthy foreigners wanting to steal our jobs, our women and our homes.
Yesterday the Snail published a scoop, 'Calais migrants mutilate fingertips to hide true identity' trumpeting "Migrants massed in Calais in hopes of getting into Britain are mutilating their fingerprints so that their true identities cannot be established, it emerged today." Wrong, this "sinister development" is a widely documented practice that has been going on since Eurodac, the centralised EU computer fingerprint data system, was introduced in 2003. That the Mail has only just found out about it merely reflects the level of 'research' that goes into the smears, sorry 'stories', it publishes about the Calais migrant situation in particular and migrants in general. [See previous post ]
Peter Allen, the paper's Paris correspondent and 'author' of this piece, well known for researching his stories from the comfort of his office desk, claims that "the most common method was to place all ten fingers* on an oven hob and turn up the heat." Of course the migrants all live in nice little pied-a-terres where they have kitchen stoves on top of hot and cold running water and all the other creature comforts that scrounging asylum seekers are meant to have.
He then goes on to conflate Eurodac with Europol and claim that the hiding of fingerprints circumvents a system that "turn(s) back [known criminals] at borders, preventing them living in countries like Britain on benefits while they claim asylum, or else disappearing into the black economy", especially as "Police in Calais believe that some of the 2000 odd UK bound migrants sleeping rough in the town are repeat asylum seekers with criminal records."
Outstanding, except the logic falls down on a number of points. One, if you have been refused asylum in the UK once, then you are not going to apply for it a second time and therefore cannot be a "repeat asylum seeker". Two, asylum seekers cannot claim 'benefits' in the sense that he and other anti-immigration obsessives believe. The National Asylum Seeker Support Service (NASS) is the only form of 'benefits' open the asylum seekers and it provides low quality housing, mostly in dispersed shared accommodation, and £42.16 per week in cash (or a weekly voucher worth £35 for 'failed' asylum seekers). Hardly the lap of luxury. And NASS assistance is usually only available for asylum claims submitted at a port of entry not 'in country' i.e. will not be available to people smuggling themselves into the UK.
In another story entitled 'Calais migrants ambush Britons at knife-point in terrifying highway robberies', the paper that once said "Hurrah for the Blackshirts" claims that "Migrant gangs in Calais are targeting British holidaymakers in terrifying 'highway robberies'. Would-be illegal immigrants are forming human roadblocks to force motorists passing through the French port town to stop. Travellers are then robbed at knife-point by the migrants, who are desperate for funds to help them sneak into the UK."
Yes, the paper that brought us the Zinoviev letter appears to have landed yet another scoop, this time one that seems to have evaded everyone else including both main papers in the area Nord Littoral and La Voix Du Nord, neither of which would shrink from printing such a story if it were true. They even managed to get some juicy quotes quotes from the local police but then all of the Mail's quotes are not always kosher.
During the run up to the Calais No Border camp Peter Allen managed to interview (again probably by remote viewing as he wasn't actually seen in the area for the entire duration of the Camp) a French anarchist called Thierry who "has already pitched a tent next to the CRS’s temporary quarters next door to Calais port." Strangely, Thierry's location mysteriously disappeared from the story on the Mail's website as quickly as it went up and we were forced to question his existence as no one in their right mind would camp anywhere near the CRS HQ, especially a lone anarchist in the run up to a Camp where 3,000 up-for-it riot police officers were to be deployed.
A third article under the banner 'A million failed asylum seekers will get free NHS care in human rights U-turn' claimed that "NHS treatment will be available for tens of thousands of failed asylum seekers to ensure their human rights are honoured, it was announced yesterday."
So how do we got from 'tens of thousands' to the figure of 'millions'? Ah yes, it's all down to MigrationWatch (why don't they just say Phillip Green? He is MigrationWatch after all**) who believes "it could open the floodgates to 'up to a million' illegal immigrants." And this story displayed yet another standard Mail trope, the use of a stock photograph of migrants in Calais, now standard practice for almost all articles on migration with the Mail (sort of makes their agenda transparent really).
The piece then continued, "There are understood to be around 450,000 failed asylum seekers who have not left the country, although only 10 or 20,000 are directly affected by the new rules." So where does the millions come from? It's far from obvious. What does Andrew Green have to say? "Sir (sic) Andrew Green, chairman of MigrationWatch, said the rules gave the green light for up to one million illegal immigrants to get free NHS care. This is possible because GPs can put patients on their books without checking if they are entitled to free care."
Er, yes. But again, where does the million figure come from? If there are 450,000 failed asylum seekers in the UK, of which "only 10 or 20,000 are directly affected by the new rules", and last year there were 25,000 asylum applications (30,000 in 2008 and 28,000 in 2007), all people who previously have had the right to free health care (until the time ones asylum application is denied), where are the extra 550,000 coming from?
