Torture victims under threat from UK proposals

(Today - UN International Day in Support of Victims of Torture)

Torture victims/survivors are under real threat from the UK's proposal for off-shore asylum processing proposals.

The UK's proposals for asylum claims to be determined outside of the country where that claim is initially made were on the agenda for last week's European Council meeting in Thessaloniki.

"We now know that the Council has not accepted the UK's proposals, but they have not gone away,” says the Medical Foundation's Advocacy Officer (Refugee Issues) David Rhys Jones.

The UK now appears to be throwing some support behind the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees which, in the words of High Commissioner Ruud Lubbers "proposes separating out the groups that are clearly misusing the system, namely asylum seekers from countries that produce hardly any genuine refugees. "These asylum seekers would automatically be sent to one or more reception centres somewhere within the EU, where their claims would be rapidly examined by joint EU teams. Those judged not to have any sort of refugee claim would then be sent straight home. The limited number of recognised refugees among them would be shared between the EU states?"

The Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture is concerned that neither the UK nor the UNHCR proposals sufficiently safeguard torture survivors in terms of health and human rights in the event that the mechanisms inherent in asylum processes taking place within the territory of the country of asylum are absent.

"Without minimum standards the most vulnerable may be at particular risk of return to their country of origin,” says Mr Jones.

Questions that the UK government and the UNHCR must answer include:

- Is it envisaged that survivors of torture and organised violence and their families would be exempt from any and all offshore asylum processing initiatives?

• What procedures, including health and mental health assessments will be put in place to provide opportunities to identify torture survivors throughout the asylum process, both in the territory of States Party and off-shore?
• Will all staff both in the territory of the States Party and in offshore processing centres and throughout the processing system be appropriately trained to identify survivors of torture?
• What consideration has been given to the issue of late disclosure of allegations of torture?
• And how will torture survivors who are identified after transfer offshore be treated?

"Freedom from Torture fears that while the UK proposal may not be endorsed, some less radical proposal for the offshore processing of asylum claims may well emerge. All such proposals currently carry a Health Warning for torture survivors.”