The Insecurities Posed in Hosting Refugees

According to Rivera (32), most regions around the world have insecurity, which is exacerbated by violent extremist groups. Criminal activity has become a typical occurrence in people’s daily lives in recent years. Typically, such extremism has deeper roots, which can include inequitable resource distribution, bad governance, and a weak rule of law. As a result, inhabitants of such countries flee to neighboring countries as refugees or asylum seekers. Despite being a humanitarian protection channel, hosting migrants causes significant anxiety among Americans. Globally, there are around 21.7 million refugees and 36.4 million internally displaced people. The displacement of people is prevalent in the sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East (Patrick 17). Resultantly, the paper found out that refugees especially from war zones like Syria have crossed the Mediterranean Sea to Europe. The inflow of refugees has been cited as one of the reasons for the steady spread of terrorism across the globe. Hence, host countries like the USA have found it necessitous to adopt stringent cautionary measures.

Refugees as Terrorists

Morton (23) indicates that nearly half a million refugees have sought asylum in Europe and in the United States. The former president Obama’s administration announced a framework to ‘surge’ the refugees from Syria into the United States. It raised the total number of refugees from 70,000 to 85,000 and even confirmed a possible increase of such admissions to 110,000 by 2017. Although Obama’s administration perceived this as a bold move, it received a lot of critiques from the republicans. Despite the current global humanitarian burden, majority of Americans especially from the Republican’s faction, saw it as an overshoot; it would expose them to terrorism. It is for this reason that Donald Trump upon ascending to presidency, pledged to suspend the admission of refugees from Syria. Besides, with as many as 25,000 persons being granted asylum in America for the past five years, quite a good number of Americans believe that cases of insecurity may rise. This is because some ‘terrorists’ who enter the USA as refugees end up radicalizing indigenous Americans or fellow refugees. No wonder, it is still unclear whether the FY 2017 pledge on resettlement will be met (Morton 23).

Refugees from Syria Settled in the USA from 2012-2017

NOTE: The 2017 data are for the first quarter

On the same note, Rivera (32) adds that the move was also greatly rebuked by Majority Staff of the House Homeland Security Committee. They had a firm stance that the move would only perpetrate terrorists’ acts than alleviate. According to them, such an admission of refugees would spread security gaps in Europe and consequently offer long term security implications to the USA.Besides, there have been mounting warnings that ISIS has been focusing in deploying its agents most precisely in Europe as refugees and people seeking asylum (Johnson 47). Syria being a war zone, has always been a factory of Jihadists whose main objective is to hit the western countries. Ironically, majority of its citizens flee their war torn country to the Western nations. For instance, between November 2015 and December 2016, Canada took close to 40,000. On the other hand, 41,000 displaced Syrians have been admitted in Germany since 2013. Nevertheless, Papademetrious, Demetrios and Elizabeth (40) note that the most dilemmatic part is how to distinguish between genuine refugees and fakes. They point out an occurrence in Germany in October 2015 whereby 10 ISIS insurgents reportedly entered the country as refugees. Moreover, the U.S. top counterterrorism officials have been issuing warnings about the insufficient intelligence on the grounds in Syria. They have therefore proposed an exquisite screening of people flying to the USA particularly from the conflict zones.

The Top Metropolitan Areas That Receive Refugees from Syria

Metropolitan Area

Number

Share of Total (%)

Total

18,007

100

Troy

594

3

Glendale

489

3

Atlanta

404

2

Dallas

437

2

Clinton Township

428

2

Houston

447

2

Sacramento

380

2

Dearborn

357

2

San Diego

1,040

6

Chicago

765

4

NOTE: The 2017 data are for the first Quarter.

Recommendations

International refugee ordinance categorically points out that those who seek asylum must abide by the laws of the host countries (Mittelstadt et al 37). They have no immunity to the crimes that they commit within the boundaries of the country. Thus, whenever their security status does not match the required measures, they can be deported on grounds of being security threat. Even so, it is vital to determine asylum mechanisms which give room for honest and effective methods of resolving whether the quest for refuge is rightful. These measures give room for precise and cautious usage of the exclusion clauses. Besides, when a nation takes the responsibility of hosting refugees, checks and inquiries can be carried out carefully. This is to ensure that exclusion is done to those who involve in the criminal activities at the determination stage or have their refugee status revoked at a later stage.

Heath (94) maintains that good practice may as well include the cooperating with the authorities of the country from which the person seeking asylum comes. Both fall within the scope of critical roles to play in trying to unearth the history of such people. On the same note, it is indispensable that guards at the borders together with the security, and intelligence officers get proper training on data protection. This kind of cooperation is only achievable if members of various security departments pursue a common objective. That is having a concise knowledge of the acute circumstance of asylum-seekers and refugees. If anything, one of the main qualities of human beings is the fact that the ‘strong’ are responsible for protecting the ‘weak’. Provision of humanitarian protection is basically essential; however, all the necessary framework should be put in place to ensure the safety of the hosts.

References

Heath-Kelly, Charlotte. “Counter-Terrorism and the Counterfactual: Producing the ‘Radicalisation’ Discourse and the UK PREVENT Strategy.” British Journal of Politics and International Relations 15, no. 3 (2012): pp. 94–95. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-856x.2011.00489.x.

Johnson, Constance. ”Immigration and Nationality: Sri Lanka in Place to Revise Immigration Law.” Global Legal Monitor, September 11, 2012, pp.47.http://www.loc.gov/law/foreign-news/article/sri-lanka-plan-in-place-to-reviseimmigration-law/.

Mittelstadt, Michelle, Bruke Speaker, Doris Meissner, and MuzafferChishti. Through the Prism of National Security: Major Immigration Policy and Program Changes in the Decade since 9/11. Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute, 2011. Accessed May 15, 2016, pp. 37-38.http://www.migrationpolicy.org/multimedia/throughprism-national-security-major-immigration-policy-and-program-changes-decade

Morton, John Fass. Next Generation Homeland Security: Network Federalism and the Course to National Preparedness. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2012, pp.23

Papademetriou, Demetrios G., and Elizabeth Collett. A New Architecture and for Border Management Transatlantic Council on Migration. Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute, March 2011, pp. 40.http://www.migrationpolicy.org/research/TCMnew-architecture-border-management

Patrick, Stewart M. ”A Global War on Terror: Multilateral Achievements since 9/11.” The Internationalist, August 19, 2011, pp.17.http://blogs.cfr.org/patrick/2011/08/19/aglobal-war-on-terror-multilateral-achievements-since-911/.

Rivera, Javier A. ”Crime and Society.” A Comparative Criminology Tour of the World. Accessed July 29, 2016, pp. 32.http://wwwrohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/rwinslow/namerica/bahamas.html.