NETWORK ON "VIOLENCE AND THE RIGHT OF ASYLUM IN EUROPE"
70 participants from 30 countries decided the creation of an network of reflexion on "Violence and the right of asylum in Europe", at an international symposium at the University of Geneva, on 23-25 September, 1993.
The purpose of the network gathering academics from various disciplins and practitioners (lawyers, social workers, psychologists, human rights activists...) is to promote interdisciplinary collective reflexion on and in connection with the right of asylum. "The right of asylum is an issue as a such, but it is also a field where transformations of our societies and new forms of exclusion can be observed at an early stage", it says in a presentation of the objectives of the network. A declaration adopted at the symposium underlines the fact the development, resp. degradation of the right of asylum in Europe is closely connected to some of the most urgent global problems and therefore is more than a mere matter of legal standards and human rights. A merely humanitarian approach ignores the dimensions of the problem. Thus, the declaration underlines the "need to ask oneself about the causes of forced population movements from South to North and to determine the responsibilities of the countries of the North in the deterioration of the economic situation of the countries of the South" and stresses that "the situation of asylum-seekers and the precariousness of migrant workers' status are not unconnected with, or dissimilar to, the situation of the unemployed, elderly and homeless in the countries of the North. Whereas these categories of the population are sometimes set against migrant workers or asylum-seekers, the reasons why they should show solidarity with each other ought to be emphasised more". "There are rich people in the poor countries and poor people in the rich countries", the declaration continues, "but whereas the rich have established a borderless transnational society among themselves, the division of State territories isolates the poor from each other and tends to convince them of the unique and specific character of their situation".
Among the sponsors of the new network are: Victor Daniel Bomilla, author and counselor of the Indian movement in Colombia; Jean-Pierre Hocke, former UN-High Commissionary for Refugees; Francis Rigaux, former professor of international law; Lode van Outrive, MEP, professor of law and president of the European Parliament's Committee on Civil Liberties and Internal Affairs.
The network has decided to make use of the 'Fortress Europe?' - Circular Letter as its organ of publication.
For further information, please contact the co-ordinator of the network: Marie-Claire Caloz-Tschopp, University of Geneva, FPSE, 9 Route de Drize, CH-1227 Carouge-Genève, Switzerland; Tel: +41/22 7057111, Fax:+41/22 3428924 (work); home: Tel/Fax: +41/21 6526443.