In light of national, cross-border, transboundary and regional hazards of various type in Southern Africa, a desk review was undertaken by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in order to enhance the understanding of disaster risk and spaces of vulnerability (i.e. exposure to hazards) in terms of natural disaster and/or crisis situations in Southern Africa, and map the current disaster risk governance structure and preparedness capacity in the region. Six countries in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region – namely, Botswana, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe – were targeted. Based on existing hazards, vulnerability and resilience, the concept of spaces of vulnerability (i.e. areas with higher exposure to risk), the review identifies spaces of vulnerability in the region to include the following elements: 1. Location of national or transboundary hazards and hazard-prone areas, including but not limited to the Zambezi, Limpopo and Okavango river basins; the Indian Ocean coastline; the East African Rift Valley; dry lands; and areas experiencing particularly unpredictable weather patterns. 2. Areas with increased level of vulnerability, including but not limited to: a. Rural areas with high poverty levels; depending on rain-fed agriculture and subsistence farming; with inadequate housing and/or access to basic services such as water and sanitation; at distance to or absence to health-care facilities; b. Urban areas not properly planned and/or informal settlements; with high poverty levels, unemployment, income inequality and social exclusion; with inadequate housing and/or access to basic services such as water and sanitation and/or otherwise poor infrastructure; with high population density; with a diverse community living in discord with each other and/or facing social tension; c. Border areas with a high level of cross-border population movement, or border areas where communities face transboundary hazards; d. Specific vulnerabilities faced by population groups or individuals, including but not limited to migrants and particularly undocumented migrants and “people of concern”; people living with HIV/AIDS; people with special needs; people disadvantaged by or living in the margins of a community/society. 3. Areas with little or no disaster risk management capacity – including absence of comprehensive planning for prevention, preparedness, response, recovery and mitigation activities. As such, disaster risk reduction and resilience initiatives adapted to national, cross-border, transboundary and regional hazards; development challenges and vulnerabilities; and disaster risk management systems are required, mainstreaming relevant regional dynamics such as sustainable development, climate change, urbanization, and migration into disaster risk management frameworks and operational mechanisms.

The years 2015-2016 saw an unprecedented increase in the numbers of people travelling by sea and overland along the migration route to the European Union (EU), with almost one and a half million people irregularly entering EU countries.This situation required frontline responders in these regions to be able to quickly identify and refer potential victims of trafficking in human beings (THB) among refugees, asylum applicants and migrants in an irregular situation. It also required the adoption of tailored protection and rehabilitation programmes for identified victims of trafficking among these people. This is particularly important for the protection of specific vulnerable groups, such as separated and unaccompanied children. The TRAM research assessment aims to contribute to the establishment of a solid knowledge base on this crucially important issue. It examines the incidence of trafficking in human beings and risk factors for THB in the context of the Balkan route and in destination countries. It also looks at the gaps, needs and challenges that exist in the identification, referral, protection and rehabilitation of victims of trafficking. The study found indications that trafficking and exploitation are a major cause of concern for migrants and refugees travelling along the Western Balkans route, yet the number of identified victims remains extremely low. The lack of statistical data is to a certain extent the result of a vicious circle, whereby if there is no evidence of trafficking cases among a certain group, the necessary resources are not mobilised to address THB and proactively identify cases, which in turn prevents the gathering of accurate statistics. The low number of identifications is also due to the lack of harmonisation and incorporation of anti-trafficking procedures into the first reception and asylum systems for new arrivals, leading to a disconnect between the two processes. The research also highlighted that in the context of the Balkan route, trafficking is often related to the migrant smuggling process, with exploitation occurring due to people being in debt to smugglers, and due to smugglers requesting increasing amounts of money for their services. The complexity of differentiating between the two distinct phenomena of smuggling of migrants and trafficking in human beings, and of understanding the points of convergence, contributes to making identification and referral procedures more difficult. From a migration policy perspective, the study found that increasingly restrictive border control policies and the lack of legal alternatives for onward movement play into the hands of unscrupulous smugglers, who use this opportunity to also perpetrate trafficking and other forms of exploitation, taking advantage of the vulnerable situation of migrants and refugees.

