New Delhi   

`Migration a direct result of globalisation'

Staff Correspondent

Concern over discriminatory portrayal of migrants

NEW DELHI: On the eve of World Refugee Day, participants in a United Nations Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) seminar on "Refugees Protection -- New Challenges" said emerging migration-related challenges could not be addressed through "securitisation of migration".

Speaking at the seminar, Dr. Mahendra Lama, Chairman of the Centre for South, Central, South East Asian and South West Pacific Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University here, said there had been a conscious discriminatory portrayal of migrants post-9/11.

"There is an emerging variety of migration that is a direct result of globalisation, but forces driven by `security considerations' were asking for the closing down of borders."

Addressing the seminar, P.R. Chari of the Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies said "illiberalism" had gained a measure of official approval post-9/11 in several countries reflected by increasing racist violence against migrants driven by xenophobia, and fears of being culturally and economically overwhelmed. He said migration-related fears are also linked to smuggling of illegal trade in drugs, arms, and human beings.

Emphasising that migration essentially was an economic phenomenon, Siddharth Varadarajan, Deputy Editor of The Hindu , said there was an urgent need to de-securitise approaches to tackling migration. "Migration is a healthy part of normal economic life. Yet post-9/11, post-SARS and post-avian flu, there has been an increasing securitisation of migration," he said, adding that many "host countries' thrive on "cultivated insecurities" of undocumented migrants.

"Farmers in California and Texas routinely use illegal Mexican labour for low wages. In India if the wages for household help have not increased it is because the host economy thrives on keeping migrants undocumented and insecure, thus keeping their wages low," he said.

Former Foreign Secretary Muchkund Dubey said there was an increasing tendency of the international regulatory mechanism related to migrants and refugees to become more discretionary, rather than strictly prescriptive and regulatory. "Instead of an international arrangement to take care of a crisis, it is left to countries which exercise their will in a discriminatory manner," he said.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

When the sun "stands still"
DDA flat-owners to pay penalty for misuse
`Migration a direct result of globalisation'
Cinematic history comes alive Vintage cinema comes alive
Airport modernisation first phase to be over by 2010
Sheila to take up pulses' price rise with Pawar
Notice to U.P. Minister for alleged extortion
Man arrested for abduction-murder
Engineer suspended
Suicide attempt by DDA stenographer
For a worthy cause
Around the City
Briefly
In The Capital Today
Inside Delhi

Copyright © 2006, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu