On the Trade in Human Beings between Britain and France

[Ambrose Musiyiwa]

Dear Colleagues,

Would it be possible for artists, as individuals and as collectives, to ask their Members of Parliament to support Early Day Motion (EDM) 2590, Report on conditions and treatment at Harmondsworth IRC. This motion is a vital tool for bringing reports of state violence into the public and parliamentary record. 

Similarly, would it be possible for artists to ask associations — including academic, professional and other associations, trade unions and institutions etc. — that they are part of to issue motions and statements: 

1. Critiquing the 'one in, one out' deal and the 'deterrence' narrative that is being used to justify the deal and the resultant state violence;

2. Calling on Parliament, the UN and human rights groups to investigate the deal and the ways in which affected refugees are being treated, and 

3. Affirming the people's right to asylum, 'safety, dignity and a chance to live a peaceful life'?

The refugees — from conflict zones that include Sudan, Afghanistan and Iran — 'accuse the Home Office of subjecting them to arbitrary detention, denial of legal representation, inadequate medical care, degrading treatment and severe psychological harm.'

The people assert that they came to the UK 'in the pursuit of safety, dignity and a chance to live a peaceful life', and are 'calling on the UN and human rights groups to urgently investigate conditions that people detained for deportation under the 'one in, one out' scheme are held in.'

When the Ukraine-Russia War broke out, Britain gave visas, the right to work, home status for students, and access to mainstream benefits and other services to Ukrainian refugees, but not to African and Asian refugees fleeing equally devastating wars, conflict and persecution. 

While the state demonstrates a capacity for robust support when it chooses (e.g., with Ukrainian refugees), it is simultaneously expanding a system where human beings — predominantly from conflict zones in Africa and Asia — are treated as units that can be exchanged, swapped and traded between Britain and France. 

At the same time, the state is expanding the infrastructure for the warehousing and summary deportation of refugees. This infrastructure and the practices that take place within it undermines both what it means to be human and international law, and  — as shown by the Windrush Scandal and the violence that agents of the state in the United States are occasioning on migrants and those perceived to be migrants —  also has implications for racialised and minoritised people in the UK, irrespective of whether they are refugees, asylum seekers, migrants or citizens. 

Kind regards,

Ambrose Musiyiwa

Coordinator, Africa Migration Report Poetry Anthology Series

Ambrose Musiyiwa | Coordinator, Journeys in Translation (Journal Article; Video Playlist), and The Africa Migration Report Poetry Anthology Series (Concept Note; Call for Submissions; Funding Appeal; Video Playlist)

(Ed.) [New Book] Japa Fire: An Anthology of Poems on African and African Diasporic Migration (CivicLeicester, 2024. Co-edited with Munya R from the migrants' rights collective, Regularise); Welcome to Britain: An Anthology of Poems and Short Fiction (CivicLeicester, 2023); Black Lives Matter: Poems for a New World (CivicLeicester, 2020)ritique