OPEN APPEAL CONCERNING THE SITUATION OF ASYLUM SEEKERS FROM SOMALIA IN UKRAINE

In January 2012 in a presentation to mark the 10th anniversary of Ukraine’s accession to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention the Ukrainian Refugee Council (URC) noted the inadequate state of the asylum system in Ukraine. Soon after that, URC member organizations found out that a group of Somalis detained in ‘Zhuravychi’ Migrants Accommodation Centre (MAC) had gone on a hunger strike because of the lack of any way of regularizing their situation in Ukraine.

According to information obtained by URC members, more than 60 persons from Somalia in the ‘Zhuravychi MAC, went on a hunger strike in the first half of January; URC member organizations have information that among the hunger strikers there might be women and minors, as well as victims of torture in their country of origin. According to reports, the hunger strike was preceded by mass arrests of Somali nationals at the end of 2011, which were conducted by law enforcement officials in Vinnytsia and by the staff of the State Border Guard Service in the Transcarpathian region. It is also known from URC members’ reports that the apprehensions and court decisions ordering their detention in the MAC, which were done in Vinnytsia, were carried out with multiple violations. In particular, the Somali nationals were deprived of adequate interpretation, effective defence during proceedings in the court of the first instance, and the right to directly participate in the consideration of the appeals lodged against the decisions of the court of the first instance. All this prevented the unjust decisions of the court of first instance from being revised.

Some of the detainees were waiting for decisions regarding their applications for refugee status; others can not submit similar requests from their current place of detention due to the fact that the units of the State Migration Service of Ukraine in the Volyn region are dysfunctional at the moment.

According to the last year’s amendments to the Law of Ukraine “On the Legal Status of Foreigners and Stateless Persons” (Art.30), the detainees were sentenced to the maximum possible term of deprivation of freedom – 12 months.

Unfortunately, organizations providing assistance to refugees from Somalia have to say that nationals of this country have not had a chance to get refugee status in Ukraine for a long time – despite the well-known situation in the country in question, which has lasted for decades, and which has led to massive human rights violations, indiscriminate violence, and large flows of people in need of international humanitarian protection. According to the position of UNHCR – the UN Refugee Agency – the situation in Somalia makes it impossible for asylum seekers to be returned back to that country without violating Ukraine’s international obligations and standards of international law. Just in June last year the European Court of Human Rights determined that any Somali national is in need of international protection, and his/her return to Mogadishu would constitute a violation of Article 3 of Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (the decision in the case Sufi and Elmi v. United Kingdom). This decision is binding upon all the Member States of the Council of Europe, including Ukraine.

Failure to provide these people with refugee status or another form of protection under the Law of Ukraine “On Refugees and Persons in need of Complementary or Temporary Protection” can not be justified merely because of the fact that the procedure for handing over the responsibilities of the liquidated State Committee for Nationalities and Religion to the State Migration Service has still not been completed. This procedure has lasted for more than a year now in the framework of the declared administrative reform.

In a situation like this, whereby the expulsion of Somali nationals by the Ukrainian state would violate binding norms of international law; when the documentation of these persons falls under Ukraine’s obligations, but there are currently no functional procedures in place to do this; when there is no possibility of relying upon a quick and unbiased consideration of their asylum applications – in such a situation the detention of Somali asylum seekers can be viewed as unlawful deprivation of freedom and a breach of Ukraine’s international obligations. And these people have no other options at the moment apart from a year in detention because they tried to seek protection – with no prospects in the future.

We call upon the Ukrainian authorities, in this the 10^th Anniversary of Ukraine’s accession to 1951 UN Refugee Convention, to provide protection to persons who flee persecution – Somali nationals in particular, – to stop the application of exclusively repressive and discriminatory methods, and to regularize their situation in Ukraine. We demand that access is provided for media representatives to the Migrants Accommodation Centre at Zhuravychi village (Volyn region), so that the persons detained there can express their position regarding the Ukrainian Government’s actions and provide the media with information, which is important for the public to know. Such a step would present the best evidence of Ukraine’s commitment to its international obligations and respect for human rights. We ask the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for human rights and UNHCR Regional Representation to send, without delay, their representatives to meet with the foreign nationals on hunger strike in “Zhuravychi” MAC.

Contacts for Ukrainian Refugee Council coordinators:

Nataliya Gurzhiy +380 67 4672079

Maryna Kurochkina +380 67 9302799

Aleksandra Nazarova +380 97 2386386