EU referendum: the fight for migrants’ rights goes on
By Carolina Gottardo, Director of the Latin American Women’s Rights Service (LAWRS) and former PICUM board member. This blog was originally published by Migrant Right’s Network on 26 June [...]
PICUM Expert Roundtable: Access to Sexual and Reproductive Health Services as Part of the Right to Health Care
By Tara Ohl, PICUM Trainee and Alyna Smith, PICUM Advocacy Officer Among the obstacles undocumented migrants face in realising their fundamental rights are the multiple barriers to access health [...]
Unlocking Detention – A ‘virtual tour’ of the UK’s immigration detention estate
By Eiri Ohtani, Project Director, Detention Forum, UK. How do you explain immigration detention to people who have never been to any detention centres? This was the starting point of Detention [...]
Undocumented and Coming of Age: What lessons can Europe draw from the USA?
By Pauline Chomel (PICUM intern), And Lilana Keith (PICUM Advocacy Officer). What are the daily realities of undocumented migrant youth coming of age? What challenges do their face in their [...]
PICUM Task Force on Legal Strategies Discusses Access to Justice and Redress Mechanisms for Undocumented Migrant
By Maria Giovanna Manieri, PICUM Programme Officer. PICUM held the fourth meeting of its Task Force on Legal Strategies in Brussels on 3 December 2015. At the meeting, participants were asked to [...]
International Migrants’ Day – Changing the Narrative
By Michele LeVoy, PICUM Director. Dear colleagues and friends, Today we commemorate International Migrants’ Day, and at the same time, a year comes to an end in which irregular migration has [...]
Bad news for UK government – Labour exploitation is rising and its anti-slavery measures are currently falling well short
By Don Flynn, Director Migrants’ Rights Network and PICUM Chair. This blog was first published by Migrants’ Rights Network on 2 November 2015. Victims of exploitative employers or [...]
Why we need to talk about ‘migrants’
By Elisabeth Schmidt-Hieber, PICUM Communications Officer, And Lilana Keith, PICUM Interim Programmes Director. This blog was first published by La Strada International, Newsletter Issue 38, [...]
Migrant crisis: Inept leaders lay foundations of future unrest
By Edel McGinley, Director of the Migrant Rights Centre Ireland (MRCI) and member of the board of PICUM. This article first appeared in the Irish Examiner on 24 August 2015 Making the hazardous [...]
PICUM Annual Workshop: Challenging Criminalisation of Undocumented Migrants
By Elisabeth Schmidt-Hieber, PICUM Communications Officer. Images of migrants sleeping in tents alongside an imposing line of police cars in Calais, France; an airport security x-ray in Ceuta [...]
The gaps in EU policies on migration, trafficking and victims’ protection
By Cécilia Rolland, And Kadri Soova. Following the launch of the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) report “Severe labour exploitation: workers moving within or into the European Union. [...]
Restricting access to the NHS for undocumented migrants is bad policy at high cost
By Lilana Keith, PICUM And Ewout van Ginneken, Berlin University of Technology. This article was first published by BMJ on 16 June 2015. The shocking loss of life among migrants crossing the [...]
PICUM Publishes Position Paper on ‘EU Return Directive’ Following First Working Group Meeting on EU Migration Policies
By Maria Giovanna Manieri, PICUM Programme Officer. Following the unprecedented loss of an estimated 1,600 migrant lives in the Mediterranean in the first months of this year, heads of EU [...]
Migrants in the Mediterranean: mourning deaths, not saving lives
By Maria Giovanna Manieri and Elisabeth Schmidt-Hieber. This article was first published by OpenSecurity on 23 February 2015. For as long as the humanitarian impulse to rescue the desperate and [...]
‘Istanbul Convention’ – How Civil Society Can Engage in the Monitoring Process
By Eve Geddie, PICUM Programmes Director. The Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (Istanbul Convention) has great potential to [...]
PICUM Working Group on Access to Health Care for Undocumented Migrants
By Lilana Keith, PICUM Programme Officer. Focus on: children’s health, local and regional service provision and strategies for the UK How can we drive change at EU and national level so that all [...]
