Refugee Rights News May 2009 “[The new permit is] a clear turning point in South Africa, which up until now has had a line that there is no problem in Zimbabwe.” – Gerry Simpson, a refugee researcher with HRW Over a million Zimbabweans currently residing in South Africa have finally been granted a respite from…
Five months after the outbreak of violence against foreigners in South Africa, civil society organisations are still working to ensure that there is an appropriate governmental response. Over the last months, civil society from across Africa has become engaged with an initiative by the Citizenship Rights in Africa Initiative to conduct an African civil society…
Refugee Rights News Volume 4, Issue 5 July 2008 As usual, media attention has quickly shifted away from the violence that took place across many parts of South Africa against foreigners in May, which left over 60 people dead and tens of thousands displaced. Yet, little has been done either to address the consequences of…
Refugee Rights News Volume 4, Issue 4 June 2008 Questions of legitimacy, over who has the “right” to live where, are growing around the world, and nowhere have antagonistic articulations of identity been more graphically illustrated than in the recent attacks on foreigners in South Africa. The sheer scale and brutality of the attacks, which…
Refugee Rights News Volume 4, Issue 3 May 2008 The question of justice and accountability has been a critical question in the ongoing peace talks between the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) and the Government of Uganda (GoU). On February 19, 2008, the LRA and the GoU made an important step forward in negotiating these issues…
Refugee Rights News Volume 2, Issue 3 September 2005 About May 19, 2005, the government of Zimbabwe’s began what it called “Operation Murambatsvina,” or “Operation Drive Out Trash.” In the process as many as 700,000 Zimbabweans were robbed of their homes and livelihoods, in a forceful internal displacement of tremendous scale and ferocity. The aim…
Refugee Rights News Volume 1, Issue 2 December 2004 In November 2004, the Solidarity Peace Trust based in Port Shepstone, South Africa released a 107-page report, “No War in Zimbabwe: An Account of the Exodus of a Nation’s People.” The report details the difficulties faced by Zimbabwean asylum seekers in South Africa. Although all asylum…