This training material was developed in the framework of the project Fight against Trafficking in Human Beings - Phase 1 (THB/IFS/1), which was funded by the European Union under its Instrument for Stability with the aim to fight organised crime and trafficking in human beings (THB) in Azebaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Moldova and Turkey. The project was implemented in the period January 2013 to September 2014 by ICMPD (International Centre for Migration Policy Develpment) in partnership with FIIAPP (Fundación Internacional y para Iberoamérica de Administración y Políticas Públicas) and EF (Expertise France) and focused on the enhancement of national, regional and trans-regional law enforcement cooperation.

Around the world more than 50 million people, many of them women, are domestic workers. Of these, a significant number are migrants, including migrants who are in an irregular situation. The work they do is invaluable. Among a myriad other tasks, domestic workers clean, iron clothes, cook, garden, provide home health care, drive, and take care of children and older persons. This is necessary work, but work that often goes unnoticed, particularly when it is undertaken by irregular migrants who work unseen behind closed doors. In fact, labour legislation in several countries does not even recognize domestic work and often excludes domestic workers from access to rights and protections that are enjoyed by other categories of workers. Domestic workers often lack access to rights, to justice and to protection both as women and as migrants, creating an environment that often leads to serious human rights abuse. The situation of migrant domestic workers in an irregular situation is even more vulnerable. They are disproportionately subjected to human rights abuse, violations which often occur inside homes, where those responsible are able to operate with impunity and where victims are unseen and unprotected. The pattern of human rights abuses is similar all over the world. Migrant domestic workers in an irregular situation face exploitative working conditions and discrimination, they lack access to basic economic, social and cultural rights and are exposed to sexual andgender-based violence. If they live in their workplace, they can be forcibly confined, lack privacy, be deprived of food and sleep, and are often prohibited from contacting their families and friends. In some countries they are subject to invasive medical tests and can be fired if they become pregnant. Very often, domestic workers are not permitted to marry. Moreover, if they flee abuse, they may be detained for lacking documents and may be denied access to social or health services or legal remedies. At risk of xenophobia and violence in the community as well as in the workplace, many may be afraid to report their suffering to the police or other authorities for fear of deportation.

In 2019, the Regional Data Hub (RDH) for the East and Horn of Africa (EHoA) launched a multistage research project aimed at better understanding the experiences, decision-making, perceptions and expectations of young Ethiopians along the Eastern Route regarding their migration projects. The project aims to investigate the nexus between decision-making, migrant expectations and realities on the ground by interviewing migrants leaving the Horn towards the Arab Peninsula. Although a reasonable body of work examining migrants’ decision-making processes exists, most of this research was conducted outside of the EHoA region. A more nuanced understanding of the migrants’ decision to migrate will help inform strategy and programmatic planning for the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and other humanitarian and development actors in the region.

This year’s A Region on the Move report aims to provide an overview of the main population movement trends in the East and Horn of Africa region (EHoA) in 2019. Home to an estimated population of 322 million, of which 42 per cent are under the age of 15, the region hosted 6.5 million international migrants at mid-year 2019. With more than six million internally displaced persons (IDPs) and more than three million refugees and asylum-seekers recorded by the end of the year, countries in the region continue to experience significant levels of internal and crossborder mobility, including intra- and extra-regional movements. Migration in the region is still triggered by a combination of persistent insecurity and conflict, harsh climatic conditions, public heath emergencies alongside socio-economic drivers and more traditional seasonal and livelihood factors. In 2019, the region observed a growing trend in intercommunal clashes, particularly in Ethiopia, Somalia and South Sudan, in addition to abnormal climatic events such as a severe drought, devastating floods and a critical desert locust invasion, all of which affected the EHoA in its entirety. Meanwhile, multiple countries reinforced their preparedness efforts to counter the risk of cross-border transmissions of the Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) from the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo. Similar to previous years, most migration trends captured through flow monitoring were motivated by economic reasons in 2019. The region continues to be characterized by large movements towards the Arab Peninsula – along the Eastern Route – with 138,213 migrant crossings to Yemen from the Horn of Africa, notwithstanding the 120,825 returns of Ethiopian nationals led by the Government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 2019 alone. Comparatively, the number of arrivals of EHoA migrants registered across European arrival points in Greece, Italy and Spain fell from 4,624 in 2018 to 3,452 in 2019.