The problem with this fiction is not only do the figures not add up but when registering with a doctor, the receptionist (this is the person who actually registers the patient not the doctor Mr Green) will require you to fill out a GMS1 form, as well as checking to see if you have a NHS Card or number and address of your previous GP. The form asks for date of entry to UK (if non-UK citizen) and would require you to show your passport as a further check of EU citizenship. If not, then one would have to show one's Application Registration Card (ARC), which everyone making an asylum application in the UK receives and which contains a photograph of the holder and fingerprint on an embedded chip. Therefore anyone who has not made an asylum application and does not fall into these categories would be unable to register anyway, irrespective of the new changes.
Green goes on to say, 'This is yet another capitulation to the immigration lobby. No wonder they are queueing up in Calais.' And this from a man who claims he has no political axe to grind. The Mail however clearly does have an axe to grind except it's not obvious whether it is against the migrants or all foreigners. These articles on Calais constantly praise the stance of the Calais Mayor Natacha Bouchart***, their new Iron Lady, but the French themselves are also a frequent target of the Mail's ire, ''Go back to your disease-ridden country!' What the French said to British schoolchildren with swine flu' and 'Thousands of French chipmunks carrying potentially fatal diseases ready to invade Britain'**** being just 2 of the stories in recent days.
* All foreigners are mutants with an extra finger on each hand!
** Has anyone else ever seen or heard of anyone else from MigrationWatch? They have a list of members of their Advisory Council on their website but as far as one can see no one else is mentioned except this ex-professional diplomat, who since retiring has "devoted his time to voluntary work" including this "independent organisation" with "no political axes to grind." After all, he only presents the facts...in a comprehensible form."
*** No doubt we'll be seeing a photograph of her in the paper as soon as they find one of her in a swimsuit.
**** "French experts warn that the animals, which can also carry rabies, could soon reach Calais and sneak aboard vehicles and vessels heading to Britain. Many carry ticks infected with the Borrelia bacterium that causes Lyme disease, a nerve illness that can disable and even kills victims if not treated early enough." No they are not talking about Afghans.
Yesterday the Snail published a scoop, 'Calais migrants mutilate fingertips to hide true identity' trumpeting "Migrants massed in Calais in hopes of getting into Britain are mutilating their fingerprints so that their true identities cannot be established, it emerged today." Wrong, this "sinister development" is a widely documented practice that has been going on since Eurodac, the centralised EU computer fingerprint data system, was introduced in 2003. That the Mail has only just found out about it merely reflects the level of 'research' that goes into the smears, sorry 'stories', it publishes about the Calais migrant situation in particular and migrants in general. [See previous post ]
Peter Allen, the paper's Paris correspondent and 'author' of this piece, well known for researching his stories from the comfort of his office desk, claims that "the most common method was to place all ten fingers* on an oven hob and turn up the heat." Of course the migrants all live in nice little pied-a-terres where they have kitchen stoves on top of hot and cold running water and all the other creature comforts that scrounging asylum seekers are meant to have.
He then goes on to conflate Eurodac with Europol and claim that the hiding of fingerprints circumvents a system that "turn(s) back [known criminals] at borders, preventing them living in countries like Britain on benefits while they claim asylum, or else disappearing into the black economy", especially as "Police in Calais believe that some of the 2000 odd UK bound migrants sleeping rough in the town are repeat asylum seekers with criminal records."
Outstanding, except the logic falls down on a number of points. One, if you have been refused asylum in the UK once, then you are not going to apply for it a second time and therefore cannot be a "repeat asylum seeker". Two, asylum seekers cannot claim 'benefits' in the sense that he and other anti-immigration obsessives believe. The National Asylum Seeker Support Service (NASS) is the only form of 'benefits' open the asylum seekers and it provides low quality housing, mostly in dispersed shared accommodation, and £42.16 per week in cash (or a weekly voucher worth £35 for 'failed' asylum seekers). Hardly the lap of luxury. And NASS assistance is usually only available for asylum claims submitted at a port of entry not 'in country' i.e. will not be available to people smuggling themselves into the UK.
In another story entitled 'Calais migrants ambush Britons at knife-point in terrifying highway robberies', the paper that once said "Hurrah for the Blackshirts" claims that "Migrant gangs in Calais are targeting British holidaymakers in terrifying 'highway robberies'. Would-be illegal immigrants are forming human roadblocks to force motorists passing through the French port town to stop. Travellers are then robbed at knife-point by the migrants, who are desperate for funds to help them sneak into the UK."
Yes, the paper that brought us the Zinoviev letter appears to have landed yet another scoop, this time one that seems to have evaded everyone else including both main papers in the area Nord Littoral and La Voix Du Nord, neither of which would shrink from printing such a story if it were true. They even managed to get some juicy quotes quotes from the local police but then all of the Mail's quotes are not always kosher.
