YouSaid · the spoken record

Sutherland

lines on the record: 12
first: 2015-05-11
most recent: 2015-05-11
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: un-security-council

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“The United Nations - the Secretary-General in particular and the Deputy Secretary-General are constantly emphasizing this publicly and personally to me - stands ready to help foster, inform and guide such a dialogue, and it should do so as it represents in particular the interests of the most vulnerable participants in this tragedy. We recognize that, by expanding the legal challenges to migrate, the real demands on our labour markets will increase. We have to be prepared to debate this in a constructive, rather than in a negative, way. The United Nations system, IOM. and civil society organizations are contributing in many ways to mitigating the crisis, and stand ready to do much more.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“My colleagues and I applaud such smart, progressive measures, and expect that the EU will adopt them with due speed and at a scale that they deserve. Even if we achieve all of this, however, we will not have addressed the larger problems we face. We speak of root causes, but what we really need are root solutions. It is easy enough to turn away from troubles that seem intractable - conflicts that go on for years on end, authoritarian Governments that abuse their citizens, demographic challenges that seem to grow exponentially - but every problem, broken down, can at least be ameliorated. At the most basic level, we need to engage in a systemic, intense dialogue among countries of origin, transit and destination. We must sit together and persist until we find a comprehensive answer.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“About half of the refugees, children, are currently not being educated at all. It is also important to highlight the responsibility of those countries where inequality, dysfunctional governance and poverty drive people to migrate. They need to be accountable to their own citizens. They need to create conditions where everyone can benefit from economic and social advancement. In order to maintain the integrity of the international protection system, it is essential that any comprehensive plan include return agreements for people who are not in need of international protection. I understand that this week the European Commission will approve a European agenda on migration. From what I have been told, it will promote many of these ideas pertaining to safer access to more channels of legal migration.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“We need larger resettlement quotas. Only half of the 28 EU member States are resettlement countries. We need to provide other options to asylum seekers: humanitarian visas, temporary protective status and short-term visas. For the doctors, professors and engineers among them - as well as for the nurses, construction workers and others with skills our countries need - we could offer labour visas, seasonal visas and circular migration visas. Family reunification is another very important right to be actively facilitated. We have barely deployed those life-saving tools. We have to establish safe ways for asylum seekers to pursue those legal avenues. Meanwhile, we need to offer far more aid to countries close to conflict zones in order to ensure the safety of refugees and migrants, educate their children and offer real hope for the future.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“Even ifthere is success in thwarting the smugglers, we will have created a new and equally pernicious problem: we will have trapped asylum seekers, unless we are careful, in some countries without access to protection, education, health care, or livelihoods. As we ramp up anti-smuggling and counter-trafficking efforts, we have to increase our capacity to provide protection for those in need. The entire international community must accept a fair share of the refugee burden. Small countries like Lebanon and Jordan are hosting together over 1.8 million people. Last year, the EU gave international protection to about 300,000 people. What should we do? Refugee resettlement and other forms of humanitarian admission are the safest, most organized means we have ofproviding protection. They are underused tools. We need more resettlement countries.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“No single actor nor any single tactic can ensure that they are arrested, prosecuted, and imprisoned. The stakes for them are high; moving people illegally across borders is today more lucrative than the sale of illicit arms or drugs, and it will take a coordinated, comprehensive effort built on mutual trust and compliance with the rule of law to counter that threat. Some draw facile comparisons to the successful anti-piracy operations off the Horn of Africa, but the calculus in the Mediterranean is far more complex, with innocent refugees - including many children - in the line of fire between smugglers and any potential military operations. All enforcement measures therefore have to adhere to international human rights, humanitarian, maritime and refugee law, and the law of nations.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“It has just six vessels in contrast to the 32 of Mare Nostrum, the Italian Government and Navy programme. The Italian and Hellenic navies and coast guards, now joined by vessels from elsewhere, continue to stem the loss of life. As a result, fewer refugees and migrants have died in recent days. In parallel, Europe and Africa have to develop a common strategy to deal with smugglers and traffickers, which, of course, will not be easy. That demands better governance and coordinated law enforcement, and there are longer-term issues at stake, quite obviously, such as development. But others, particularly in Africa and the Middle East as well as the EU, have to take their responsibilities seriously in that respect. Organized criminal gangs are active from the greater Middle East, sub-Saharan Africa, through North Africa, and into Europe.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“It was left primarily to the Italian navy, which exerted considerable effort and activity, to save lives, as well as to ill-equipped merchant vessels and non-governmental organizations such as Migrant Offshore Aid Station. Since then, the situation has improved. I know from a visit to the European Commission last week, and from the President of the Commission, that an additional paper is about to be adopted. Should it be adopted, would, in my view, improve matters further and make a significant advance in the European Union's position. The EU has pledged to triple its resources in the Mediterranean. It must commit to search-and-rescue as its first priority with Operation Triton. But this is still limited to operating within 35 kilometres of Italy's shore.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“Most of those crossing the Meditteranean pay smugglers $5,000, $10,000 and perhaps, in some cases, even $15,000 for their passage. That represents more than the life's savings of any one individual from many of the countries of origin. About half of those who reach Europe, on the current evidence, qualify for international protection as refugees. An effective strategy to address the crisis, including in the context of a Security Council draft resolution, therefore begins with the immediate need to save lives. If we do not frame our response in that way, it would represent a moral failure that would undermine international law and security. Until 900 people died on a single weekend in April, the international community was largely absent from the Mediterranean.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“That demands intensive dialogue among all of us - the United Nations, regional organizations and Governments, especially in source, transit and destination countries. As the High Representative of the European Union (EU) has emphasized, the situation in the Mediterranean represents, first and foremost, a crisis for the hundreds of thousands of refugees and migrants who have been placed in harm's way. In the first 130 days of 2015, at least 1,800 people have drowned in the Mediterranean. That total represents a 20-fold increase over the same period last year. Should that pace continue, between 10,000 and 20,000 migrants could perish by this autumn. That is why it is a compelling, collective responsibility to act immediately.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“Those are, of course, first: saving lives and safeguarding the human rights of refugees and, more generally, of migrants; secondly, law enforcement actions that are effective against traffickers and smugglers; thirdly, radically increased safe avenues of refugee resettlement, family reunion and labour migration; then, greater solidarity with countries closer to conflicts, and an intensified effort to end conflicts and stem the development failures that have displaced more people today than at any point in history. In addressing each of those challenges, the United Nations has a crucial role to play: the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees as concerns refugees and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) as concerns economic migrants.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source
“Mr. Sutherland: I thank you, Madam President, for the invitation to brief the Security Council. A month ago, Deputy Secretary-General Eliasson mobilized an informal group - including High Commissioner Antonio Guterres, High Commissioner Zeid, Director General of the International Organization for Migration Bill Swing and myself - to deal with the issue of the Mediterranean crisis. We have been meeting regularly since, and have issued a number of joint statements that reflect the position of the United Nations on what has been happening. In these brief remarks, I will set out the priorities, as we see them, for the collective response to the crisis.”
2015-05-11 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7439 (2015) · source