Jerusalem, Undefined | AFP | Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cancelled an agreement with the UN refugee agency on Tuesday aimed at avoiding forced deportations of thousands of African migrants only hours after having announced the deal himself. The stunning turnaround after Netanyahu announced the accord in a televised address …
Read More »Netanyahu suspends Israel-UN deal on African migrants
Jerusalem, Undefined | AFP | Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday suspended a resettlement deal for African migrants faced with deportation, just hours after his office had announced the agreement with the UN refugee agency. “I’ve decided to suspend implementation of this accord and to rethink the terms of the …
Read More »Israel cancels controversial plan to deport African migrants
Jerusalem, Undefined | AFP | Israel announced Monday it had reached a deal with the UN refugee agency to cancel a controversial plan to deport African migrants and replace it with a new one that will see thousands sent to Western countries. A minimum of 16,250 migrants will be resettled …
Read More »Warming climate will displace millions in coming decades: World Bank
Washington, United States | AFP | The wave of refugees fleeing crop failures, droughts and rising sea levels will grow drastically over the next three decades if world governments do not intervene, the World Bank warned Monday. By 2050, 143 million “climate migrants” will face an “existential threat” and be …
Read More »African, EU states focus anti-trafficking efforts at source
Niamey, Niger | AFP | Thirteen African and European countries and the EU agreed Friday that efforts to crack down on migrant trafficking to Europe should also focus on economic woes that prompt poor Africans to seek a better life in Europe. In ministerial-level talks, they agreed to “attack underlying …
Read More »Israel court suspends plan to deport African migrants ‘to Uganda and Rwanda’
Jerusalem, Undefined | AFP | Israel’s supreme court on Thursday suspended a controversial government plan to deport thousands of Eritrean and Sudanese migrants in response to a challenge from those opposed to the move. The court said in its decision the state was given until March 26 to provide …
Read More »African migrants start hunger strike over Israel expulsion
Jerusalem, Undefined | AFP | Hundreds of African migrants launched a hunger strike to protest Israel’s implementation of its controversial policy to expel or indefinitely imprison them, a spokesman for the group said Wednesday. Israel has resolved to expel thousands of Eritreans and Sudanese who entered illegally over the years, …
Read More »Pope condemns media denigration of migrants
Vatican City, Holy See | AFP | Pope Francis on Monday criticised media which “denigrates” migrants through emotive or incomplete reporting on their situation. “Some months ago I saw a newspaper headline about a small town in Italy which read, ‘this is the town where there were the most rapes this …
Read More »Valentine’s Day a rosy opportunity for jobless Colombians
Tabio, COLOMBIA | AFP | Valentine’s Day is a crazy rush for Colombia, one of the biggest flower exporters in the world, resulting in huge demand for labor in greenhouses near Bogota. That’s how Rubiela Mendez and William Perez found themselves shivering in a cold they’d never known, preparing roses …
Read More »African migrants in Israel opt for jail over deportation
Holot Detention Centre, Israel | AFP | At a detention centre in Israel’s Negev desert, African migrants facing deportation say they would rather be imprisoned than sent to a country they know nothing about. “I won’t go there,” Abda Ishmael, a 28-year-old Eritrean, said in excellent Hebrew outside Holot, an …
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