During the run up to the Calais No Border camp Peter Allen managed to interview (again probably by remote viewing as he wasn't actually seen in the area for the entire duration of the Camp) a French anarchist called Thierry who "has already pitched a tent next to the CRS’s temporary quarters next door to Calais port." Strangely, Thierry's location mysteriously disappeared from the story on the Mail's website as quickly as it went up and we were forced to question his existence as no one in their right mind would camp anywhere near the CRS HQ, especially a lone anarchist in the run up to a Camp where 3,000 up-for-it riot police officers were to be deployed.
A third article under the banner 'A million failed asylum seekers will get free NHS care in human rights U-turn' claimed that "NHS treatment will be available for tens of thousands of failed asylum seekers to ensure their human rights are honoured, it was announced yesterday."
So how do we got from 'tens of thousands' to the figure of 'millions'? Ah yes, it's all down to MigrationWatch (why don't they just say Phillip Green? He is MigrationWatch after all**) who believes "it could open the floodgates to 'up to a million' illegal immigrants." And this story displayed yet another standard Mail trope, the use of a stock photograph of migrants in Calais, now standard practice for almost all articles on migration with the Mail (sort of makes their agenda transparent really).
The piece then continued, "There are understood to be around 450,000 failed asylum seekers who have not left the country, although only 10 or 20,000 are directly affected by the new rules." So where does the millions come from? It's far from obvious. What does Andrew Green have to say? "Sir (sic) Andrew Green, chairman of MigrationWatch, said the rules gave the green light for up to one million illegal immigrants to get free NHS care. This is possible because GPs can put patients on their books without checking if they are entitled to free care."
Er, yes. But again, where does the million figure come from? If there are 450,000 failed asylum seekers in the UK, of which "only 10 or 20,000 are directly affected by the new rules", and last year there were 25,000 asylum applications (30,000 in 2008 and 28,000 in 2007), all people who previously have had the right to free health care (until the time ones asylum application is denied), where are the extra 550,000 coming from?
The problem with this fiction is not only do the figures not add up but when registering with a doctor, the receptionist (this is the person who actually registers the patient not the doctor Mr Green) will require you to fill out a GMS1 form, as well as checking to see if you have a NHS Card or number and address of your previous GP. The form asks for date of entry to UK (if non-UK citizen) and would require you to show your passport as a further check of EU citizenship. If not, then one would have to show one's Application Registration Card (ARC), which everyone making an asylum application in the UK receives and which contains a photograph of the holder and fingerprint on an embedded chip. Therefore anyone who has not made an asylum application and does not fall into these categories would be unable to register anyway, irrespective of the new changes.
Green goes on to say, 'This is yet another capitulation to the immigration lobby. No wonder they are queueing up in Calais.' And this from a man who claims he has no political axe to grind. The Mail however clearly does have an axe to grind except it's not obvious whether it is against the migrants or all foreigners. These articles on Calais constantly praise the stance of the Calais Mayor Natacha Bouchart***, their new Iron Lady, but the French themselves are also a frequent target of the Mail's ire, ''Go back to your disease-ridden country!' What the French said to British schoolchildren with swine flu' and 'Thousands of French chipmunks carrying potentially fatal diseases ready to invade Britain'**** being just 2 of the stories in recent days.
* All foreigners are mutants with an extra finger on each hand!
** Has anyone else ever seen or heard of anyone else from MigrationWatch? They have a list of members of their Advisory Council on their website but as far as one can see no one else is mentioned except this ex-professional diplomat, who since retiring has "devoted his time to voluntary work" including this "independent organisation" with "no political axes to grind." After all, he only presents the facts...in a comprehensible form."
*** No doubt we'll be seeing a photograph of her in the paper as soon as they find one of her in a swimsuit.
**** "French experts warn that the animals, which can also carry rabies, could soon reach Calais and sneak aboard vehicles and vessels heading to Britain. Many carry ticks infected with the Borrelia bacterium that causes Lyme disease, a nerve illness that can disable and even kills victims if not treated early enough." No they are not talking about Afghans.
Wednesday, 22 July 2009
The Wizardry of Oz
On Saturday about 1,000 people protested in Tel Aviv against on-going plans for the mass expulsion of migrant workers and refugees by Israel's immigration authorities. This follows the formation of a new immigration police force, the Oz unit, which began operations on July 1, detaining 220 people in its first 2 weeks of existence.*
During the same period there has been a growing opposition movement to the expulsions and Saturday's demonstration was the third in 3 weeks. The march and demonstration was joined by a large number of migrant workers and refugees including some of the Israel-born children facing deportation and who are gaining widespread public sympathy.
