Targets on vulnerability and protection

The Inter-ministerial Ad hoc Committee to manage emergency situations concerning refugees in Cameroon was created by President Paul Biya on March 2014 as a response to the massive influx of refugees and displaced people escaping from the sectarian fighting in the Central African Republic as well as those escaping from the armed fighting between Boko Haram and army of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Statistics on the refugee situation in the country put the total number at above 110,000.

Local settlements have been used in Africa, especially Uganda, Tanzania and Sudan, as a response to protracted refugee situations and as an alternative to keeping refugees in camps. In Belize, Uganda and Tanzania, the governments saw refugees as a means to develop underutilized land, and pursued this by allocating land to the refugees. In Tanzania in the 1970s, each family was given a minimum of ten acres of land for farming.

In 1999, UNHCR and the Government of Uganda began to implement a long-term assistance strategy aimed at self-reliance for the Sudanese refugees who have been present in the West Nile region of northern Uganda since 1988.

1. Context:

Foreigners make up one-fifth of the total Swiss population. They constitute a quarter of the labour force and fund a significant share of our health care system. But studies show that they are less healthy than the local population. Migrants are exposed to greater health risks and have a more difficult time accessing our health care services. Their knowledge about health-promoting behaviour is often insufficient, and they experience communication problems in their dealings with health institutions.

Ecuador has signed bilateral social security agreements with Chile, Colombia, Spain and Uruguay, as well as Multilateral and Ibero-American conventions on Social Security. Furthermore, the Ecuadorian State has commitments and obligations in this area, product of Community directives for the Andean Community of Nations (CAN).

The Philippines Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) implemented a rule that provides penalty for charging and or collecting placement free from workers seeking employment in countries which have laws that provide the same. The No placement fee policy is a serious administrative offense with a penalty of cancellation of license of the concerned recruitment agencies. The same administrative rule penalized that act of charging of excessive placement fees.

Given the dramatic situation in Syria, Swiss authorities put in place an easing of visa requirements for relatives of Syrian nationals living in Switzerland from September to December 2013 and extended the concept of family reunification beyond the members of the nuclear family (spouses and children up to age 18) to other relatives in ascending and descending order (grandparents, parents, children over the age of 18 and grandchildren).

In 2010, the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States and the European Union (EU) agreed on a Joint Declaration on Migration and Development that was endorsed by the ACP-EU Council in June 2010. In this declaration, the parties committed to strengthen and deepen cooperation in the area of migration, in particular based on three pillars:

Public engagement with diverse American communities, including diaspora and migrant communities is a priority for DHS CRCL. CRCL’s Community Engagement Section responds to community concerns and provides information on DHS programs, activities, and issues.

The goals of our program are:

In order to assist DOL in the protection of migrant workers employed in the United States and to help communicate with workers whom it might not otherwise be able to reach, DOL has established formal partnerships with the embassies of Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Peru and the Philippines. DOL’s Bureau of International Labor Affairs which coordinates the program is working to expand these partnerships to embassies and consulates of other countries.