Officials say navy and air force efforts to rescue up to 50 people has shown no signs of progress
Dozens of people are feared to have died off the coast of Greece after their boat sank while attempting to make the perilous crossing from Turkey.
Efforts by Greece’s navy and air force to rescue up to 50 people who went down with the vessel in stormy waters off Rhodes had shown no signs of progress by late Wednesday, coast guard officials said.
Continue reading...In decision quashed by federal court, citizenship application was rejected despite father’s name on birth certificate and Medicare card
The Department of Home Affairs rejected an Australian-born child’s citizenship application after her estranged Australian father couldn’t be reached to provide a DNA test, which her lawyer says rendered her “stateless”.
In a decision quashed by the federal court, the overseas-born mother of the child was told the department did not have proof of a biological link to the father – despite his name being listed on the girl’s birth certificate and Medicare card, his payment of child support and photos of the pair together.
Continue reading...British nationals living in country are unable to access healthcare, change jobs or travel in and out
British nationals living in Portugal are unable to access healthcare, change jobs, or travel in and out of the country as its ministers have not issued them with post-Brexit residency cards, it has emerged.
The UK government has raised the issue at ministerial level and urged Portugal to implement fully the withdrawal agreement and protect the rights of the 34,500 Britons who made the country their home before Brexit.
Continue reading...Exclusive: asylum seekers in the offshore detention centre who had contact with Australian journalists, lawyers and advocates were closely watched, documents reveal
The Australian government used private security contractors to collect intelligence on asylum seekers on Nauru, singling out those who were speaking to journalists, lawyers and refugee advocates, internal documents from 2016 reveal.
Intelligence officers working for Wilson Security compiled fortnightly reports about asylum seekers “of interest”, including individuals flagged as having “links with [Australian] media”, “contact with lawyers in Australia” or “contacts with Australian advocates”.
Continue reading...Falsehoods and disinformation could cause breakdown in relations with local communities, says World Vision
Ukrainian refugees are likely to become victims of rising tensions and disinformation campaigns in their host countries, a report has warned.
False reports exaggerating how much aid refugees receive compared with local people, as well as linking refugees with violent crime and political extremism, could cause a breakdown in relations with local communities, the charity World Vision said.
Continue reading...MS Victoria is temporary solution to host refugees but there are concerns about small rooms and seasickness
Ukrainian refugees staying on a cruise ship docked in Edinburgh must be moved to more suitable accommodation within days, welfare groups have said, as those onboard already report concerns about small rooms and feeling seasick.
The first arrivals of mainly women and children displaced by the war in Ukraine boarded the MS Victoria passenger ship earlier this week. Chartered by the Scottish government, it is expected to host up to 1,700 people and is a temporary solution to a growing accommodation crisis, which earlier this month prompted the government to pause its Ukrainian refugee sponsorship scheme for three months.
Continue reading...Twenty five people rescued in dangerous route frequently used by migrants seeking to reach the US
Seventeen people died after a boat carrying dozens of Haitian migrants capsized off the coast of the Bahamas, authorities said on Sunday, as more Haitians attempt to reach the US to flee gang violence and poverty at home.
Rescue teams recovered the bodies of 17 people including an infant and 25 people were rescued, the Bahamian prime minister, Philip Davis, told reporters. Davis said authorities believe the people were on a speedboat heading for Miami.
Continue reading...No change in Operation Sovereign Borders policy
Clare O’Neil is asked about the desperate situation in Sri Lanka, where many people are trying to find a way out.
Operation Sovereign Borders is Australian government policy.
‘I went to help people,’ says Togolese boy, who was among 71 survivors rescued nine days after boat sank, killing at least 30
The actions of a teenager from Togo have been lauded after video footage was published of him supporting a baby he saved from a shipwreck in the Mediterranean Sea last week in which at least 30 people died.
The 17-year-old, whose identity has not been disclosed, swam to save the child, whom he was holding above water when a rescue team arrived, in footage published by the French media group Brut.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Freedom-of-information investigation reveals error in urgent submission to then minister Marise Payne
A file number bungle by an Australian government department caused a four-week delay in helping some Afghan citizens at risk of retribution from the Taliban as the militant group swept to power in Afghanistan, Guardian Australia can reveal.
A freedom-of-information investigation reveals the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade prepared an urgent submission for the then minister Marise Payne asking for a decision about a group of former embassy employees within three days.
Continue reading...Human rights groups say there have been no autopsies or identification of the 23 people killed trying to cross into Spain
Seconds after Mohamed stepped on to Spanish soil, he turned around to see how his friends had fared along the metres-high chain link fence that slices off the Spanish enclave of Melilla from Morocco.
“It was horrible,” said the 20-year-old from Sudan. “It was a bloodbath; many of them appeared dead and many were injured.”
Continue reading...Mexican foreign minister mourns ‘huge tragedy’ as US investigates effort to smuggle people across border
Fifty-one people believed to be migrants were found dead and at least a dozen others were hospitalized after being found inside an abandoned tractor-trailer rig on Monday on a remote back road in south-west San Antonio, officials have said.
The discovery in Texas may prove to be the deadliest tragedy among thousands of people who have died attempting to cross the US border from Mexico in recent decades.
