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Immigration and asylum - in brief

01 November 1996

Switzerland denounced for detention of "foreigners": The Swiss Human Rights League has submitted a report to the UN Human Rights Commission denouncing the "administrative detention" of foreigners. The report criticises particularly the following conditions which are contravening the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR): a foreigner can be detained for up to 12 months without having committed a crime awaiting a decision on their deportation; the procedure applied to foreigners in "administrative detention" is inferior to those applied to people arrested under the penal code; the detention conditions often do not respect the rights of detainees as defined in the ICCPR. La Lettre de la FIDH, no 663-664, 31.10/7.11.96. Asylum down, deportations up: Home Office statistics for the first half of 1996 reveal that asylum claims for the second quarter (March-June) plummeted by half to 5,600 from 11,000 per quarter in 1995. At the same time, almost 18,000 people were served with deportation or removal notices, and 5,000 of them actually left the UK. Home Office Statistical Bulletin, 23/96, 24 October 1996. Somalis stranded: The CRE obtained an injunction against Sudan Airways after it unlawfully instructed staff to refuse to carry any Somali passengers, in case they carried forged documents, making the airline liable to pay fines. The injunction has no effect outside Britain, however, and so will only apply to those buying tickets in the UK for relatives. Migration News Sheet December 1996.