UK should make voluntary pledge to increase resettlement of vulnerable refugees

The Home Secretary should use the opportunity of the EU interior ministers' meeting today to make a voluntary pledge to increase the resettlement of vulnerable refugees to the U.K.

Sile Reynolds, Lead Asylum Policy Advisor for Freedom from Torture, said:

"It is truly invidious that desperate men women and children who have risked drowning in an effort to escape torture and other forms of persecution should be left stranded on Europe's shores while the Home Secretary and other EU interior ministers quibble over who should offer them sanctuary.

"The survivors of torture and other human rights violations who are among those who have risked the Mediterranean crossing, have done so because they had no other choice. Such individuals are enduring ongoing insecurity in countries neighbouring their own and yet cannot travel legally to the UK for the purpose of claiming asylum. The existing UK resettlement programmes are operating at too small a scale to contribute meaningfully to solving the current crisis.

"The Government should use the opportunity of this European meeting to make a voluntary pledge to increase resettlement of vulnerable refugees to the UK. In 2014 the UK admitted only 187 persons under its resettlement programme for vulnerable Syrians, a number that pales beside the volume of survivors of torture and other human rights abuse who have been forced to flee and are currently struggling to survive in neighbouring countries that can offer neither immediate safety nor durable protection.

"Traumatised survivors of torture and human rights abuse stranded in refugee camps in overwhelmed and under-resourced countries such as Jordan, have no hope of accessing the rehabilitation services and help they need to rebuild their lives . The UK could and should do more through planned resettlement programmes, alongside other measures to ensure safe and legal routes to the UK, so that those who need protection are welcomed and supported in this country."