Ecuador 2019

Volume II of the Agenda for the Protection of Cross-Border Displaced Persons in the Context of Disasters and Climate Change provides for examples of humanitarian protection mechanisms for the admission and stay of cross-border disaster-displaced persons.

It compiles a broad set of humanitarian protection measures, which may be based on regular immigration law, regional or bilateral agreements on the free movement of persons, exceptional immigration categories, or provisions related to the protection of refugees or similar norms of international human rights law.

The Papyrus Project, which officially began in February 2017, is a project of the Canton of Geneva, supported by the Swiss Confederation. The project aims to initiate a process of regularisation of undocumented migrants in Geneva and to address the economic sectors affected by undeclared work and unfair remuneration. Operation Papyrus was developed and implemented with the active participation of Geneva associations and trade unions, which advised and supported migrants in the preparation of their regularization file.

In line with Pakistan’s policy on ‘Voluntary repatriation and management of Afghan nationals’, the Government of Pakistan registered around 880,000 undocumented Afghans in 2017-2018. This registration aimed to provide better protection to the undocumented Afghan nationals living in Pakistan, enable them to safely return to their country of origin, obtain legal travel documents, benefit from the visa policy of Pakistan towards Afghan nationals and contribute to the development of their country of origin as well as destination as regular migrants.

The Law on Refugees, Complementary Protection and Political Asylum incorporates the concept of “complementary protection”. A person who does not comply with the criteria defined by such law to be recognized as a refugee, can be granted complementary protection to prevent their return to a country where their life could be in danger. Beneficiaries of complementary protection have a documented stay in the country, freedom of movement, access to gainful employment, as well as basic social rights.

The Italian legislation provides for a temporary residence permit in case of exceptional natural disaster in the country of origin, where return under conditions of safety would be impossible. 

In 2017, Argentina granted access to temporary residence and suspended the deportation of Haitians, due to the situation in Haiti, in particular the repeated natural disasters.

In 2014 and 2017, Morocco implemented two regularization campaigns, which benefitted, among others, migrants with serious illnesses, women and their children, and unaccompanied children.

From 1 January 2014 to 31 January 2014 Morocco implemented the first regularization of migrants on an exceptional basis. The categories of migrants in an irregular situation who could benefit from the regularization were the following:

In Finland, a residence permit on compassionate grounds may be granted as a residual and final step of the asylum procedure, after the refugee claim under international and regional refugee law has been rejected. It can be granted for reasons related to medical conditions, ties to Finland or other individual compassionate grounds, particularly in consideration of the circumstances a person would face in the home country or the vulnerable situation of the individual.   

In Spain, the migration law (Aliens Act) foresees the possibility to request a temporary residence permit for humanitarian reasons

In Argentina, temporary residence for humanitarian reasons can be granted to migrants when there is a presumption of risk of death in the country of origin due to the lack of medical treatment.