Clearing the Jungle, the Calais Refugee Operation

Written on October 29th, 2016 in politics Comments Off

Published on Dissident Voice, by Binoy Kampmark, Oct 26, 2016.

… It grew out as an organic consequence of failure – a failure on the part of Europe’s authorities to come to some measure of proportionate and even handed procedures to assess and process desperate refugees who have very little intention of returning back to their countries.  

Calais’ informal camp, which came to be known as the Jungle, had 7,000 residents from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, among other countries, living in squalid conditions, an assemblage perched tantalisingly close to the English coast. Since Monday, more than 4,000 individuals have been moved. The operation has involved the tearing down of wooden shacks and the deployment of diggers to remove debris.

Aware of the political message it might convey, French authorities have insisted on a dismantling process to be done essentially by hand. This has merely cloaked the cynicism further, as it would make little difference to some of the residents determined to make a fist of keeping the “Jungle” tradition alive in some form. The promise of sub-camps sprouting in the environs of the Channel coast is already being made … //

… British Home Secretary Amber Rudd inched a bit closer to some rapprochement with a promise that half of the camp’s unaccompanied children would be taken to British shores, though it’s a meagre concession. The move is being facilitated by what has been termed the “Dubs” amendment to the Immigration Act, permitting vulnerable children of a certain category to be admitted, despite not having family residing in the country.

The principle behind this entire operation remains one and the same. Far from having a human element, it bristles with a security rationale. It was, in fact, left to an umbrella of non-government organisations to fill the human void, among them Secours Catholique, Kitchen In Calais and Care 4 Calais, to name but a sprinkling.

There will be those from the inhuman Jungle who will find settlement; few will find their way to Britain. Others intend resisting the thousand or so riot police slated for the operation. But the failings in Calais will simply be propagated further, a story not merely of French but European mismanagement. Bureaucracy, and security, remain twinned policy rationales in the global refugee crisis.

… (full text).

Links:

Nomi Prins: Hillary Clinton Will Continue the Big Bank Protection Racket, on naked capitalism, by Yves Smith, Oct 28, 2016;

Seven World-historical Achievements of the Iraq Invasion of 2003, on Dissident Voice, by Gary Leupp, October 27, 2016;

The Illusion of Meritocracy, Thomas Piketty in Australia, on Dissident Voice, by Binoy Kampmark, October 27, 2016;

SR#1294 – Michael Moore Visits WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange, Under Siege, Seeking Asylum, 3.00 min, uploaded by Bill Still, Oct 26, 2016;

A Candidate Unhinged, Trump Targets the Essence of America, on Spiegel Online International, an Essay by Charles Hawley, Oct 19, 2016: to be American means to believe in the Constitution: This narrative, despite its obvious flaws, has kept the country together over the centuries. Now, though, Donald Trump is presenting an altogether different identity for the United States. And the consequences are potentially horrific;

Gregor Gysi steht Oliver Welke Rede und Antwort, 10.38 min, von Bananenrepublik1 am 02. Okt 2015 in der Heute Show;

… and this:

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