Reports Reveal Filing Deadline Has Denied Asylum to Thousands of Refugees and Wastes Government Resources
A new Human Rights First report examines how a technical asylum filing deadline in U.S. law has barred thousands of refugees with well-founded fears of persecution from receiving asylum in the United States. The report details real case examples of the deadline’s harmful effects and demonstrates that it has caused increased costs and significant inefficiencies in the asylum system.
A second report, written jointly by Human Rights First, Heartland Alliance’s National Immigration Justice Center’s National Asylum Partnership on Sexual Minorities, and Penn State Law’s Center for Immigrants’ Rights, is the first to examine how the asylum deadline is handled by the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), the highest level of administrative appeal available to asylum seekers. The study analyzed 3,472 BIA asylum cases decided from 2005 to 2008 and found that one out of five asylum cases was denied because it was filed after the deadline.
Read the report: The Asylum Filing Deadline: Denying Protection to the Persecuted and Undermining Governmental Efficiency.
Read the report: The One-Year Asylum Deadline and the BIA: No Protection, No Process.
Read the NYTimes article, “Reports Say Deadline Hinders Refugees.”
Read more about the one-year asylum filing deadline.
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Human Rights First Welcomes Attention on LGBTI refugees and Urges Further Reforms to Ensure Protection
On September 30th, representatives from governments, civil society and academia met in Geneva for a Roundtable discussion on how to better protect lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) refugees.
At the Roundtable, Human Rights First’s Jesse Bernstein presented a new paper, Persistent Needs and Gaps: the Protection of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex (LGBTI) Refugees, and urged the UN refugee agency – UNHCR – to continue to undertake concrete steps to ensure LGBTI refugees and asylum seekers are protected on the basis of equality and dignity.
The paper explains the plight of LGBTI refugees who are forced to flee their homes on account of their sexual orientation or gender identity and the particular challenges they face in accessing protection and assistance. Following the Roundtable, Human Rights First welcomed statements issued by UNHCR and the U.S. Department of State on the need to improve protection for LGBTI refugees. These statements are consistent with a number of Human Rights First’s recommendations.
Read the paper: Persistent Needs and Gaps: the Protection of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex (LGBTI) Refugees.
Read Human Rights First’s press statement.
Read Human Rights First’s Blog Post following the Roundtable.
Read UNHCR’s Statement following the Roundtable.
Read the Department of State’s Statement following the Roundtable.
Detention Reforms Anniversary Passes as Human Rights First Urges ICE to Fulfill Its Promises
October 6th marked the one-year anniversary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) announcement of its plans for a wide-reaching overhaul of the long-mismanaged immigration detention system.
Detention Reforms Anniversary Passes as Human Rights First Urges ICE to Fulfill Its Promises
October 6th marked the one-year anniversary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) announcement of its plans for a wide-reaching overhaul of the long-mismanaged immigration detention system.
While DHS has taken some important steps to improve the current detention system, it has yet to make significant progress toward the underlying goal of detention reform – a true shift from a penal to a civil approach to immigration detention. DHS’s announcement in 2009 came on the heels of two government reports that had concluded that the U.S. immigration detention system was inappropriately modeled on the correctional system.
Read Human Rights First’s press statement.
Read Human Rights First’s new backgrounder on civil detention.
Tell the DHS to improve the treatment of asylum seekers immediately.
Panel Discussion: LGBTI Rights Challenges in Africa
On October 19th, Human Rights First joined the Open Society Foundation, the Council for Global Equality, and Human Rights Campaign in hosting a reception and panel discussion on the human rights of LGBTI individuals in Africa.
Human Rights First’s Jesse Bernstein spoke about particular challenges faced by LGBTI refugees. Julius Kaggwa, the Director of Support Initiative for People with Atypical Sex Development and the recipient of Human Rights First’s 2010 Human Rights Award, spoke about efforts to defeat the proposed Anti-Homosexual Bill in Uganda and his advocacy for the human rights of LGBTI people in Uganda and elsewhere in Africa.
Other panelists included Michael Posner, Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Rights, and Labor; and Cheikh Traore, Senior Advisor of Sexual Minorities, UN Development Programme. The panel was moderated by Michael Heflin, Director of LGBTI Rights Initiative at The Open Society Foundations and Elisa Massimino, President and CEO of Human Rights First, provided closing remarks.
Watch a video about Julius Kaagwa’s work fighting for LGBTI equality.
Read about the Human Rights First 2010 Human Rights Award recipients.
Read more about violence against LGBTI persons.
The Marvin Frankel Annual Award
Each year, Human Rights First honors the memory of Judge Marvin E. Frankel, a founding father of Human Rights First and former Chairman of our Board of Directors, with an award in his name.
On October 21st, Human Rights First announced this year’s recipients: Sullivan and Cromwell LLP in New York and Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, LLP in Washington D.C.
Attorneys at both firms have donated thousands of hours to provide top quality pro bono legal representation to asylum seekers through the Asylum Legal Representation Program at Human Rights First for many years. They have taken on particularly challenging cases, including detained cases and those with urgent deadlines. Human Rights First is grateful for the generosity of all the law firms and attorneys who make our work representing asylum seekers so successful.
Read more about Human Rights First’s Asylum Legal Representation Program.
Read more about the Frankel Award.