Migration laws must respect rights of migrants and refugees

May 29, 2012: Caritas Europa and Caritas organizations in the Mediterranean call on the European Union (EU) to ensure the coherence between the Union’s and Member States’ policies on migration and the respect for human rights, revealed a press release on Tuesday.

Earlier, at the annual Caritas Migrant Conference, 16-18 May 2012, Caritas organizations in the Mediterranean expressed their concerns about the impacts of current EU policies that strongly focus on externalization, criminalization, return and detention of migrants and refugees.

Caritas advocates the right to seek a better life in peace away from one´s place of origin, as well as, the right to enjoy decent living conditions in one´s country of origin. Moreover, Caritas stresses that International and European law recognizes the right to leave any country, including one´s own, and to return to one´s country, the right to seek asylum and right to asylum.

Caritas Europa and the Caritas organisations in the Mediterranean recommended that the EU and Member States to:
- Refrain from structural creation of irregular migrants and safeguard human rights and dignity of all people by enabling legal channels for migration and realistic migration policies.
- Refrain from detention of migrants and asylum seekers. Detention should be used only as last resort in exceptional cases and alternatives to detention have to be given preference.
- Within the Multiannual financial framework 2014-2020, makes sure that funds do not only focus on return and border management.
- Encourage Member States to engage in resettlement of refugees with the support of the Joint EU Resettlement programme.
Caritas Europa will continue monitoring the future developments of EU policies in this field, the press release added.