Stranded Migrants and the Fragmented Journey

Journal of Refugee Studies Vol. 23, No. 3 ß The Author 2010. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: doi:10.1093/jrs/feq026 Advance Access publication 5 August 2010 Stranded Migrants and the Fragmented Journey Sussex Centre for Migration Research, University of Sussex, Falmer, Brighton BN1 9SJ MS received January 2010; revised MS received May 2010 Long and dangerous ‘fragmented journeys’ have become a common feature of global migration systems. These are more than simple responses to stricter migration controls and are associated with related developments in technology and communications. They are therefore a structural change in migration systems which require a re-examination of the ways in which protection is offered to migrants. This has become an important theme of international discussion since 2005 but the humanitarian situation of international migrants on particular routes remains of concern to aid groups and many in the international community. This paper, based on research in Morocco, considers the protection needs of three groups of ‘stranded’ migrants: yet to be recognized refugees, previously recognized refugees and those with other protection needs. It examines migration histories to identify reasons why this third group of individuals may be unable or unwilling to return and the nature of humanitarian assistance they require. Keywords: forced migration, Morocco, European Union, protection It is now widely accepted that migrants who are not recognized as refugees may still be considered as ‘persons in need of protection’ (UNHCR 2008). There is, however, continuing uncertainty about how to define this expanded category and what this might mean in terms of practical policy responses. Protecting vulnerable international migrants who fall outside the scope of the international refugee regime has generated significant international concern since at least the early 1990s. This concern was formalized in 2007 with UNHCR’s 10-point plan on ‘Refugee protection and mixed migration’ (UNHCR 2007) and the High Commissioner’s dialogue on ‘Durable solutions in the context of international migration’ (UNHCR 2008). The number of undocumented migrants who are killed or injured during lengthy and extremely risky overland or maritime journeys initially motivated these concerns. Data on the number of migrant fatalities is increasingly robust, MICHAEL COLLYER 274 Michael Collyer particularly in the Mediterranean (Carling 2007). Responding to this humanitarian and human rights challenge is now a subject of discussion at the highest levels. The first element of the 10-point plan is ‘cooperation with key partners’ and there is evidence that these international discussions have had some positive results. They have helped to identify limited areas where international cooperation can make a genuine difference, such as laws around interception at sea; UNHCR signed a new agreement with the Moroccan government in 2007, which has resulted in greater respect for UNHCR-issued documentation; there are new priority areas for continued focus, such as ‘protection sensitive border controls’, and the discussions have drawn international attention to the human rights of undocumented migrants, which may well have resulted in a reduction of state sponsored abuse of international migrants; there has been no repeat of the Moroccan police force’s decision to abandon an estimated 2,000 migrants on its remote desert border with Algeria in October 2005, for example. Yet, although progress is inevitably slow and some signs of minor changes are evident, it is difficult to escape the impression that the tremendous focus of international attention at very high levels over a period of several years, has not accomplished very much. The most obvious explanation for this is that the problems posed by these types of movements are particularly difficult to solve. Until relatively recently these migration systems were characterized as the ‘asylum–migration nexus’ though the term appears to have fallen out of use following its rejection by UNHCR as focused too clearly on south to north movement (Crisp 2008). The European Commission, which considers Europe as the intended destination for many of these migrants, continues to refer to ‘transit’ migration (EC 2009) which also emphasizes south to north movements. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has, since 2005, institutionalized the idea of the ‘stranded’ migrant, in its Stranded Migrant Facility (IOM 2009). The label ‘mixed migration’ has become popular more recently and although this initially seemed to offer few new insights more recent analysis, particularly following the High Commissioner’s dialogue, has involved a recognition of the greater complexity of motivations, timing, legal status, resources and locations involved in such movements (UNHCR 2009). This article uses the terms ‘stranded migrant’ and ‘fragmented migration’, both key elements of ‘mixed migration’ which capture the essential character of the protection requirements of migrants in this situation. ‘Stranded migrants’ is a broad term, with a variety of uses dating to 1921, when it was used to describe the plight of African Americans moving from the rural south of the US to the cities of the north without resources (Henderson 1921). Although IOM’s Stranded Migrant Facility provides an invaluable service to many migrants who wish to return and would otherwise not be able to, return is obviously not the only potential solution to being stranded. There are a significant proportion, the ‘terminally stranded’, who do not wish or are not able to do so. I follow Dowd (2008) in her clear analysis of the term. Stranded Migrants and the Fragmented Journey 275 Fragmented Migration across the Sahara Migration across the Sahara was first recognized as a significant issue in the late 1990s (Goldschmidt 2004), much later than comparable overland movements to the European Union from Eastern Europe or overland migration into the United States. It was not until December 1999 that illegal migration of non-Moroccans into the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla provoked the construction of a double high tension chain link fence along the entire length of each town’s border with Morocco. In 2000 the Moroccan news magazine Demain ran an article on sub-Saharan Africans in Tangier who made the crossing of the straits of Gibraltar in the rickety wooden pateras (Lmrabet 2000), illustrating the immediate impact of the increased difficulty of entering Ceuta and Melilla. Changing patterns of controls at Morocco’s The migrants of concern in this paper are distinguished from other ‘stranded’ migrants, such as domestic workers who have fled abusive employers (Human Rights Watch 2008), by the ‘fragmented’ nature of their migration, broken into a number of separate stages, involving varied motivations, legal statuses and living and employment c (...truncated)