Viet Nam Human Rights
Gains and Losses of Irregular Migration
7/12/19
While opening a newspaper or watching a TV program we are every day made aware of the plights of irregular migrants. Some recent examples among many – on 24 October, 39 Chinese nationals were found dead in a lorry trailer in Essex. They had apparently frozen to death within a refrigerator container with temperatures as low as -25C (-13F). This while tragedies occur almost daily on the Mediterranean Sea. On 26 November, a rescue vessel found a boat almost completely sunken. It had three dead bodies aboard. Fifty-five migrants were saved. Three of them were in a critical condition, and one died after reaching Melilla in Spain, where the migrants were brought in. Three children were among the survivors, though a further ten individuals were reported missing. Nowadays, such news items pass by almost imperceptibly. Every day, thousands of unfortunate human beings are trafficked all over the world to suffer underpaid, hazardous work, or prostitution.
It is easy to ignore that international migration is a complex phenomenon touching on a multiplicity of economic, social and security aspects. It is associated with geopolitics, trade and cultural exchange. Accordingly, migration provides opportunities for businesses and communities. In countries of origin and destination migration has improved people's lives. However, acknowledging this does not imply that all migration takes place under positive circumstances. In recent years an increase in displacement has occurred, due to conflict, persecution, environmental degradation, and lack of human security and opportunity. The UN refugee agency UNHCR currently estimates that there are 25.9 million refugees worldwide, of which 80 percent live in places neigbouring their countries of origin.1
In 2019, the global number of international migrants reached an estimated 272 million, comprising 3.5 percent of the global population. 2 Actually a small minority since an overwhelming majority of people remain within their country of birth.
It cannot be denied that migration may generate benefits for migrants, their families, and countries of origin. Wages earned abroad tend to be considerably higher than those for similar jobs at home and migration tends to have a positive impact on human development, particularly in areas such as education and health. According to a World Bank report from 2016 migrants from the poorest countries, on average, experienced a 15-fold increase in income, a doubling of school enrolment rates, and a 16-fold reduction in child mortality after moving to a developed country.3
Globally, remittances are now more than three times the amount of official development assistance, at the same time as migration result in the transfer of skills, knowledge, and technology and thus foster economic and social development in origin countries.
Migration also generates economic and other benefits for destination countries. Among other results, immigration can have positive effects through an increased labour supply in sectors and occupations suffering from shortages of workers, not only evident in high-skilled sectors, but also in lower-skilled occupations. The immigration of young workers might also ease pressure on pension systems of high-income countries with rapidly aging populations.4 Contrary to popular perceptions, an OECD study found that the difference between the taxes migrants pay and the benefits and government services they receive generally is quite small and in most of the analyzed OECD countries immigrants paid more in taxes than they received through benefits.5
Accordingly, stories about hapless or deceitful migrants, ruthless human traffickers, and constant tragedies are not constituting the entire truth about international migration. Trafficking is a crime that has to be deterred and penalized. The United Nations defines human traficking as:
- the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation.6
I recently obtained an insight into immigration when I in Rome met a successful migrant who told me his life story. A tale of hard toil, stubborn determination and lifelong planning, with a happy ending.
Through a good friend of mine I had ended up as dinner guest with a man of a Bangladeshi origin and his family. He was proud owner of a car repair workshop. A steady income made it possible for him to support his family, invest in his business, afford a nice apartment and a car. He was even able to invest some of his income and support relatives back in Bangladesh. Over a sumptuous meal in a modern apartment, my generous host told me his life story.
He had been born to poor parents in Dhaka and orphaned already at the age of seven. His wife was also an orphan from a poor background. They married very early and had stayed true to one another ever since. Early on he judged that the only possible advance in life for a poor boy like him was to join the army. For twenty years he served in the armed forces and learned to be a driver and car mechanic. Experiences he later used after having been recruited as a migrant worker to the Gulf States, and most successfully in Singapore, where he finally had been able to save the money needed for realizing his ultimate goal – to migrate to Europe, make a living there and bring his family over for a better, more secure life.
In the neighbourhood of his home in Dhaka he had for many years been in contact with a "travel- and job organizer" who had told him he would be able to bring him to Italy and that it would cost him approximately 30,000 euros. This became the driving force for all of my host´s endeavours. He experienced many setbacks, but never lost hope. Several years ago he was finally prepared to leave for Europe, putting all his trust in the men working for the "travel organizer". I asked him:
– How could you bring your entire life´s savings into the hands of this man? You could easily have been lost or killed along the perilous trail through Asia and Europe. What was the guarantee that you would be able to make a living in Europe? And … who was this guy? A human trafficker?
