Clarify refugee stance

THE JAMAICAN Government owes its citizens and the international community a clear explanation of the basis on which it plans to expel 37 would-be Haitian refugees, ostensibly because they did not satisfy the criteria for being granted asylum.

At the same time, the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), the regional economic and political organisation, should urgently develop a regional strategy for dealing with the Haitian refugee question. That, however, does not relieve Jamaica of its obligations on this issue.

The rights group Freedom Imaginaries, which has been championing the cause of Haitian immigrants, says that more than 120 have been sent back to their troubled country over the past 14 months, having been afforded questionable due process, most likely in contravention of the United Nations Convention on Refugees, and despite the call by the UN Refugee Agency for a halt to the forced return of Haitians who have fled their homeland.

“We are concerned that significant due process issues continue to plague the asylum procedure and have now undermined the integrity of the decision, with devastating consequences for the applicants,” Freedom Imaginaries said with respect to the 37 Haitians who were a week ago told that their asylum applications were rejected and that they would have to leave.

“The decision was made without giving the applicants an opportunity to be heard before the (refugee) Eligibility Committee,” the organisation added.

If this were true, it would seem a callous act, suggesting that the Jamaican authorities, for reasons that continue to baffle, were intent on defying international humanitarian law, as well as the island’s own policy, on the treatment of refugees. It would also reinforce the seeming hollowness and cynicism of Security Minister Horace Chang’s assurance to the same group of Haitians last August that Jamaica had their backs.

“You are our friends,” Dr Chang told the group at the time. “We welcome Haitians. We will look after you.”

PLEDGED SUPPORT

That was days after the Government was, at the intervention of Freedom Imaginaries founder Marlene Alleyne, shamed into reversing the planned deportation of the batch of 37, who, having been rounded up, were quickly tried and convicted for illegal entry and were about to be put on a Coast Guard vessel out of Jamaica. The group included several children.

Before then, and since, several other Haitians have been deported from Jamaica, in many instances “without being allowed to access an asylum procedure or communicate with legal counsel”, Ms Alleyne wrote in this newspaper on Sunday.

Haiti has a long history of political turmoil, but the crisis took a new turn two years ago with the assassination of President Jouvenel Moise and the collapse of internal security, with criminal gangs killing thousands of people and maiming similar numbers. This week, a coalition of gang leaders announced that they had taken over the country and would prevent the return of the prime minister, Ariel Henry.

Dr Henry was in Kenya attempting to firm up a promise by the East African country to deploy 1,000 police to Haiti as part of its proposed leadership of a United Nations- approved but non-UN force to tackle the Caribbean country’s security crisis. The Kenyan High Court declared the planned deployment unconstitutional, but the country’s president, William Ruto, has been attempting to find workarounds, including appealing the court’s decision.

Jamaica’s approach to the treatment of Haitians arriving on its eastern shore has been, in the circumstance, surprising. Jamaica has committed to contributing troops to the security mission and also pledged to support it in cash and/or kind. Additionally, the former Jamaican prime minister, Bruce Golding, is part of the Caribbean Community’s Eminent Persons Group which has been working with Haitian stakeholders on ways to solve the political crisis.

But beyond these factors, Jamaica is a signatory to the UN’s Refugee Convention, as well as the Organisation of American States’ Cartagena Declaration, and has clear responsibilities to asylum seekers and people fleeing conflicts.

REFUGEE POLICY

Indeed, the Cartagena Declaration specifically lists “generalised violence … internal conflicts, massive violations of human rights or other circumstances which have seriously disturbed public order” as among the crises that refugees may be attempting to escape. All of these are present in Haiti.

Further, the UN’s convention prohibits returning asylum seekers “to the frontiers of territories where (their) life or freedom would be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion”.

According to Jamaica’s refugee policy, where a person, having faced initial immigration interviews, declares a wish to be granted refugee status, that person’s request should be forwarded to the government’s Refugee Eligibility Committee.

The committee is expected to robustly review these requests, including interviewing the applicants in, as the policy requires, the language they speak or properly understand.

But according to Ms Alleyne, “the applicants are still being excluded from access to basic information, such as the composition of the committee, the committee’s recommendation to the MNS (Ministry of National Security), and the documentation that informed the decision”.

Jamaica is morally and legally bound to be clear about the reasons for its decision.

At the same time, notwithstanding their summit a week ago, CARICOM’s leaders should urgently reconvene to discuss the latest developments in Haiti.

The opinions on this page, except for The Editorial, do not necessarily reflect the opinions of The Gleaner.