A call for action from Calais. We do not forget.

Dear friends and comrades all over the world. Another friend has been killed here in Calais (see below and here: http://calaismigrantsolidarity.wordpress.com/)



Again, the state is trying to cover up the death. As you would expect, the Sudanese and other communities here in Calais are full of anger and sadness right now. People are asking for our support to make sure that more lives are not passed over in silence. We are organising demonstrations, a media campaign, and legal action here in Calais.



We think this mobilisation can be even stronger if comrades act in support elsewhere, in order to put more pressure on the French government. It would be great if in the next few days and weeks there are many demonstrations or any other events that will draw attention to what is happening.



Especially, we would like to ask if comrades at the No Border camp in Duesseldorf/Koeln can make this a campaign for the camp.

Also, at the same time as remembering N., let's also remember all the other people killed in Calais, and on all the bloody borders of Europe and the world.



Please pass on this message to other friends and comrades.

More details about the ongoing investigation and campaign will be posted on the blog in coming days http://calaismigrantsolidarity.wordpress.com/



Ni Oubli. Ni Pardon.

...


Another friend killed in Calais



One more death. In the early hours of Saturday Morning (7 July),
our friend N., 28 years old, from Sudan, died in Calais town centre.
His body was dragged out of the canal near the Sub-Prefecture. As often
in the past, the police have been point blank refusing to allow friends
and family access to his body, or to hold an inquest into his death.
They have already prepared their story about his death, which is
starting to unravel as more evidence comes to light.


Not because it bears any relation to the truth, but this is the 
official line: N stole a mobile phone in the town centre, he was chased
by a friend of the "victim", and somehow he managed to fall or jump into
the canal, where he drowned. Apparently there is no need for an autopsy
or inquiry. No need to explain police movements that night just before N
died. No need to wait for evidence that he stole anything. This story,
straight from the mouths of the cops, was parroted by the local hate-rag
"La Voix du Nord" without further investigation. A migrant. A black
man. A thief. An accident, maybe even a well-deserved death.

N's
friends, and witnesses, tell a different story. We cannot write more
about what really happened at this moment, but we will do so soon. This
morning (Monday 9) around 40 people demonstrated outside the police
station in Calais. N was well loved. We hope to write more about his
life soon as well, with full respect to all his family and friends. We
will not let this death be forgotten.

The cover-up by state
authorities and media accomplices of deaths in Calais is standard. Just
to give another recent example, on December 22, another friend, Ismael,
was found dead at the bottom of a bridge in central Calais. The police
immediately closed the case, calling it suicide. They refused to allow
his friends to see or identify the body, and refused an autopsy.
Ismael's friends went twice to the police station asking to see his body
and were twice refused and threatened with arrest by the immigration
police (PAF) if they didn't leave. Only one white French friend was
allowed in to identify him. There was no further investigation.

The
border kills. We don't know how Ismail died. We have seen many times
police chasing migrants off bridges, into canals, into the harbour.
Bullets and clubs are not the only way to kill people. A fall from a
bridge can kill just as well. Constant beatings and hunger can kill just
as well. Years of fear and frustration and humiliation can kill just as
well. These are the deaths that keep Europe's looted wealth safe from
the foreigners.

Ni Oubli. Ni Pardon. (Don't forget. Don't forgive.)

Iraqi parliament refuses to accept nationals deported from Europe

Baghdad bans forced return of deportees and threatens to fine airlines that carry failed asylum seekers

An Iraqi asylum seeker in his 14th-floor flat in Liverpool. Photograph: Christopher Thomond for the Guardian.


The Iraqi parliament has banned the forced return from Europe of tens of thousands of failed asylum seekers and threatened to fine airlines that take part in deportation programmes.

The unilateral declaration has already resulted in deportees being turned back at the border, according to the London-based refugee support organisation that has lobbied for the policy change.

For the past year, the United Kingdom has been unable to remove Iraqis, even after they have lost the right to remain in Britain, owing to legal disputes over their reception at Baghdad airport and the state of security within Iraq.

Across Europe, tens of thousands of Iraqis are in legal limbo, waiting to have asylum claims processed or under threat of return to the Middle East if their applications have been rejected.

Physical mistreatment of Iraqi Kurds at Baghdad airport, sectarian violence and al-Qaida bombings at one stage led the European court of human rights in Strasbourg to intervene, blocking deportations on the grounds that many areas remained too dangerous. The UK has failed to return any rejected Iraqi asylum seekers since last spring. The regional parliament in Iraqi Kurdistan blocked forced returns from European airports several years ago; last month, the Iraqi parliament, known as the Council of Representatives, voted to extend the ban nationally.

The four-part motion ordered the Iraqi government to refuse to accept forcibly returned Iraqi refugees, to review a memorandum of understanding between Sweden and Iraq regarding the repatriation of Iraqi refugees, to fine companies that returned forcibly deported refugees, and to hold a conference on the issue of Iraqi refugees abroad.

Millions of Iraqis fled the country after the British and US invasion in 2003 that overthrew Saddam Hussein. Most went to neighbouring Arab countries but large numbers sought sanctuary in Europe.

The ban on forced returns was promoted by the International Federation of Iraqi Refugees (IFIR), based in London, which has been campaigning against deportations in Iraq and Kurdistan.

Dashty Jamal, of the IFIR, said: "This is a great victory for Iraqi refugees, who are the victims of war and oppression. Norway and Denmark have been sending refugees back by force recently. They will now have to stop.

"I understand some people have already been turned back at the border since the weekend.

"We know that there are at least 1,300 Iraqi refugees in the Netherlands alone who have been threatened with being sent back. Sweden has said that it has received 20,000 asylum applications from Iraqis since 2003."

The Home Office was unable to say how many failed Iraqi asylum seekers remained in the UK.

The IFIR believes relatively few Iraqis are in UK immigration detention centres; people are not normally detained unless there is an immediate prospect of their removal.

A British government spokesman said it was aware of the vote but questioned whether it was binding. A Home Office spokesman added: "We continue to make returns to Iraq on a case by case basis."

A Foreign Office spokesman said: "I am not aware of any other countries that refuse to accept deportees. The UK courts have confirmed, however, that we are able to return people to Iraq, and that return of Kurds via Baghdad is permitted."

Frontex, the EU agency that co-ordinates deportation flights and border security with member states, said it had not organised any return flights since last autumn.

A spokeswoman said: "There have been other examples of countries refusing to accept their nationals: in the 1990s the authorities opposed Roma returnees to Kosovo because they could not guarantee their safety."

Bron : Owen Bowcott
guardian.co.uk,