Seeking Asylum Alone: Unaccompanied and Separated Children and Refugee Protection in the US

Submitted by crinadmin on

Every year thousands of children fleeing persecution arrive in the United States alone in search of protection. A report was recently published on theis issue. Seeking Asylum Alone: Unaccompanied and Separated Children and Refugee Protection in the US.

The report describes the nature and scale of migration by children entering the US without parents, drawing upon government data and statements, advocates’ accounts, court proceedings, and interviews with key participants, including migrant children themselves. It is part of an international comparative research project on children and asylum conducted in the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia. Reports describing the findings in the other countries, and an overall analysis comparing policies and practices in all three countries, will be published later this year. All four reports will be accessible on-line at: http://www.humanrights.harvard.edu for both download and purchase.

The report acknowledges the efforts being made by several government agencies to improve the access to protection for unaccompanied and separated children. However, it expresses concern about the many shortcomings in policy and in practice regarding children seeking asylum alone.

Among the key findings of the report are that many unaccompanied and separated children have a stronger claim to asylum than has been recognised or acknowledged so far. It further suggests that many existing problems can be solved relatively easily, without jeopardising United States’ migration management programmes, instituting open door immigration policies or establishing reckless incentives to use children as migration anchors or investment commodities. The report calls for a transformation of the current system to recognise the obligation to take unaccompanied and separated children’s best interests seriously.

Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=8866&flag=report

For more information, contact:
Susan Frick, Programme Manager
University Committee on Human Rights Studies
Harvard University, David Rubenstein Room 112, 79 John F. Kennedy Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, United States
Tel: +1 (617) 496 4950; Fax: +1 (617) 495 4297
Email: susan_frick@harvard.edu
Website: http://www.humanrights.harvard.edu

More information

Owner: Jacqueline Bhabha and Susan Schmidtpdf: http://www.humanrights.harvard.edu/conference/Seeking_Asylum_Alone_US_Re...

Organisation: 
Harvard University
Attachment Link: 
http://www.humanrights.harvard.edu/conference/Seeking_Asylum_Alone_US_Report.pdf

Countries

Please note that these reports are hosted by CRIN as a resource for Child Rights campaigners, researchers and other interested parties. Unless otherwise stated, they are not the work of CRIN and their inclusion in our database does not necessarily signify endorsement or agreement with their content by CRIN.