Letters

A two-tier system for refugees?

Asylum system needs reform

Sat Jun 25 2022 - 16:52

Sir, – Sinéad Gibney appears to want Ireland to operate what is essentially an open-door asylum policy (“Why is there a two-tier system for refugees”, Opinion & Analysis, June 24th).

In 2018, Gallup estimated that more than 750 million adults worldwide wanted to permanently migrate to better-off countries. Some 24 per cent in the Middle East and North Africa and 33 per cent in sub-Saharan Africa wanted to do so. Continuing governance failure in these regions, combined with population growth and climate change, will only add to those figures. In addition, over 100 million people are presently displaced by wars and ethnic conflicts.

In light of the above reality, arguably even current Irish and EU asylum policies are not economically, politically or socially sustainable in the long term.

The UN’s 1951 Refugee Convention and 1967 Protocol need to be urgently reformed to take account of the growth of cheap mass travel, people traffickers, “asylum shopping” and the use of refugees and migrants as political pawns by autocrats. – Yours, etc,

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KARL MARTIN,

Dublin 13.

Sir, – Sinead Gibney’s article on the contrasting treatment of asylum seekers fails to mention that the most significant difference between those fleeing the Ukraine and those fleeing Somalia, Syria, or Afghanistan is not race or religion, but gender. According to the Central Statistics Office (CSO), 84 per cent of arrivals from the Ukraine were women and children: 48 per cent were women aged 20 and over, while 38 per cent were individuals aged less than a year to 19. According to Pew Research, during the 2015 migrant crisis, 73 per cent of asylum seekers were male and 42 per cent were young men of military age (18 to 34). For example, 71 per cent of Syria migrants were male and 39 per cent were young men. – Yours, etc,

BRIAN KELLY,

Lecarrow,

Co Roscommon.