Why a rights-based approach to migrant children? The case of undocumented children and families
By Lilana Keith, PICUM Programme Officer. The current approach to migrant children is piecemeal, focusing on protecting certain categories of children, such as unaccompanied, asylum seeking, [...]
PICUM Members Take the Floor
This June, over 100 PICUM members came to Brussels to participate in PICUM’s 2014 Annual Workshop and General Assembly. Exploring how civil society can actively shape migration policies in the [...]
Listen to me! I am building my future
Originally posted by Terres des Hommes on Destination Unknown, on 20 June 2014. Geneva, 19th June 2014, United Nations – “I want to continue writing, I want to travel the world, I want to go into [...]
What a Multicultural Cookbook can tell us about the Lives of Migrant Domestic Workers
By Mercedes Miletti. International cuisine has become very popular as recipes from different regions of the world are becoming an increasingly common part of our weekly menus. But what do we [...]
Check Before You Vote: The European Parliament Resolution on Undocumented Women and the EU Elections
By Louise Bonneau and Eve Geddie. As Europe prepares to go the polls this month to elect its representatives for the 2014-2019 European Parliament, we invite you to take a deeper look into the [...]
A Child is a Child – How the European Union can Ensure the Rights of Undocumented Migrant Children
Over the past decade of advocacy work for the rights of undocumented migrants, the Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM) has recorded how immigration control has [...]
Voluntary return for undocumented migrants in Morocco, a solution for whom?
By Leila Marzo. After the boat tragedies off the shores of Lampedusa and Malta made international headlines, the European Union came under high pressure to rethink its immigration policies. [...]
PICUM WORKING GROUP ON ACCESS TO JUSTICE FOR UNDOCUMENTED WOMEN
By Eve Geddie, PICUM Programmes Director. An in depth-discussion about the Victims’ Directive The EU Directive establishing minimum standards on the support and protection of victims of crime [...]
PICUM Working Group Explores Legal Strategies in Advocating for Undocumented Migrants
By Maria Giovanna Manieri, PICUM Programme Officer The first meeting of the PICUM’s Working Group on Legal Strategies was held in Brussels on 12 December 2013. The meeting brought together legal [...]
PICUM says thank you!
By Elisabeth Schmidt-Hieber, PICUM Communications Officer As Christmas approaches, PICUM has received many seasonal greetings underlining the large number of activities and campaigns taking place [...]
The EU Must Do More to End the Exploitation of Seasonal Workers
By Eve Geddie, Programmes Director at PICUM. The debate on migration to the EU has been very much focused on death at sea, mainly in the Mediterranean, as Europe deliberates how to control [...]
Working group discusses how to end child detention and ensure access to services for undocumented migrant children and their families
By Nicola Delvino, Advocacy and Communications Intern at PICUM. PICUM hosted its third thematic working group on undocumented children and families on 13 November 2013 in Brussels. PICUM used the [...]
A Postcard from Britain – ‘Hostile Environment’, Border Control in Communities and Indefinite Immigration Detention
By Eiri Ohtani, The Detention Forum, London, UK. A stone’s throw from a relatively upmarket hotel, near London’s Heathrow airport, stand two detention centres, Harmondsworth and Colnbrook [...]
More than 100 people are dead and hundreds still missing – What will the tragedy in Lampedusa change?
By Elisabeth Schmidt-Hieber, PICUM Communications Officer. ‘The sea is full of dead bodies.’ ‘Corpses are crammed into the wreck and some of the bodies – even in death – seeming to [...]
New Portuguese legislation grants rights only partially to undocumented migrants
By Juliana Moya, Portuguese Association for Victim Support (APAV). A change of legislation grants more protection to undocumented migrants in Portugal such as a residence permit for victims of [...]
How relevant, effective and humane is the EU border control regime?
By Michele LeVoy (PICUM Director), and Kadri Soova (PICUM Advocacy Officer). 1999 saw the historic conflation of the security agenda with migration that would shape all the future EU policy [...]
Let’s save hospitality!
By Nacho Sánchez, Málaga Acoge. On 31 December last year, a radio programme gathered several individuals and groups to spend an untypical New Year’s Eve together and to start the New Year [...]
