The UN Migration Agency, IOM (International Organization for Migration) announced on Wednesday, December 11 that the Vucjak camp in the Una Sana Canton in Bosnia is now officially closed. 750 migrants were relocated to two facilities near the capital Sarajevo. Teams are now cleaning the Vucjak area.
A boat carrying around 190 migrants was intercepted by the Mauritanian coast guard on Friday, the UN migration agency said. This comes less than two days after 63 migrants drowned when their vessel sank in the same waters en route from The Gambia. The country's president has vowed to crack down on people traffickers.
At least 150 people were on board the migrant vessel that departed from Gambia at the end of November. 83 who were on board swam to shore.
The IOM and the UN Security Council have expressed concern over the humanitarian situation in war-torn Libya. IOM director Antonio Vitorino has called for all migrant detention centers to be closed.
A very small percentage of the world‘s population resides outside the country in which they were born. According to the UN migration agency's latest figures, most of them migrate to find work, sending home more than half a trillion dollars.
In Niger and the Sahel region in west-central Africa, the trade in goods and people has been big business for centuries. In the last few years, people smuggling was an officially recognized profession. In some cases, smugglers even paid taxes. But in the last year, that business has been experiencing a downturn as a series of laws, passed originally in 2015, have begun to bite, causing the former smugglers to look elsewhere for an income.
A new study published by Germany's Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) found that over 80% of those who chose to voluntarily return from Germany were happy or satisfied with the help provided by the state-run program "Starthilfe Plus".
Migrant deaths on the three Mediterranean routes to Europe have decreased by nearly 50 percent compared to the same period last year, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) reports. The number of migrants entering Europe via Greece and Spain accounts for about three-fourths of the regional total.
Even as a migrant rescue ship disembarks 88 asylum-seekers in an Italian port, a UN official says the Mediterranean isn't the most dangerous place for migrants. Many more die trying to reach the coast than in the sea.
On Tuesday hundreds of migrants were released from a detention center in southern Tripoli and escorted to the UNHCR-run Gathering and Departure Facility (GDF) as heavy gunfire rang out across the Libyan capital. When the migrants arrived at the GDF, they were refused entry and forced to spend the night under the pouring rain, with police allegedly confiscating their mobile phones and banning them from making contact with anyone outside the group. InfoMigrants reports.
Tens of thousands of people have set out from West and Central Africa in recent years in the hope of reaching Europe. Not all have completed the dangerous journey – opting instead to retrace their steps and return to their families. But going home brings new risks – including being seen by the community as ‘a failure’.
154 Somali refugees were sent to Germany from Ethiopia last week. The resettlement was made possible through a program run by the German and Ethiopian governments, the UN migration agency, and the UN refugee agency.