UK Government accused of 'appalling lack of leadership' amid global rejection of refugees

Toxic narratives of blame, fear and scapegoating, coupled with the ‘perilously weak’ global response to the refugee crisis, leads Amnesty to warn that ‘history will judge us’

Amnesty International's annual report condemns the 'little political will' by the UK and others to address a long list of crises across the globe, including war crimes committed in countries such as Syria (pictured) (Getty)

The UK has been accused of shirking its responsibilities and showing an “appalling lack of leadership” over the international refugee crisis as safe spaces for refugees dwindle across the globe, Amnesty International has warned.

The human rights organisation’s annual report states that toxic narratives of blame, fear and scapegoating by those in power, coupled with a “perilously weak” global response to mass atrocities and the movement on people, has sent out a message that refugees across the globe are not entitled to basic human rights.

The report, which delivers the most comprehensive analysis of the state of human rights around the world, raises concerns that the failure of the UK and other nations to act accordingly in response to the crisis has brought the idea of human dignity and equality under “vigorous and relentless assault”, prompting a warning from Amnesty that “history will judge us”.

Steve Symonds, refugee and migrant rights programme director at Amnesty International UK, told The Independent the UK Government was shirking its responsibility to protect people fleeing war from the hands of traffickers and other human rights abuses.

“We are in a spiralling problem whereby places of safety are getting smaller and smaller, and that comes as successive governments, including the UK, either start trying to close their borders or trying to force refugees out of their countries, including back to on-going and escalating conflicts,” he said.

“Governments have powers to either take responsibility or shirk those responsibilities, and I’m afraid our Government is increasingly shirking those responsibilities. The signal that the UK Government and governments in Europe are sending elsewhere is a dramatically bad one for refugee protection globally.

“As more and more governments turn their backs, the smugglers and traffickers turn out to be the only people seemingly offering hope to people fleeing conflict and persecution, so of course more and more people are driven to their hands."

Mr Symonds cited one of the most serious current examples of this being the situation in Afghanistan, where hundreds of thousands of Afghans have been forcibly returned to a country that is getting increasingly unstable and already has more than a million people internally displaced within it.

“Iran and Pakistan are sending back hundreds of thousands of Afghans who immediately become internally displaced,” Mr Symonds added.

“And then you have European countries, including the UK, which themselves have chosen to turn their backs on Afghan refugees, and themselves are seeking to increase their forced returns of Afghans to that unstable place.”

The report, titled The State of the World’s Human Rights, condemns the “little political will” to address a long list of crises across the globe, including war crimes committed in at least 23 countries last year.

It condemns the UK’s “continued to resist calls to take more responsibility for hosting refugees”, citing the few dozen separated children it accepted from France following the demolition of the Calais Jungle and the criticism from NGOs after a recent policy for further removing safeguards against harmful detention of immigrants within the country.

The report also outlines the marked rise in hate crime as a significant factor in the failure to respond to the plight of refugees, stating that “a hateful, divisive and dehumanising rhetoric” has developed in the West thanks to “anti-establishment” figures who blame so-called elites.

“Hateful, divisive and dehumanising rhetoric unleashed the darkest instincts of human nature. By casting collective responsibility for social and economic ills onto particular groups, often ethnic or religious minorities, those in power gave free rein to discrimination and hate crimes, particularly in Europe and the USA,” the report says.

“When self-styled ‘anti-establishment’ figures blamed so-called elites, international institutions and the ‘other’ for social or economic grievances, they chose the wrong prescription.

“The sense of insecurity and disenfranchisement – arising from factors such as unemployment, job insecurity, growing inequality and the loss of public services – demanded commitment, resources and policy shifts from government.”

Hate crimes in the UK surged by 14 per cent in the three months after the Brexit vote in June compared to the same period the previous year, and it is widely feared that with the triggering of Article 50 these numbers will rise further.

Kate Allen, director of Amnesty International, said: “When language around ‘taking our country back’ and ‘making America great again’ is coupled with proposals to treat EU migrants like bargaining chips or to ban refugees on the grounds of religion, it fosters deep hatred and mistrust and sends a strong message that some people are entitled to human rights and others aren’t.

“This toxic rhetoric being used by politicians around the world risks taking us into a dark age of human rights and could lead to profound consequences for all of us.

“We are witnessing the worst refugee crisis since the Second World War and wealthy nations like the UK and the US have shown an appalling lack of leadership and responsibility. History will judge us for this.”

Mr Symonds said the conviction that the UK is doing all it can to help refugees was “absurd”, and warned that if more wasn’t done to solve the refugee crisis now, it could escalate to a level that demanded much more in the future.

“If we carry on like this, it will only continue, and we’ll see more people trying to make the desperate journeys which killed at least 5,000 people in the Mediterranean last year," Mr Symonds added.

“The UK could and should be doing an awful lot more to allow family reunification of people who already here to be joined by refugees fleeing from the conflicts elsewhere.

“It is absurd to think this country could not do significantly more, and if we don’t do significantly more now, we’re only going to find that the escalation of these crises demand much more of us well into the future.”

Amid its condemnation of the global response to the refugee crisis, the report commended the actions of some people in taking actions to help refugees and affirm humanity and the fundamental dignity of others.

Mr Symonds said those in power must endeavour to recognise this. “Governments also need to recognise that while there are members of the public who have responded in appalling ways and are driven by horrible rhetoric, there are also large numbers of the public who have responded in clearly compassionate humanitarian ways to go out and provide support elsewhere,” he said.