Continue reading...Incident marks one of the deadliest tragedies involving people attempting to cross US border from Mexico in recent decades
Forty-six people were found dead in a sweltering tractor-trailer that was abandoned on a remote back road in San Antonio, Texas shortly before 6pm local time (12am GMT) on Monday.
Sixteen people were taken to hospital, including four children, and treated for heat stroke and exhaustion.
A San Antonio fire department official said they found “stacks of bodies” and no signs of water in the truck. “The patients that we saw were hot to the touch, they were suffering from heat stroke, exhaustion,” the San Antonio fire chief, Charles Hood, told a news conference. “It was a refrigerated tractor-trailer but there was no visible working A/C unit on that rig.”
A city worker heard a cry for help from the truck and discovered the gruesome scene, the police chief, William McManus, said.
A spokesperson for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) said that its Homeland Security Investigations division was investigating “an alleged human smuggling event” in coordination with local police.
San Antonio mayor Ron Nirenberg said the 46 who died had “families who were likely trying to find a better life … This is nothing short of a horrific human tragedy.'”
Texas governor Greg Abbott, a Republican running for reelection, said in a tweet: “These deaths are on Biden. They are a result of his deadly open border policies.”
Mexico’s foreign minister, Marcelo Ebrard, called the suffocation of the people in the truck the “tragedy in Texas” on Twitter and said consular officials would go to the hospitals where victims had been taken to help “however possible”.
A spokesman for the Honduran foreign ministry told Reuters the country’s consulates in Houston and Dallas would be investigating the incident. Ebrard said two Guatemalans were sent to hospital and Guatemala’s foreign ministry said on Twitter that consular officials were going to the hospital “to verify if there are two Guatemalan minors there and what condition they are in”.
The incident is among the deadliest tragedies to have claimed thousands of lives of people attempting to cross the US border from Mexico in recent decades. Ten migrants died in 2017 after being trapped inside a truck that was parked at a Walmart in San Antonio.
South Texas has long been the busiest area for border crossings. People ride in vehicles though border patrol checkpoints to San Antonio, the closest major city, from which point they disperse across the United States.
NGOs say toll could be as high as 37 after hundreds of people break into border control area in attempt to reach Melilla enclave
Human rights campaigners in Spain and Morocco have called for investigations to be launched in both countries after a mass attempt to scale the border fence between Morocco and the Spanish enclave of Melilla left at least 23 people dead.
Spanish officials said about 2,000 Africans made their way to the iron fence at dawn on Friday, with more than 500 managing to slip into a border control area after cutting an opening with shears.
Continue reading...Crowd of more than 500 enter border control area after cutting fence in attempt to cross from Morocco
The death toll from the mass attempt to cross from Morocco into Spain’s enclave of Melilla has risen to 23, according to Moroccan state TV.
About 2,000 people approached Melilla at dawn on Friday and more than 500 managed to enter a border control area after cutting a fence with shears, the Spanish government’s local delegation said in a statement.
Continue reading...Prince of Wales says at summit any move by members to become a republic can be ‘without rancour’
The Prince of Wales has told Commonwealth leaders that keeping the Queen as head of state or becoming a republic is “a matter for each member country to decide”.
Charles made the comments during the opening ceremony of a summit of Commonwealth prime ministers and presidents in Rwanda. He said he believed such fundamental changes could be made “calmly and without rancour”.
Continue reading...Exclusive: new visa scheme to attract staff to ease the chronic shortages in the sector has left many open to exploitation
Read full story: Migrant workers trapped in debt bondage
Care workers recruited from overseas to look after elderly and disabled people in Britain are being charged thousands of pounds in illegal fees and forced to work in exploitative conditions to pay off their debts.
An Observer investigation has uncovered a network of agencies supplying workers to care homes and homecare agencies that charge recruitment fees to candidates.
Continue reading...Investigation: Britain called out to workers around the world to ease a staff crisis. But many have to pay thousands in illegal fees to recruitment agencies
Read exclusive story: Migrant care workers charged thousands in illegal fees
Meera Stephen came to Britain with a big suitcase and even bigger dreams. The 27-year-old had left Kerala in south India to work at a care home in Manchester, one of thousands of migrant workers to come after a government recruitment drive to fill more than 100,000 vacancies in social care.
The job would pay £10 an hour – just above minimum wage. But it came at a price. In exchange for securing her employment, she would pay a recruitment agent 1.3m rupees – about £13,700.
Continue reading...‘Mentally exhausted’ expected deportees launched last-minute legal bids to avoid removal from UK
An Albanian asylum seeker and suspected victim of trafficking has told the Guardian he is in a “very bad mental state” as he expects to board a deportation flight to Rwanda, a country of which he knows “nothing”.
The 26-year-old Albanian man is one of seven asylum seekers who have launched last-minute legal challenges to avoid being forcibly flown to the east African country. Others include three Iranians, one Iraqi and one Vietnamese asylum seeker. All arrived in the UK on small boats in the middle of May.
Continue reading...Final remaining asylum seekers understood to have been taken off the flight following legal intervention
You can watch the Sturgeon press conference here.
Sturgeon is now taking questions.
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