Sociologist Karen Akoka notably studies how asylum and hospitality policies have evolved in history, depending on the nationality of applicants and political considerations. Lecturer in political science at Paris-Nanterre University, she wrote Asylum and exile (La Découverte, 2020) and co-authored When Boat People Were Resettled, 1975-1983, (Palgrave, 2021, untranslated).
The reception of Afghan refugees divides in France and more widely in Europe. What do you think of these debates?
We are witnessing a moment of astonishment when Western states are multiplying the rhetoric of empathy without being able to envisage real solutions and where the feeling of helplessness dominates. To go beyond this moment, it is interesting to make a historical return to the way in which we received people seeking asylum, and to deconstruct the official speeches.
There is a certain hypocrisy to say today that we would like to welcome threatened people but that the situation prevents it, when we have done everything to block the path of Afghans fleeing for several years the persecution of the Taliban. .
European states are inconspicuously multiplying the obstacles to the arrival of these Aghans: by locking their borders, by outsourcing migration control and asylum in third countries, such as Turkey. Those who manage to enter are finally blocked by the Dublin regulation which requires them to apply for asylum in the country of arrival. This regulation is a way for states like France, the United Kingdom and Germany to place the responsibility for asylum on Greece and Bulgaria, entry points for Afghans in Europe.
In France, however, the government affirms that a large majority of Afghan asylum requests are accepted.
The proportion of Afghans whose application is successful is around 60% at the level of the state institution, the French Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons (Ofpra), and 80% after passing before the National Court of Human Rights. asylum (CNDA), the court of appeal. But three quarters of these people (87%, according to an Ofpra activity report) then only obtain subsidiary protection, which is more precarious. And these figures will decrease further because the CNDA questioned in November 2020 the case law on which it relied to protect the Afghans.
In addition, in recent years, a growing number of Afghans have been deported to other European countries, even those who then return to Afghanistan, due to the 2016 Cazeneuve circular which urges prefects to apply the regulation more firmly. Dublin. But the most important thing to understand is that the percentage of acceptance applies to the minority who have made it through the cracks. Almost half of the Afghans in France cannot actually apply for asylum because of the Dublin regulation.
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