Assisting and protecting refugees in Europe and the Middle East - politics, law, and humanitarian practices

Event jointly organized by the Norwegian Centre for Human Rights (UiO) and the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies (PRIO, CMI, NUPI).

Migration management policies and practices in Europe and the Middle East are usually studied and discussed separately. When European policy makers consider protection of refugees and asylum seekers in the Middle East, the overarching concern is generally how these states can be better supported in their means to protect and assist – all in a bid to prevent onwards movement to Europe. In other words, a failure to deliver on this on behalf of Middle Eastern states is generally seen as a question of capacity rather than political will. Closer examination nevertheless reveals a more complex picture, including intricate policies of temporariness and marginalization. And while the means to strengthen European borders seem endless, European states are also holding back on relief to those arriving in Europe, following an ostensible fear of creating pull factors for more refugee arrivals.

In this one-day seminar we explore three interconnected themes which are axiomatic to today’s refugee response. First is the increased criminalization of humanitarian aid. Where states seek to prevent the arrival and/or stay of refugees and other migrants, this phenomena has become increasingly pregnant. In politicized contexts both in Europe and in the Middle East, humanitarian actors are seen as agents facilitating the arrival and unauthorized presence of these individuals. Sometimes humanitarian actors have even faced accusations of being complicit in migrant smuggling. How does this process of criminalization affect humanitarian action as such, its room of manoeuvre and interaction with state-led policies?

A second trend is the growing policy of containment of refugees, both in regions of origin but also in the border regions of Europe. Efforts to constrain, deflect and deter migrants have intensified, and include high-tech barriers in the Southern Mediterranean and the reinforcement of border control in central Europe. The EU’s policy of regional containment in the Middle East has not only resulted in the criminalization of individuals arriving to Europe irregularly – and their helpers – but arguably also to the development of the Middle East region as a ‘catch basin’ for refugees and other migrants. While the containment of people on the move is often miscast as a humanitarian action to save lives, a pressing question is whether this regional containment policy is actually turning the Middle East into a SuperCamp that immobilizes refugees and migrants alike through humanitarian architectures of containment?

As a third theme, this seminar explores the practice of humanitarian lawyering. The shrinking space for civil society in many countries has had an especially pronounced effect on defenders of the rights of refugees. The ability of legal aid organizations and others to argue for the protection of asylum seekers and refugees is increasingly constrained in both Europe and in the Middle East. In Europe, asylum seekers’ access to legal aid has been undermined by legislative proposals targeting civil society organizations that support the arrival or stay of asylum-seekers or refugees. Even in countries where legal aid is available in general, obstacles regarding the quality, funding or availability of legal aid for asylum applicants are increasingly reported. In the Middle East, few states are furthermore party to the core international treaties protecting refugees and few have fully developed national asylum systems. Yet, local legal practitioners have founded national non-governmental organizations and networks of lawyers to protect refugees – and have achieved notable successes. How is the provision of refugee legal aid affected by the shrinking of civil society space? How do humanitarian lawyers navigate, and adapt to, the current pressing challenges?

This event is free and open for all. Please register by following this link.

The content of this event is based on three projects funded by the FRIPRO-programme of the Research Council of Norway.

• Humanitarianism, Borders, and the Governance of Mobility: The EU and the ‘Refugee Crisis’ (PRIO, headed by Maria Gabrielsen Jumbert).
• Refugees and the Arab Middle East: Protection in States Not Party to the Refugee Convention (Norwegian Centre for Human Rights, headed by Maja Janmyr).
• SuperCamp: Genealogies of Humanitarian Containment in the Middle East (CMI, headed by Are John Knudsen).

Tentative Program (more information to follow)

09:00 – 09:15 Welcome and introduction

Maja Janmyr, Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Oslo, and Maria Gabrielsen Jumbert, Research Director and Senior Researcher, PRIO

09:15 – 10:45 First session: Humanitarian criminalization

“Migration and criminalization: the social production of the ‘crimmigrant other’”, Katja Franko, Professor, Department of Criminology and Sociology of Law, University of Oslo

“The progressive criminalization of aid to migrants en route to Europe: from Mare Nostrum to Salvini’s closed ports”, Maria Gabrielsen Jumbert, Research Director and Senior Researcher, PRIO

“Situating criminalization: Juridification and lawfare in the humanitarian sector”, Kristin Bergtora Sandvik, Professor, Department of Criminology and sociology of law, University of Oslo, and Research Professor, PRIO

Chair: Bruno Oliveira Martins, Senior Researcher, PRIO

10:45-11:00 Coffee break

11:00 – 12:30 Second session: Humanitarian containment

“SuperCamp – the Middle East as a regional zone of containment”, Are Knudsen, Senior Researcher, Chr. Michelsen Institute

“Baquba refugee camp and the origins of humanitarian containment” in the Middle East, 1918-20”, Dr Benjamin Thomas White, Lecturer, University of Glasgow

“Humanitarian Containment? United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and the Palestinian Refugee Question”, Kjersti G. Berg, Post-doctoral Fellow, Chr. Michelsen Institute

“’Going on the game’: humanitarian containment along the Balkan route”, Synnøve Bendixsen, Associate Professor, University of Bergen

Chair: Are Knudsen, Senior Researcher, Chr. Michelsen Institute

12:30 – 13:15 Lunch

13:15 – 14:45 Third session: Humanitarian lawyering

“Humanitarian Lawyering: exploring the concept and key questions”, Dr Martin Jones, Senior Lecturer in International Human Rights Law, University of York

“Legal aid in humanitarian operations: experiences from the Norwegian Refugee Council”, Fernando de Medina Rosales, Special Adviser ICLA, Norwegian Refugee Council

“Legal aid in the Jordanian refugee context”, Samar Muhareb, ARDD Legal Aid Team Director (Jordan)

“Protecting Refugees in Lebanon through Strategic Litigation: Lessons from the Past and Challenges of the Present”, Ghida Frangieh, Lawyer and legal researcher, Legal Agenda (Lebanon)

Chair: Maja Janmyr, Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Oslo

14:45 -15:00 Coffee break

15:00 – 16:00 Roundtable debate: Europe and Middle East Migration Policies 

Morten Bøås, Research Professor, NUPI

Tove Skarstein, Independent Expert, former Director of Department for Migration, Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Dallal Stevens, Professor, School of Law, University of Warwick

Chair: Maria Gabrielsen Jumbert, Research Director and Senior Researcher, PRIO

See: https://www.humanitarianstudies.no/events/assisting-and-protecting-refugees-in-europe-and-the-middle-east-politics-law-and-humanitarian-practices/