Empowerment of a grassroots migrant organisation in Morocco – MRCI Ireland meets ODT Immigrés in Morocco
By Pablo Rojas Coppari, Strategic Advocacy Officer MRCI Ireland. Recent news reported on efforts of Spanish and Moroccan authorities to reinforce border security and raised the question of [...]
Food Movement: Another “Sleeping Giant” Awakens on Immigration Reform
By Navina Khanna, Joann Lo and Cathi Tactaquin. What do food banks, food chain workers, and Dreamers all have in common? The answer, when it comes to immigration, is just about everything. Today, [...]
“Children and Irregular Migration”
Side Event prior to the United Nations Day of General Discussion (DGD) on “The rights of all children in the context of international migration” The Platform for International Cooperation on [...]
Migration status as vulnerability factor in situations of human trafficking and exploitation
By Kadri Soova, Advocacy Officer, PICUM, Brussels. This blog will look at how lack of authorised migration status contributes to increased vulnerability of migrants in situations of human [...]
Un projet de régularisation pour les travailleurs sans-papiers au Maroc
Par Marta Grosso, PICUM Project Officer. Sans accès à la santé, à l’éducation, à un logement décent, sans recours à la justice, comment pensons-nous pouvoir créer des citoyens forts et actifs ? [...]
ASGI on the transposition of the Employers’ Sanctions Directive and new regularisation in Italy
By PICUM. With a recently published position paper, the Italian Association for Juridical Studies (ASGI), expresses its concerns over the transposition of the Employers’ Sanctions Directive in [...]
Do You Commemorate Independence Day?
By Yasmine Soraya, Indonesian Migrant Workers Union (Netherlands). (Editor: Cilia Mather) Sixty seven years is a quite old for human being. At this age, a person perhaps is already retired and [...]
“Undoc Camp”: Web and technology to help undocumented children
By Nicola Flamigni, PICUM Communications Officer. Migrants, activists, lawyers, designers, web developers, journalists, photographers, engineers and musicians…. all together to attend [...]
Access to Justice for Undocumented Women: A Reality in the EU?
By Eve Geddie, PICUM Program Officer. On Thursday 21st June, the launch of a seminal report on undocumented women was cohosted by members of the European Parliament from across the political [...]
Do you know who cleans your place?
By Eva Valentová, Association for Integration and Migration in Czech Republic. In its new campaign, the Association for Integration and Migration urges employers to respect the rights of domestic [...]
3 questions on Greek chaos to Miltos Pavlou – I-Red Network (PICUM member)
Miltos Pavlou is a sociologist with legal and interdisciplinary formation, author of numerous publications and public presentations on migrants and minorities, racism and discrimination in Europe [...]
Greece: detention of undocumented migrants and asylum seekers on health grounds
By Nicola Flamigni, Communications officer, PICUM, Brussels. Everywhere is the same. When elections approach, the moderate party tries to gain some votes by echoing some of the slogans of the [...]
Spain – Four unhealthy cracks
On April 20th, the Spanish government approved a new set of austerity measures, modifying the conditions of access to health system. Among other aspects, this new regulation denies access to [...]
National Workshop on Undocumented Children in Belgium
On 17th April 2012 more than sixty professionals and members of civil and political society who work with undocumented children in Belgium, came together for PICUM and Plate-Forme Mineurs en [...]
Being an undocumented child in Iran
By Bahar Shoghi, and Setareh Masoumbeiki. Setareh and Bahar and Gita are part of a team of independent artists and practitioners based in Tehran, Iran. In the last several years, the team has [...]
Belgian far-right website incites people to denounce undocumented migrants – PICUM speaks out against worrying trend in Europe
By PICUM. On 10 April 2012, the Belgian far-right party Vlaams Belang launched a new website inciting citizens to denounce through on-line application crimes committed by undocumented migrants. [...]
The Odyssey of Unaccompanied Minors in Europe
By Karl Kopp, PRO ASYL Director of European Affairs. Refugee children are detained in despicable Greek jails along the Turkish border. Homeless Afghan boys roam the city centre of Athens, Greek [...]