– No, he was not a Mafiosi. He was a businessman, well known by his clients. I knew he could not afford taking the risk of losing a client like me. If he had been a crook. If he had fooled his clients on their way to Europe and pocketed their money. If he had not planned and paid for every step of the journey and guaranteed the safe transfer of a client of his, he would have been lost. Everyone in my neighbourhood knew him and his business. He could neither overcharge me, nor lose me. It is an extremely risky business.
– Nevertheless, many are fooled, lost and killed.
– Quite true, but such unfortunate victims are generally desperate people. They have not planned and worked for the venture during so many years as I had. They had not inquired enough, neither about the risks involved, nor about the men they put their trust in.
It took more than half a year to reach Rome. We traveled by busses, lorries and on foot. Through India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, Hungary, and Slovenia. It was worrisome and I was often scared, nervous and impatient. We were captured in Ukraine and it took almost three months to get us out of that country and we also encountered problems in Moldova. However, these mishaps had been taken into consideration beforehand and true to our original agreement the travel arranger succeeded in keeping his word.
I did not know anyone in Rome. The arrangement was that I began selling things in the street. Gradually, I advanced to selling fruits and finally found work in an auto repair shop. I am a skilled mechanic, my work was appreciated and words about my expertise spread among the customers. After some years I could open my own business. From then on life changed for the better. I could bring over my family. We found suitable husbands for my two daughters and finally a son was born to me. I´m a fortunate man.
It may be stated that my Bangladeshi acquaintance had been "trafficked" since he migrated to Italy through irregular means provided by people who made a profit. However, he denied that he had been exploited. He assured me that he had made a carefully calculated business deal with people who guaranteed him passage to Italy and to a certain degree acclimatization to that country. It had been a win-win deal for the people who took him to Italy, for himself, his family, his country of origin and Italy as well.
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All comments [ 20 ]
emigration effectively cancels out the effect of immigration on population size, so the discussion would not be complete without showing the total effect of migration on population size.
Since 1983 there has been a dramatic increase in the annual number of migrants into Europe and North America, and forecasts for the years to come remain high.
Most of these migrants — fleeing poverty, the lack of economic prospects or attacks on human rights and minority rights — very often enter the host countries clandestinely, with the help of illegal networks and traffickers who provide them with false papers. Moreover, many asylum-seekers with a job "go underground".
These clandestine migrants are exploited by employers who profit from this cheap workforce, thus distorting the labour market in the host countries and increasing anxiety about the influx of foreigners.
While short-term restrictive measures aimed at combating the trafficking and employment of clandestine migrants are widely implemented in the member states of the Council of Europe, these measures nonetheless remain incomplete.
Consideration should also be given to drafting a convention to combat all types of clandestine migration and signing bilateral or multilateral readmission agreements for illegal migrants by the state of origin or the state of transit.
The legalisation of clandestine migrants should also be facilitated, since for most of them forced repatriation would constitute inhuman treatment.
In order to control the migratory flows from east to west and from south to north caused by social, economic and demographic differences and which have frequently fuelled racial and political tension and conflicts, the member states have taken various restrictive measures which are now proving inadequate.
Clandestine immigration is largely due to the growing demand in Europe for unskilled, poorly paid labour, and can neither resolve employment problems in western Europe nor stimulate economic growth in the less developed countries. It also results in a major drain on the human resources of those countries.
Traffickers and organised networks are generally well-established both in countries of origin and receiving countries; they put migrants in touch with employers offering clandestine work.
The employment of clandestine migrants results in economic distortions which jeopardise the national economy as a whole.
The victims of unscrupulous traffickers are not always aware of their illegal migrant status or of the strict entry conditions in force in the host countries.
The trafficking and employment of clandestine migrants are often linked to other forms of international organised crime.
this situation is used as a pretext to stir up racism and xenophobia.
This desire to migrate to western European countries, in spite of the presence of restrictions, is further enhanced by the demand in western Europe for low paid and flexible unskilled workers to meet labour needs that are increasingly difficult to satisfy with local workers.
this enthusiasm soon gave place to negative views, owing to fears about the arrival of illegal workers in western Europe.
The dangers of clandestine migration and the resultant difficulties for both the migrant and the receiving state are numerous and serious.
The rights of the clandestine migrant, the mechanisms for protecting the regular migrant worker and the genuine asylum-seeker, and sectors of the economies of both the host and sending states are all put at risk by clandestine migration and its attendant evils.
Another powerful motivating factor for the clandestine migrants is the presence of a tradition of migratory flows from his or her community to a given state.
If there is a large and receptive group in place in the target state, then "networking" can occur and the transition process for the migrant becomes less complicated.
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