The Oz unit is tasked with expelling all of Israel's 'illegals' by 2013, including 20,000 this year with the first mass expulsion due in August. Israel's Interior Ministry estimates there are 280,000 foreigners living in Israel illegally. Of these, 118,000 are foreign workers who entered the country legally and either lost their status or stayed after their five-year permits expired. An additional 90,000 are people who entered the country on a tourist visa and did not leave when it expired. The remainder is made up of 24,000 'infiltrators' and asylum-seekers, and 2,000 minors who were born here to parents from other countries and have no legal status.
Many of these foreign workers were originally encouraged to come to Israel to fill jobs that Palestinian workers were no longer able to fill due to the Infantada and the government continues to grant work permits to thousands of new migrants. One source of the problem is that migrant labourers are often tied exclusively to one employer, and enjoy limited to no freedom in choosing jobs. Once they lose their job, they have only 3 months to find a new one before facing deportation.
One Israeli MP Ilan Gilon said in a recent Knesset debate, "My friends, this is a revolting stock exchange of slaves, slave traders and pimps whom you all serve. That is the reality." Others have compared Israel's policy on foreign workers to that of apartheid South Africa.
Many foreign workers are also exploited by Israeli employment agencies and lawyers who make their living by scamming the ignorant and vulnerable of money for non-existent jobs of work visas.
Some migrants and ordinary Israelis have taken the fight back to the Oz Immigration officers with the head of the unit, Tziki Sela, receiving hundred of threatening phone calls as part of a phone blockade. One message allegedly said, "you've forgotten what it's like to be a persecuted minority." "Coordinators of flights to hell, you'll get there, too", ran another text message. And in recent weeks attempts to detain Sudanese and Nigerian migrants have ended in mass dust ups.
In an amusing footnote, Micky Louis Mayon, a high-profile Ku Klux Klan member wanted in the US on charges of racist assaults, setting fire to vehicles belonging to federal agents and a host of violence incidents, was arrested at his Tel Aviv hideout on Monday by the very same Oz enforcement unit.
* 64% were asylum-seekers from Sudan and Eritrea who were arrested for violating an Immigration Authority order that forbids them from residing in the centre of the country, 16% were migrant workers and 20% were people with expired tourist visas or people who had crossed the Egyptian border illegally.
During the same period there has been a growing opposition movement to the expulsions and Saturday's demonstration was the third in 3 weeks. The march and demonstration was joined by a large number of migrant workers and refugees including some of the Israel-born children facing deportation and who are gaining widespread public sympathy.
The Oz unit is tasked with expelling all of Israel's 'illegals' by 2013, including 20,000 this year with the first mass expulsion due in August. Israel's Interior Ministry estimates there are 280,000 foreigners living in Israel illegally. Of these, 118,000 are foreign workers who entered the country legally and either lost their status or stayed after their five-year permits expired. An additional 90,000 are people who entered the country on a tourist visa and did not leave when it expired. The remainder is made up of 24,000 'infiltrators' and asylum-seekers, and 2,000 minors who were born here to parents from other countries and have no legal status.
Many of these foreign workers were originally encouraged to come to Israel to fill jobs that Palestinian workers were no longer able to fill due to the Infantada and the government continues to grant work permits to thousands of new migrants. One source of the problem is that migrant labourers are often tied exclusively to one employer, and enjoy limited to no freedom in choosing jobs. Once they lose their job, they have only 3 months to find a new one before facing deportation.
One Israeli MP Ilan Gilon said in a recent Knesset debate, "My friends, this is a revolting stock exchange of slaves, slave traders and pimps whom you all serve. That is the reality." Others have compared Israel's policy on foreign workers to that of apartheid South Africa.
Many foreign workers are also exploited by Israeli employment agencies and lawyers who make their living by scamming the ignorant and vulnerable of money for non-existent jobs of work visas.
Some migrants and ordinary Israelis have taken the fight back to the Oz Immigration officers with the head of the unit, Tziki Sela, receiving hundred of threatening phone calls as part of a phone blockade. One message allegedly said, "you've forgotten what it's like to be a persecuted minority." "Coordinators of flights to hell, you'll get there, too", ran another text message. And in recent weeks attempts to detain Sudanese and Nigerian migrants have ended in mass dust ups.
In an amusing footnote, Micky Louis Mayon, a high-profile Ku Klux Klan member wanted in the US on charges of racist assaults, setting fire to vehicles belonging to federal agents and a host of violence incidents, was arrested at his Tel Aviv hideout on Monday by the very same Oz enforcement unit.
* 64% were asylum-seekers from Sudan and Eritrea who were arrested for violating an Immigration Authority order that forbids them from residing in the centre of the country, 16% were migrant workers and 20% were people with expired tourist visas or people who had crossed the Egyptian border illegally.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)