Fair Deal Security: Centring people and planet in Lib Dem strategy

4 October 2023: Rethinking Security: Fair Deal Security: Centring people and planet in Lib Dem strategy

Rethinking Security presented its case for a Human Security Strategy at the Lib Dems conference in Bournemouth in September. Richard Reeve here advances five evidenced arguments that should inform Lib Dem policy and strategy before the next general election.

As ever, early autumn is conference season in the UK and Parliament will not sit until its members have finished meeting with their party faithful, councillors and activists in conference centres across the land. This year’s conference season is particularly significant due to the expectation that a general election will be held next year. So all the parties are currently busy trying to set the parameters, if not fine detail, of their election manifestoes.

For Rethinking Security it is also significant as we have our own research findings and analysis to share ahead of not just a looming election year but the anticipation of yet another national security review process in the months that follow these polls. So last week Leonie Mills-Woanya and I attended the Liberal Democrats’ conference and shared our findings at a special fringe event, Security Reclaimed: Towards a Human Security Strategy for the UK

Read more: https://rethinkingsecurity.org.uk/2023/10/04/fair-deal-security-centring-people-and-planet-in-lib-dem-strategy/

Mapping Statelessness

Updated 17 October 2023: European Network on Statelessness: Are Stateless Claimants Disadvantaged Within Asylum Procedures? New Evidence from the UK Context

Thomas McGee, PhD researcher at Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness (Melbourne Law School) and the MENA Statelessness Network (Hawiati)

This blog post introduces new research, conducted as part of the #StatelessJourneys project, into the challenges faced by stateless claimants within asylum procedures in the UK context. The study focuses on the experiences of stateless Kurds from Syria in the UK, revealing hurdles related to civil documentation, cultural understanding, and language analysis. These findings emphasize the need for more statelessness-sensitive procedures and policy changes, both in the UK and within other countries of asylum across Europe.

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Exporting people seeking asylum – Rwanda

Updated 10 October 2023: Human Rights Watch: UK: Abandon Rwanda Asylum Transfer Plan

New Report Documents Rwanda’s Global Targeting of Rwandan Refugees, Critics

  • Rwandan authorities and their proxies are using violence, judicial mechanisms, and intimidation to try to silence criticism from Rwandans living around the world.
  • Rwanda’s targeting of Rwandans abroad, including in the UK, underlines Rwanda’s contempt for human rights norms enshrined in the international protection system.
  • The UK should abandon its asylum transfer deal with Rwanda and take action to enhance the protection of Rwandan residents and refugees in the UK.

(London) – Rwandan authorities and their proxies are using violence, judicial mechanisms, and intimidation to try to silence criticism from Rwandans living around the world, Human Rights Watch said in a report published today. The abuses, which have fostered a climate of fear and self-censorship, are being brought to light as the United Kingdom government is at the Supreme Court appealing the judgment that its plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda is unlawful.

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In the run-up to the General Election 2024

QARN – What do Quakers hope for, after the 2024 General Election

QARN-What-do-Quakers-hope-for-after-the-2024-General-Election_Aug-2023 Download


2 October 2023: Guardian: In one vulgar swoop, Suella Braverman has humiliated every single migrant in the UK

The home secretary’s assertion that multiculturalism has ‘failed’ would have been considered beyond the pale even decades ago

Even by this government’s standards, last week was bleak and this one, as the Tory conference gets under way, promises to be no less dispiriting. It is clear that Conservative party policy proposals and rhetoric are now nothing but wild last-ditch attempts to renew chances at the next election, but Suella Braverman’s latest assertion that multiculturalism has “failed” proved that when it comes to immigration, we have moved away from dog whistles and back towards the sort of Powellite language that, even decades ago, was considered beyond the pale.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/oct/02/suella-braverman-migrant-uk-multiculturalism