8

REFLECTIONS

SUNDAY EXAMINER

Stop asylum seeker bashing

orld Refugee Day was

marked this year on
June 20 as the United
Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR) announced
that for the first time in history the
number of displaced people in the
world exceeded 60 million.
Although only a handful are
seeking protection in Hong Kong,
they are a long way from finding an
open-hearted welcome or home to
begin a new life and instead are facing a new round of refugee-bashing
with regular reports in the media
about fake refugees.
In addition, the screening process they face is somewhat
controversial.
At an event to mark World Refugee Day held at The Hive Studios
on June 16, a Christian Egyptian
known as Poules, spoke confidently
of his hope that his claim would
eventually succeed.
However, he noted that in the
four years he has been in Hong
Kong, he has only been interviewed
once.
A television reporter from a
religious minority, he was active in
the 2011 Arab Spring that overthrew Hosni Mubarak.
He described his lone flight,
leaving family behind, as the result
of the consistent beating and persecution by the Egyptian military that
he was subjected to.
A return home is out of the
question, so his future in Hong
Kong lies with the Unified Screening Mechanism.
Peter, from the Hong Kong Refugee Union, said there is always the

We are not here to

take away your
home and jobs. We
are here to seek
protection from
the Hong Kong
government

chance of third country resettlement, if the claimant is convincing.

However, he explained that refugees are seldom willing to divulge
details even among the wider asylum seeker community.
The Vine Centre also hosted an
event marking World Refugee Day
under the theme of United in Love
on June 18.
Jeffery Andrews, a case worker
from Christian Action Centre for
Refugees, told success stories of
UN-brokered third country resettlement in the United States of
America.
Curse of Love is the story of one
of them.
An Iranian teenager, called Ida,
who fled threats to religious minorities with her family in 2012, told
her story in the third-person. She
said her claim was approved in
three-and-half years and those like
her deserve protection in Hong
Kong.
Ida declared, We are not here to
take away your home and jobs. We
are here to seek protection from the
Hong Kong government.
Quoting the Immigration
Department, Adam Severson, from

An African band of asylum seekers performing at The Hive Studios at

an event to mark World Refugee Day. Photo: Hongyu Wang

Reflection
Reflection
the Justice Centre Hong Kong,
revealed the average hearing time
under the Unified Screening Mechanism is 28 months. Many failed
claimants then go to the Torture
Claims Appeal Board.
Severson lamented there are few
legal people prepared to appear for
them and rejected cases are difficult to get into court.
A colleague of his is bringing
this issue before the head of
UNHCR in Geneva.
He added that deportation and
repatriation takes a long time, as
Hong Kong only recognises voluntary repatriation and this requires a
passport, which many asylum seek-

ers do not have. But Severson did

not rule out the possibility of forced
repatriation in the future.
Emily Lau, a member of the
Legislative Council and chairperson of the Democratic Party,
reflected on Hong Kongs history
and her own experience of being
banned from mainland China and
Macau.
Lau stressed, Hong Kong can
do a lot for the protection of refugees, because Hong Kong is a land
of refugees.
Vowing to do her best to convince her party and colleagues
before her retirement in September,
Lau appealed to the public to take
action and not allow the newspapers to report on fake refugees
every day.
She then called on the social

To you the brave firefighters

he unknown faces that have come to touch many lives...

We offer our prayers today for you, without knowing you
beforehand, for prayers do not request us to know faces...
Your gesture of love led you to sacrifice your lives. You were just a life,
but now your names mean something greater than just an identity.
You surely inspire many lives with your heroic action.
We pray for you...
You are martyrs of love, the sign of pure sacrifice... At Ngau Tau Kok
you knew that fire was dangerous, yet you chose to face it in order to
save lives. That move itself spoke louder than books about self-denial
We pray for you...
You were aware that such work needs tremendous courage and you
could have opted for the easy way, but you did not to back off...
The love of your work and the sense of duty led you
to the ultimate sacrifice...
You well-built state of mind will never go unnoticed!
We pray for you...
What to say in these circumstances? Words are not enough to fully
express our deepest feelings, but let me use them to express myself:
You are the soldiers of love and the faces of sacrifice; You are the ones
who chose fire to leave us a message that the fire of love should burn
in our hearts Yes Lord, (re)kindle in us the fire of your love...You
are that person that gave more than your job could possible offer...
We pray for you...
I wont say, They were just doing their job, but will say thanks for

your noble sacrifice. May you rest in peace,

O valiant firefighters.
The fire may have consumed your bodies, but it
will not consume your souls... It may have
deleted your lives, but it will never erase
your action from our memories, for acts
of love will never perish
by the verdict of the fire.
We pray for you...
And to your families, O brilliant souls, may God be with you.
and may he always bestow upon you the fire of his love so
that you may continue to bear witness to the love you
have demonstrated with courage.
We pray for you...
To you who are directly affected by this fire, firefighters and other
people as well, may you know that our prayers connect us with your
feelings at this very moment. You are in our hearts as we ask
the Lord to lead you, to protect you and to comfort you all.
We pray for you...
And to us all, let us not forget that caring is love made visible...
A prayer for them will be a gift of love.
A message of love will be a way to express our sympathy.
United as one, we pray for you...
And may God rest your soul.
l Father Dominique Mukonda cicm

3 JULY 2016

conscience of Hong Kong, as the

true measure of a civilised society
is how you look after the most
vulnerable.
The UNHCR established an
office in Hong Kong in 1952,
which became permanent with the
arrival of Vietnamese boat people
in 1979.
Hong Kong has never been a
signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention and is not obliged to
process or accept asylum claims,
but in 1992 it did ratify the Convention Against Torture and other
international treaties, which form
the protection channels of today.
In the wake of Nine/Eleven
2001, many countries tightened
their immigration policies in sharp
contrast to Hong Kongs open borders, which have continued to allow
a steady increase in the number of
claimants entering the territory.
In March this year, the number
stood at 11,201, mostly from southern and south-eastern Asia with a
significant number from Africa.
Prior to 2008, asylum seekers
only held UNHCR protection, with
the government offering no objection to presence documents. But
then papers were made available
along with minimal monthly assistance payments.
Permanent resettlement can be
sought under the Refugee Convention through the UNHCR or with
the government as a torture claimant. Most try both.
Chances of success are slim.
Gordon Mathews, an anthropologist at the Chinese University of
Hong Kong, said that 1,547 refugee
claims were evaluated by UNHCR
in 2008, but only 46 were recognised.
A mere 22 torture victims succeeded with the Hong Kong
government in the first 22 years
after the convention against torture
was ratified.
The dual paths began to merge
in March 2013 when the Court of
Final Appeal ruled in favour of
asylum seekers in a case against
repatriation after their claims had
been rejected by the UNHCR.
A year later, the Unified Screening Mechanism was set in motion
by the Immigration Department for
all non-refoulement claims. This
transferred refugee status determination from the UNHCR to local
bureaucrats.
Substantiated cases are referred
to the UNHCR for recognition as
refugees, but Immigration Department figures as of March 2016
show there are only 52 out of 8,465
cases.
This reflects a different Hong
Kong from the one that welcomed
millions of people fleeing the aftermath of the Chinese civil war and
Maoist political campaigns, who
have made the city what it is today.
l Hongyu Wang