The conference heard that the experience of one Eritrean refugee, published in the report, is “all too familiar.”   The boat on which he was fleeing was intercepted by Greek authorities, who then confiscated the engine and abandoned its occupants. He was rescued by fishermen, but detained on arrival in Greece.

Even those who make it to Europe cannot be considered safe

Stefan Kessler

A conference in Brussels has heard that the EU “actively hinders” the arrival of refugees to Europe.

The event was told this is the result of a “deep-seated aversion” of EU countries to give forced migrants access to asylum procedures.

Member states had also “failed” to agree on comprehensive reforms to improve national asylum systems, it was said.

“Across the world, 88 percent of Eritrean migrants who seek asylum are recognized as refugees,” said Reut Michaeli, an attorney for The Hotline for Migrant Workers. “I find it very difficult to believe that the ones who come to Israel are any different.”

Israel OKs Funding to Block African Migrants

By AMY TEIBEL     Associated Press

JERUSALEM (AP) – The Israeli Cabinet voted unanimously Sunday to finance a $160 million program to stanch the flow of illegal African migrants by stepping up construction of a border fence and expanding a detention center to hold thousands of new arrivals.

A practice increasingly employed throughout the world

Rome, 7 December 2011 – In its latest report, Safe and Secure: How do Refugees Experience Europe’s Borders?, JRS finds ample evidence that European governments actively hinder refugee arrivals. JRS field offices confirm these deplorable practices are not limited to Europe; they are rapidly becoming the norm throughout Asia and Africa.

As the world commemorates the anniversary on 10 December of this poignant document, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Jesuit Refugee Service urges states to:

• respond swiftly to all migrants and refugees in distress at sea and offer all those apprehended, including at land borders, access to procedures to determine whether they are in need of international protection; and
• end the practice of forcibly removing migrants to third countries where their human rights cannot be effectively protected.

“Never before the Mediterranean Sea has been as closely monitored as this year because of the war in Libya and still more boat people than ever perished or disappeared”

Matthew Vella

NATO officials have reportedly agreed to provide additional information into the deaths of asylum seekers in the Mediterranean, as part of an investigation by Dutch MP Tineke Strike for the Council of Europe’s parliamentary assembly committee on migration.

The additional information may include satellite imagery.

Hundreds of Refugees Held Hostage in Sinai Torture Camps Need Rescuing

Agenzia Habeshia – Italy, Release Eritrea – United Kingdom , International Commission on Eritrean Refugees (ICER) – United States, Eritrean Movement for Democracy and Human Rights (EMDHR) – Sweden, The America Team for Displaced Eritreans – United States, Physicians for Human Rights – Israel, Hotline for Migrant Workers – Israel

Claims that a large number of refugees have been released from Sinai camps following media reports represents only a partial picture of the current situation on the ground. Human rights organizations worldwide have come together to publish up-to-date information in their possession which shows that the smuggling networks are still up and running and that hundreds of refugee hostages are being tortured by human traffickers in the Sinai.

For more than 18 months, the chilling evidence of horrors inflicted by human traffickers on refugees as they are on their way to Israel through the Sinai desert has been published and broadcast in Israel and throughout the world. During the past year, the organizations signed on this document have provided detailed information, systematically collected, regarding smuggling networks operating in the Sinai and beyond (Israel, Ethiopia, and Sudan) to influential bodies in the international arena including diplomats, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), Amnesty International and the Israeli authorities. Despite these numerous appeals, and the concrete nature of the information that was transferred, the detention camps, the extortion, and the torture continue.