Europe Is Denying Thousands of Migrants a Chance at Asylum
The UN wants to support migrants in Europe who want to return to their country of origin. In practice, this scheme has forced asylum seekers to choose between deportation, indefinite detention in immigration centers, or destitution.
Migrants who have just arrived from Greece wait outside a UNHCR tent in a refugee reception center. (Matt Cardy / Getty Images)
The worst thing about being in Greek immigration detention for Ahmad* — even worse than the insalubrious conditions, casual police brutality, and not knowing when he would be released — was that he was totally cut off from the world. Without visitors or access to his phone, he lived with the fear of what would happen if no one knew where he was, worried sick about what his family in Afghanistan thought had become of him.
Ahmad’s only communication with the outside was with caseworkers from International Organization for Migration (IOM), the UN migration agency. “They wore dark blue vests and lanyards, imprinted with the UN emblem,” said Ahmad. “And once or twice a week they would come and ask me, ‘Don’t you want to go home?'”
“Voluntary” Return?
The Assisted Voluntary Return and Reintegration (AVRR) program delivered by IOM aims to provide safe, dignified return to migrants; a crucial service for many stranded migrants who desperately want to go home but lack the means to do so. Nonetheless, of late the program has been plagued with questions surrounding its “voluntary” nature when it comes to refugees returning from the EU, especially Greece.
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