Migrants from the Horn of Africa continue to travel along the southern route towards South Africa and almost all of them use smugglers to get to their final destination. This RMMS briefing paper provides an update on the volume, trends and dynamics of mixed migration and migrant smuggling along this route. It offers new estimates on the volume of migration and the value of the illicit migrant smuggling economy from Ethiopia and Somalia to southern Africa and highlights many of the protection issues migrants and refugees face while being smuggled south. The research draws upon data from the RMMS Mixed Migration Monitoring Mechanism initiative (4Mi), through which field monitors conducted 398 interviews in South Africa, as well as additional interviews in southern Africa and secondary research.

The approach of states to managing immigration and asylum relies to a significant extent on the assignment of categories to people entering from abroad and residing in the country. Among these categories are regular migrant, labour migrant, irregular migrant, asylum seeker, refugee, unaccompanied child, smuggled migrant and trafficked person. Each of these categories has a specific definition in national law, and so every person migrating into a country fits into one of these categories – or at least that is how we understand migration and migration policies. There are indeed many reasons why this categorisation is necessary – each category has specific rights attached to it, and describes the situation that each person is in. Those of us working on migration policy also apply these categories in order to guide the scope of our work. However, in responding to mixed migration flows to Europe during the past few years, this has been a challenge. Some people are experts on human trafficking, while others are experts on asylum and refugees. Other people are experts on irregular migration or migrant smuggling, while still others are experts on children in a migration context. Yet to comprehend these migratory movements, it is necessary to understand legislation, policy and practice in all of these areas, because the adults and children who travelled along the Balkan and Mediterranean routes to European Union (EU) countries during the past three years did not fit neatly into just one of these categories. In fact most of them fell under a number of categories at once. What has been referred to as the “politics of labelling” in the area of mixed migration – the politically loaded use of certain terms to elicit particular responses to groups of people – is usually discussed in relation to the choice as to whether to use the term “migrant” or “refugee” (Whitham, 2017). This highlights the sometimes artificial distinctions embedded within the language of migration and the use of “language, definitions and categorisations” to determine the rights and treatment afforded to different people (Dolan, 2017). Acknowledging that multiple categories can be applied to individual people in this context is problematic, because states and service providers, as well as researchers and policy advisors, depend on the application of these categories in order to make sense of their work. This paper examines the challenges, and some possible ways forward, in dealing with the nexus between asylum, migration management and combatting human trafficking in mixed migration contexts in general.

A practical guideline for frontline workers

Smuggling and Trafficking in Central and Eastern Europe. The yearbook gives an overview of developments in the area of irregular migration, human smuggling and trafficking in the wider Central and Eastern European region in 2010. The information provided in the yearbook was collected through a questionnaire distributed to border agencies, ministries of the interior and other national authorities dealing with issues related to irregular migration. The data is directly obtained from states’ authorities and therefore provides authentic information as reported by the contact points. The country chapters summarise the developments in each of the countries or territories. After many years of decreasing numbers of apprehensions, the overall numbers of migration-related border apprehensions increased slightly in the region in 2010. While Greece and Turkey remained the countries reporting by far the most apprehensions, considerable numbers of apprehensions were also found in Albania as well as in Hungary. Citizens from Ukraine and the Russian Federation were often among the top citizenship groups apprehended for illegal entry or stay in the region. The number of human smugglers apprehended decreased, while the number of smuggled persons increased in the region. Also, the number of victims of trafficking increased in the region. The special topic of this year’s edition is detention of asylum seekers and migrants prior to deportation. The data provided in this yearbook provides a unique overview of practices and statistics on the detention of migrants in terms of the use of detention centres, numbers of persons in detention and maximum duration allowed for detaining migrants. The yearbook aims to support fact-based discussions on irregular migration and contribute to well-informed policy decisions.