Coalition to stop deportations to Iraq

It also wants the government to grant protection to all Iraqi asylum seekers and recognise them as victims of war and allow them the right to work or to receive a decent level of benefit. The release of the remaining Iraqi asylum seekers held in detention is a further demand.

No Deportations to Iraq!

RESOLUTION of the Conference of the Coalition to Stop Deportations to Iraq, London, 24 June 2006

This conference notes that Iraq is a highly dangerous country and that its inhabitants still suffer the US/British occupation, rising sectarian strife, rampant corruption, general lawlessness, daily kidnappings, abductions, large-scale killings by death squads and suicide bombers; and women are at risk of honour killings. Power and water supplies and medical facilities still do not function properly, three years on from the invasion, and many people cannot get sufficient food or food that is fit to eat. The IMF is pressing for abolition of the basic food ration. Many places are catastrophically contaminated with uranium as a result of the last two wars.

This conference also notes that Kurdistan (Northern Iraq), to which people are now being returned, at present via the so-called “voluntary returns programme”, is still part of Iraq and, although not suffering full scale open warfare like much of Iraq, suffers from many of the other problems listed above. In addition it is still unsafe politically for people who originally left because of persecution by Kurdish parties or Islamist groups, and it has large and rising numbers of displaced persons who still do not have permanent homes or jobs or tolerable living conditions.

This conference therefore calls on the British government to:

• Stop deportations to Iraq
• Grant protection to all Iraqi asylum seekers and recognise them as victims of war.
• Allow them the right to work or to receive a decent level of benefit
• Immediately release the remaining few Iraqi asylum seekers held in detention

This conference further notes that a very welcome debate has started about the need to regularise the position of many migrants in this country, and agrees that the campaign will

• actively participate in this debate
• press for the Home Office to re-open the cases of all asylum-seekers who feel that they have been unfairly refused asylum here by the Home Office or the courts
• work with other organisations that are seeking to stop deportations to other dangerous, war-ridden countries and regions
• work for greater unity within the refugee and migrant movement and the labour movement on these issues

We shall continue to campaign as a broad Coalition to Stop Deportations to Iraq, both to stop removals to Iraq, and for humane treatment of asylum seekers living here, and we invite other organisations and individuals who agree with this resolution to join us in this work.

We agree to send copies of this resolution to Prime Minister Tony Blair and to the Minister for Nationality Citizenship and Immigration Liam Byrne.

Conference of Coalition to Stop Deportations to Iraq, London
June 24 2006