While Covid-19 has devastated lives around the world and altered the way we live, it has hit the most vulnerable the hardest. There are currently 26 million refugees and millions more have been forcibly displaced due to violence or disaster.
They not only face a health and economic crisis like the rest of the world, but they are also dealing with a protection crisis, as well. Many refugees live in crowded conditions, where social distancing is a luxury and sanitation, clean water, and basic healthcare are hard to come by. The situation is complicated by the fact that many countries have decided to lock down their borders to curb the spread of Covid-19.
BORDER LOCKDOWNS
Since the pandemic began, over 150 countries have locked down their borders, and as a result, fewer than 12,000 people have been resettled this year, according to the UNHCR.
Some countries, like the US, have used the pandemic as an excuse to quietly shut down their asylum-seeker programmes. In 2019, months before the pandemic hit, President Trump already declared, “We have a system that is full. And when it’s full, there’s nothing you can do. You have to say, ‘I’m sorry, we can’t take you.’”
This year in March, at the beginning of the pandemic, the CDC closed the US border to migrants, including those without valid travel documentation, citing dangers to public health. Now these people are waiting out the pandemic in Mexico’s border towns in hopes of getting another chance to enter the US and apply for asylum.
The US is certainly not the only country to shut its borders to refugees specifically. Italy closed its ports, saying they were “unsafe” during the pandemic, while the UK refuses to take in unaccompanied minors from Greek refugee camps who have relatives in the UK. Another example from South East Asia is Malaysia, which closed its borders in March. In April, a ship with almost 400 Rohingya refugees was left drifting at sea off the coast of Malaysia, where the government said they would not be taken in due to the pandemic. In May, the government deported 400 more refugees to Myanmar and indicated that they intended to continue deporting refugees.
Assistant High Commissioner for Protection, Gillian Triggs, also warned against “externalising” the asylum process to third countries, as some countries have. This practice could lead to countries abandoning their responsibility towards refugees and can land them in greater harm in overcrowded, isolated camps.
Border lockdowns have led to racism, xenophobia, and increased stigmatisation of refugees, as some politicians blame the spread of Covid-19 on migrants and refugees in an attempt to close borders. However, as refugees and migrants are prohibited from crossing borders, the virus continues to spread due to ongoing global commerce and non-refugees travelling internationally, which means that refugees are being used as scapegoats, while the pandemic becomes an excuse to further politicise the refugee crisis.
THE WAY FORWARD
Despite the hardships the pandemic has brought on a global scale, some countries are still accepting refugees at their borders. In mid-September, the High Commissioner of Refugees, Filippo Grandi, praised Jordan’s “great spirit of solidarity” for providing refugees with health care and including them in the country’s Covid-19 response plan. Jordan is now home to more than 658,000 refugees from neighbouring Syria alone, and more are expected to make their way to the country in the coming months.
Over 100 countries have now resumed their asylum procedures, with most switching to technologies that process claims remotely.
Despite the challenges refugees and other migrants face during the pandemic, many are actively helping combat the crisis. A number of countries have relaxed their immigration laws to allow refugees with medical training to work as nurses, doctors, and other healthcare professionals to alleviate the strain their local communities are under from Covid-19, proving that continued support for refugees can greatly benefit their host country.
Isabelle holds a MA in International and Comparative Commercial Law at SOAS, University of London and just completed her LLM in Professional Legal Practice at the University of Law, Leeds. Her focus lies on areas such as dispute resolution, the international tribunals and the use of force. She has experience working with refugees in South Africa and the Hague, Netherland.