You are a bit confused.
Laws of asylum are like laws of war.
A nation follows those laws because they are the “right thing to do”.
- So with asylum, it should be obvious that some asylum seekers will die if they are forced to go back to their home.
- So it should be obvious that the UK should give asylum to any German Jew who lands on the beach in 1939.
- And therefore it should also be obvious that the UK is no longer obligated to give her asylum after 1945.
- And so the German Jewish girl that my wife knew later on, who was an older woman of her parent’s generation, who was given asylum, could have gone back to Germany at the end of the war, but did not - because she was able to stay here in the UK.
- And this would also have been the right thing for the UK to do.
- But we need to be reasonable about this.
- Some German Jews did go back to Germany at the end of the war.
- Others went back to Holland - the place where they found safety, until only a few months before the liberation of Holland the SS found their hiding place.
- And some even went to New York, or to Palestine.
- Each country has their own way of deciding what is right.
- The general obligation is only that we give them asylum until they can go back without fear of dying or punishment.
- And that we have no other obligation to them, at all. Not citizenship. Not a job. Not even a place to live outside of a “safe” refugee camp.
This is what makes Rwanda such a controversial place for the UK to send people who are given asylum in the UK.
- By giving them asylum, the UK is recognising its obligation.
- But deporting them to another country is infringing on that obligation.
There really would not be that much of a problem in understanding everything if it wasn’t for the deliberate confusion of refugee and economic migrant.
Deliberately confused, because the refugee does not have to work, and the migrant comes here to work.
And the basis of this is racism.
- No one would have said anything if the German Jew my wife knew was sent to the US as a “safe place” instead of having to stay in London during the bombing.
- And the genuine refugee from - lets say Somalia - would be safer in Rwanda than Somalia.
- So what your question is basically asking is for the refugee to have the right to pick and choose the safest place to stay, and to stay as long as she wants.
- But that is not how it works.
- Simply put, if the refugee is deported and we find out that she is not then killed, but is able to save up some more money to try the people smugglers once again, it is much more likely that she was not genuine and was just an economic migrant.
- No country should be obligated in any way to give asylum to someone who is not a refugee. No refugee should be treated in any way different to anyone who just needs a safe place to stay - and that safe place - even a prison - is all our obligation has to be.
I remind you of some basic facts, at least how I see it.
- That German girl, now a woman, after the war, was allowed to stay and become a British citizen. This was the right thing to do.
- But far too many people from Somalia seem to want to blow themselves up on the Tube, after they get here.
- We need to ensure that no one is confused about our obligation. It should not be about skin colour, or religion, or sexuality. The moment you tell us how much “Einstein” can do for us if we give him asylum, or the moment you tell us how much “Mo” can do for us in the Olympics, you lose focus on what that obligation is supposed to be about.
No comments:
Post a Comment