Biodun Iginla, BBC News

Biodun Iginla, BBC News
Showing posts with label british charities. Show all posts
Showing posts with label british charities. Show all posts

Sunday, October 23, 2016

British charities press France ahead of Calais camp closure


© AFP file photo | A view of the Calais 'Jungle' camp

Latest update : 2016-10-23  09H:21  GMT/UTC/ZULU TIME


British charities and lawmakers have urged French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve to ensure the safety of children in the "Jungle" Calais migrant camp during its demolition set for Monday.

The signatories said in a letter dated Friday they had "very serious worries concerning the security and well-being of unaccompanied minors and vulnerable adults".
Cazeneuve has pledged that all remaining migrants at the site, currently occupied by around 5,700 people according to official figures, would be given "dignified" shelter after the camp is cleared.
"We fear that the resources currently being deployed and the proposed responses are insufficient to ensure the effective protection of the most vulnerable, notably unaccompanied children," the letter said.
The signatories, which included Save the Children, the Refugee Council, Safe Passage UK-Citizens UK and the International Rescue Committee UK, said tensions had risen in the camp since its demolition was announced, due to a lack of clear information from the authorities about the future of its inhabitants.
They said a poorly-organised clearance would put already fragile people into an even more precarious situation.
The letter asked for all unaccompanied minors to be found shelter before the demolition begins, for a designated "safe zone" in the camp during the dismantlement and, that everyone eligible to join family in Britain be identified.
They also called for independent rights observers to be present during the demolition.
The signatories included 60 of the 650 MPs, two bishops and several members of parliament's upper House of Lords, including Paddy Ashdown, the former international high representative for Bosnia.
But at the "Jungle" camp in the northern French port of Calais on Saturday, migrants seemed prepared for the move to various locations around France.
'We've been waiting'
"Monday I take the bus!" declared a smiling Sudanese named Kali, living in a tent marked with graffiti saying "London Hotel".
"Everyone has had their bags packed for a week already because they told us it could be on the 17th (of October) and since then we've been waiting," said Mohammed, also from Sudan.
The 43-year-old former computer engineer says he's given up trying to get to Britain, which was the goal of most of the 6,000 to 8,000 migrants in the Calais camp. Some claimed to have family links there and many believed they would have a better chance of finding work.
"Some people don't want to be forced to move," Mohammed added.
Volunteers with the British association Care 4 Calais walked from tent to tent to inform the migrants about the plans and give them emergency contact phone numbers.
Police could be seen maintaining a discreet presence near the temporary welcome centre where interviews were to take place for unaccompanied minors hoping to join relatives in the UK.
After 100 youngsters left on Saturday, another 40 were set to leave Calais for Britain on Sunday morning, said Pierre Henry, head of the France Terre d'Asile charity.
Among the Afghans who run food shops in the camp, one owner with the sign "Do not destroy the Jungle" has his doubts about whether the dismantlement will actually happen.
"We'll see on Monday, I don't believe it," he said.
Another Afghan shopkeeper, when asked what he would do after the camp was torn down, just said, "I will go to the next Jungle."

Sunday, September 6, 2015

Migrant crisis: 'Extraordinary' support for charities

by Emily Straton and Biodun Iginla, BBC News, London

23 minutes ago


The British public's response to the refugee crisis has been "extraordinary" and "so supportive", charities say.
Save the Children said its appeal, which started on Thursday, raised more than £500,000 in its first 24 hours.
The British Red Cross said the public were "realising that it's a massive humanitarian crisis" and had given "hundreds of thousands" of pounds.
On Friday David Cameron said the UK would take in "thousands" more refugees from the conflict in Syria.
European countries are struggling to cope with a surge of migrants from the Middle East and Africa.
Austria and Germany are expecting thousands more migrants to arrive from Hungary after Budapest eased restrictions on their travel.
More than 350,000 migrants were detected at the EU's borders in January-August 2015, many of them fleeing conflicts in Syria and Afghanistan, and abuses in Eritrea.
In other developments:
  • The Scottish government says it will provide initial funding of £1m to co-ordinate Scotland's response to the refugee crisis
  • A petition calling for Britain to take more refugees has received more than 400,000 signatures - four times the amount needed for the issue to be considered for debate by MPs
  • Chancellor George Osborne has said resettling refugees has to be part of a wider plan to deal with the crisis

Speedy donations

Calls for the UK to take in more refugees have intensified after the publication of a picture of the body of a drowned three-year-old Syrian boy, Alan Kurdi, washed up on a Turkish beach.
Save the Children's appeal has been boosted by several authors pledging to match donations up to £10,000.
At 20:30 BST on Saturday, a spokeswoman for the charity told the BBC the scheme - organised via social media - had raised £380,000 so far.
And she said thousands had been donated by lawyers giving an hour's pay, using the Twitter hashtag #Billablehour.
She said she could not yet update the figure of more than £500,000 raised, but added: "The speed at which this money has been raised has been, I think, quite extraordinary."
Image copyright EPA
Image caption The Red Cross has been helping migrants in countries including Hungary
The British Red Cross said it could not give details of how much money it had raised, but said it was already in the hundreds of thousands.
A spokeswoman said the money would be used by Red Cross organisations in every country affected by the crisis.
"The public response has been so supportive and people are realising that it's a massive humanitarian crisis," she said.
An appeal by Islamic Relief UK started on Friday and raised more than £50,000 in its first 24 hours.
A spokesman said Islamic Relief worldwide had spent £130m helping those affected by the Syria conflict since 2011, but the latest appeal was to help refugees in Greece, Germany and Italy.
He said there had been a "sense of despair" in Syria in recent months because people there felt the crisis had been "rather forgotten" by the international community.
But he said the situation in Europe was "shining a light" on Syria as part of the wider crisis, and he hoped there would now be more international efforts to bring the Syrian factions "to the negotiating table".

Plea from councils

Earlier, UK council leaders called on the government to provide more resources to help them house the extra refugees the UK is planning to accept.
David Simmons from the Local Government Association (LGA) said: "We need to make sure that if people are going to be moved to the UK, that we've a clear idea of what the cost is going to be, to provide the public services that they expect when they come here."
Under existing schemes, government financial support for Syrians resettled in the UK lasts 12 months.
Details of Mr Cameron's plans have not been announced, but the Syrians are expected to be taken to Britain under existing schemes, so the 12-month limit on central government support is expected to apply.
After that, costs including health, education and social care will fall to councils.
An exact figure on how many people the UK will take in is yet to be decided, but Mr Cameron made it clear on Friday that the extra refugees would come from camps bordering Syria, and not from among those already in Europe.

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