Photo by syriana2011/Flickr (Creative Commons)
Protesters in Damascus, Syria, April 2011
A video series on Multi-American this week is featuring the stories of Southern California immigrants from Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen and Syria, all of them coping in their own way with the political upheaval taking place in their native countries.
But what about their loved ones and others back home, those directly affected by violence and instability, especially in conflict zones like Libya? Will more of them be coming to the United States as refugees?
Officials from both the U.S. State Department and the United Nations agency that handles refugees have said that they have not seen a notable increase in nationals of those countries affected by what has become known as the “Arab Spring” seeking to come to the U.S. as refugees. However, the agencies are seeing resettlement demand among people who were already refugees, particularly in Libya, who are being displaced once more by the conflict there.
A report from the Migration Policy Institute this week described how the unrest in the Middle East is and isn’t affecting migration at this point:
What immediate impact the revolts have had on emigration from migrant-sending states is unclear but, at the time of writing, a scenario of mass migration in response to political unrest seems unlikely.
So far, only Tunisia has experienced a surge of emigration, with some 25,000 irregular migrants having landed on the southern Italian island of Lampedusa in the first three months of 2011. In Egypt, Syria, and Yemen, no similar movement has occurred, and the topic of emigration has simply disappeared from the mainstream media.
What makes Tunisia special is the proximity of Europe (giving would-be migrants the impression — the wrong impression, as it happens — that the Italian shore is within reach); a common border with Libya from where waves of migrants are currently fleeing the war; and a dramatic wish to emigrate that predated the revolt.
What refugee agencies have noticed In predominantly migrant-receiving states, it is not the outcomes of the revolts that will most impact migration, but instead the immediate reality of the protests themselves and their repression by states.
When the revolt first broke out in Libya in mid-February 2011, the country was host to 1 million or more migrants mainly from Egypt, Tunisia, and sub-Saharan Africa. As of May 5, a recorded 720,609 migrants have fled insecurity in the country as a result of the revolt, the vast majority crossing Libya’s land borders with Tunisia and Egypt.
The scenario of the First Gulf War between 1990 and 1991, during which time 3 million migrant workers and their families were suddenly driven into exile, is being repeated in Libya.
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