SWEDISH BORDER CONTROLS MOVED TO COUNTRIES OF DEPARTURE
From 1 January 1996, the Swedish immigration authorities will place their first so-called "aliens attaché" at a Swedish embassy. The attaché's task is to prevent ill-documented persons from travelling to Sweden and to assist immigration authorities in asylum examination procedures. In practice, this amounts to moving Swedish border controls to foreign countries, critics contend.
The first aliens attaché will be stationed at the Swedish embassy in Damascus, but will have both Syria and Lebanon as his field of work and will have diplomatic status. The immigration authorities plan to send aliens attachés to a number of countries later. They are to work alongside with attachés of the police's aliens department and forms of cooperation on the spot with the other Nordic countries is currently being discussed.
The aliens attachés will, among other things, be charged with preventing insufficiently documented persons from boarding planes to Europe. Moreover, they will carry out investigations on the spot in connection with specific asylum procedures in Sweden. According to the immigration authorities, this will contribute to "speedier and better asylum examination procedures" and thereby reduce the cost of asylum procedures.
"Just by preventing a number of entries of persons who abuse the asylum system - persons who accede to the procedure without identity, who give false names and are eventually deported, this activity will be cost-effective", says an immigration authorities official.
The aliens attachés will be responsible for training airport personnel in detecting false travel documents and advise them in handling specific "suspicious" documents.
According to the immigration authorities, the aliens attachés' task is not to not prevent persecuted people from leaving their home country, but the UNHCR, the Swedish Red Cross and Amnesty International emphasise that victims of persecution often flee with false documents. A speaker from the Red Cross also expressed concern about the immigration authorities' intention that aliens attachés should seek contact with local authorities abroad in checking claims of asylum seekers.
Source: Svenska Dagbladet, 18.12.95.Comment
"We are not hindering anybody from getting out. Objectively, what we are doing is to inform. If somebody has a false travel document, we will not accept this, but of course will make it clear that this is a false passport and an invalid Swedish visa". This is how a spokesman of the immigration authorities meets the concern expressed by a number of human rights and asylum organisations.
Indeed, the aliens attachés will not themselves prevent anyone from boarding a plane. The dirty work will be done by the personnel of the airlines . . . acting upon information provided by the attachés.
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