United Nations Migrant Workers Convention

Using detention to talk about the elephant in the room: the Global Compact for Migration and the significance of its neglect of the UN Migrant Workers Convention

“…Much as the GCM was prompted by the migration crisis in the Euro-Mediterranean region (Sookrajowa and Pécoud, 2019, p. 13), the process leading to the drafting of the ICRMW was partly triggered by an incident in the Franco-Italian Mont Blanc tunnel in 1972 when twenty-eight irregular migrants from Mali were found dead in a lorry (Battistella, 2009, p. 51). At the time, it became clear that restrictive immigration policies trigger irregular movements, trafficking and labour exploitation, and the UNGA expressed alarm at the discriminatory treatment of foreign workers, especially in Europe (Cholewinski, 1997, p. 138).…”

“…We argue that the organised shortage of information on the ICRMW, as discussed in Section 2.2, has contributed to the ‘collective amnesia’ that obfuscates the fact that the ICRMW is the outcome of the first-ever multilateral negotiation on migration. Few people are familiar with the convention (Pécoud, 2017, p. 30; Sookrajowa and Pécoud, 2019, p. 9). Scholars have also pointed out that the very organisation that created it – the UN – failed to substantively support it when launching the GCM process (Sookrajowa and Pécoud, 2019, p. 13).…”

“…Few people are familiar with the convention (Pécoud, 2017, p. 30; Sookrajowa and Pécoud, 2019, p. 9). Scholars have also pointed out that the very organisation that created it – the UN – failed to substantively support it when launching the GCM process (Sookrajowa and Pécoud, 2019, p. 13). IOM was equally aware of the existence of the ICRMW: fifty of its (then) 166 Member States were bound by the convention at the adoption of the NY Declaration (Guild et al , 2017, p. 6).…”