IOM Press Briefing Notes - 28 juli 2009 (alleen beschikbaar in het engels)
ITALY - Stranded Migrants Seek Assistance - An IOM team completed yesterday a 10 day assessment mission in San Nicola Varco, a town some one hundred kilometres south of Naples, where up to a thousand irregular migrants have taken over abandoned structures, eking out a living amid piles of rubbish, without running water or electricity.
The migrants, all young men from Morocco employed without a work contract as seasonal workers in the agricultural sector, say they are being exploited by unscrupulous employers who pay them between 15 and 25 euros a day to work in the nearby greenhouses and fields.
Speaking to IOM, many migrants said they have to pay employers for services such as water and 3 euros each time they go from the encampment to the fields, where they toil from 4.30 am till 4.00 pm.
"We've been asked by the local authorities and by the Italian Ministry of Interior to carry out an assessment in the area in order to identify solutions for these desperate migrants," says Peter Schatzer, IOM's Chief of Mission in Italy. "Their living and working conditions are unsafe, insalubrious and undignified."
On Sunday night, a fire broke out in the encampment, causing some damage but no injuries to the migrants.
"Our team discovered that most of the migrants have fallen victim to a fraud," says IOM's Peter Schatzer. "All came to Italy through the seasonal quota system established every year by the Italian government. They paid a fee to a rogue agent in their country of origin and to an Italian employer, who promised to give them a regular job. Once in Italy, the migrants found that their employer had disappeared or just refused to employ them. Without a legal work permit, many fell into exploitation."
The IOM team of 4 legal officers and 2 cultural mediators interviewed more than 200 migrants and IOM is now working with the relevant authorities in Italy and Morocco to address their many needs.
"We are working with our Italian counterparts to see if the migrants could benefit from assistance and protection in Italy," says Peter Schatzer. "IOM could also provide support for those who wish to go home through IOM's assisted voluntary return programme."
Illegal labour, especially in the agricultural sector is a widespread phenomenon in Italy, with official statistics showing that it accounts for between 15.9% and 17.6% of the country's gross domestic product.
For further information, please contact Flavio Di Giacomo at IOM Rome,
Tel: + 39 06 44 186 207 email: fdigiacomo@iom.int
CENTRAL AMERICA - Launch of Regional Counter Trafficking Campaign - The IOM offices in Costa Rica, El Salvador and Nicaragua have launched a regional public information campaign aimed at fighting human trafficking in Central America and Mexico.
With the campaign slogan, No More Human Trafficking or No más trata de personas, IOM in coordination with National Counter-trafficking coalitions, is advertising the hotlines numbers in each country (Guatemala 1552; El Salvador 911; Nicaragua 133; and Costa Rica 911) and raise awareness amongst potential victims and the general population on the dangers of human trafficking for men and women, either for labour or sexual exploitation.
The campaign also includes radio and TV spots, a radio soap opera, posters and other materials which will be prominently displayed in public places and distributed to thousands of persons in each country.
Central America and Mexico are considered countries of origin, transit and /or destination for human trafficking, some all three at the same time.
A series of 14 national studies carried out by IOM in Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama, confirmed the need for improved legislation as the major hurdles to combat human trafficking
Some of the main findings of the IOM research include:
- Lack of awareness amongst local prosecutors who do not recognize human trafficking as an international organized crime;
- Varying definitions in the penal codes of what constitutes human trafficking;
- Strong limitations in terms of human and financial resources, including access to computers and transportation in order to investigate crimes; and
- Lack of resources for witness and victim protection programmes.
"In Nicaragua, IOM is fortunate to have the support of the National Counter-Trafficking Coalition, which is made up of some 130 organizations and institutions," says Berta Fernandez, IOM Chief of Mission in Nicaragua. "As a result, IOM and its partners have seen a marked improvement in the psychological well-being of the victims that have benefited from our assistance programme."
Nicaragua is a country of origin for women and children trafficked for sexual exploitation and forced labour. Women and young girls are trafficked for sexual exploitation within the country and outside its borders primarily to Guatemala and El Salvador, and in smaller numbers to Costa Rica, Mexico, Honduras, Venezuela, Spain, and the United States. Children are trafficked within the country for forced labour in construction, agriculture, fishing, and domestic servitude.
The campaign will be launched in the coming weeks in Mexico, Honduras and Panama.
The new IOM regional information campaign has received the backing of the countries of the Regional Conference on Migration (RCM) and is funded by the U.S Department of State Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration (PRM)
For more information, please contact: Ana Beatriz Fernández at IOM Costa Rica, Tel: +506-2221-5348, Email: afernandez@iom.int ; Elisabeth Ramírez at IOO El Salvador, Tel: +503.22646590, Email: eramirez@iom.int; Brenda de Trinidad at IOM Nicaragua, Tel: +505 278 95 69, Email: bdetrinidad@iom.int
AFGHANISTAN - IOM to Build Kabul Reception Centre for Returnees - IOM is to start construction of a reception and transit centre in Kabul for some of the thousands of Afghans returning to Afghanistan from abroad every year.
The centre, which will be located in the Jangkalak compound of the Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation (MORR), will comprise 19 flexible rooms housing up to 76 people at any one time.
A groundbreaking ceremony for the building, which will be funded by the United Kingdom, is scheduled for tomorrow. The project is scheduled for completion in May 2010.
Last year a total of 277,699 refugees returned to Afghanistan voluntarily, while over 400,000 were forcibly returned. Many had spent years as refugees outside the country and had no "homes" to return to.
The centre, which will be managed by the MORR, will substantially increase the capacity of the Government of Afghanistan to address the immediate needs of returnees and contribute towards their successful reintegration.
Since the fall of the Taleban government in 2001, more than 4.3 million refugees have voluntarily returned to Afghanistan.
For more information please contact Bogdan Danila at IOM Kabul, Tel. +93.700.224.863, Email: bdanila@iom.int
