Refugees: Eritrea

Lord Bates Excerpts

Tuesday 12th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the recent UN Special Rapporteur’s report on the plight of unaccompanied minors who are refugees from Eritrea.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Bates) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government recognise the plight of unaccompanied children and have carefully studied the special rapporteur’s report. Country information and guidance is based on an objective assessment of the situation in Eritrea using evidence from a range of sources, including that of the Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in Eritrea.

[Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for his response. As he has said, the UN special rapporteur’s report highlights the appalling situation of unaccompanied children from Eritrea who travel into and across Europe seeking sanctuary. The UK has a long history of supporting young victims of persecution, such as during the Second World War, so will the Government now respond to last week’s recommendation from the International Development Select Committee and agree to take at least 3,000 of the most vulnerable refugee children already in Europe, many of whom are from Eritrea?

[Lord Bates]

As my noble friend Lady Anelay has made clear, we took very seriously the UN special rapporteur’s report on the situation in Eritrea. In fact, it was the basis of the ongoing Article 8 dialogue with the EU as part of the Khartoum process. It seems that the Eritrean Government have given an undertaking to limit national service, which was the principal driver of a lot of the migration flows. On the noble Baroness’s second point, we have had an opportunity to look at the Select Committee’s report, which was published on 5 January and is very thorough. We will be responding to it in due course but it raises a number of very important issues.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, will the Minister confirm that the June 2015 report of the UN commission of inquiry said that probable crimes against humanity are being committed in Eritrea? That is why there has been such a haemorrhaging of the population, with 10% of the people—some 350,000—having fled thus far. If we do not come to terms with the root causes, will not those massive numbers of migrants continue to rise? What are we doing to pursue the recommendations in that report? Furthermore, does the Minister not recognise that when those migrants leave Eritrea, the story is not over, as the beheadings in Libya by ISIS only go to prove?

[Lord Bates]

That is absolutely right. It was a horrific report and it is not something on which the British Government are standing idly by. It is an issue on which we have engaged with the Eritrean Government through our embassy in Asmara. There was a meeting between the Foreign Minister and James Brokenshire at the margins of the EU and African Union conference in Rome in November, and that was followed up by a visit by Foreign Office and Home Office officials to assess the situation there. We continue to put great pressure on the Eritrean Government to live up to the commitments that they have made. It is only by tackling the cause of the problem, whether in Eritrea or Syria, that we can hope to stem the flow that results in the consequences that the noble Lord has highlighted.

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for highlighting what is causing the problem. The UN special rapporteur has identified in this report quite a number of reasons that are driving this terrible situation and, in particular, highlighted human rights issues. A number of people have been arrested, such as the politician Mr Ali Omaro, journalists and the G15 group. Can the Minister update us on the situation of those high-profile people who have been arrested and detained?

[Lord Bates]

In response to the noble Baroness, Lady Kinnock, there was, on 15 July last year, a response from the Government, by my noble friend Lady Anelay, to that specific report. One of the problems with that report was that the rapporteur, disgracefully in our opinion, was not given access to Asmara and could not go to Eritrea to engage and find out for herself. That is why the dialogues that have been undertaken by Foreign Office officials and James Brokenshire are so important in establishing what is happening on the ground and in holding the Eritrean Government to account on the commitments that they have given.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, can I go back to the Question of my noble friend Lady Kinnock? The proposal to resettle 3,000 unaccompanied refugee children is not a new one. On 2 September, the Prime Minister said that the Government would discuss it further. On 2 December, he said that they would think about it some more. Yet here we are, a further month on. I plead with the Minister to inject some urgency into these discussions. Every day that a positive decision is not taken, more children are left vulnerable to trafficking, to the cold, to disease or even death.

[Lord Bates]

When we hear about this situation, as when the Prime Minister heard about it, the immediate instinct is to think that there are, somewhere, 3,000 unaccompanied children waiting to find placement. Of course, 3,000 is an estimate of the total number, and where they are in the system is clearly a matter to be defined. We think that the way to do that is through the Dublin regulations and by making sure that they are properly recorded when they arrive in the UK. It is worth noting that the conclusion to that report said:

“We strongly commend DFID for setting an exemplary standard in its commitment to funding humanitarian assistance to address the Syrian crisis”.

That is part of the solution, but there is more to be done, and the Prime Minister will make an announcement on his review when he has examined all the facts.

[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

My Lords, do the Government recognise that some of the factors identified in the special rapporteur’s report—fear of forced conscription; fear of facing the same ordeal as their parents, including imprisonment on the basis of religious affiliation; hopelessness, and so on—are push factors, which are different from the pull factors that are often talked about by the Home Secretary? Will he accept that if the Government recognised some of the push factors at play, tragedies might be avoided, such as that which happened a few days ago, when a young boy died trying to cross the channel to join his sister in the UK, even though I am advised that he would have been entitled to have his case considered here under Dublin III?

[Lord Bates]

It is right to point to that. We have seen an increase from 2012, when 80 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children from Eritrea came to the UK, to last year, when 460 came. The noble Baroness rightly identifies that the point behind that is the arbitrary nature of national service. The Government have given a commitment that that will now be limited to 18 months. The second factor which we weighed in their favour was the fact that they required an exit visa that required them to have completed national service before they could leave the country. That is why we continue to take very seriously applications for asylum from that country, particularly from unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.