The 1% We Don’t Talk About

“Remember, remember always, that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionists.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt

“A simple way to take measure of a country is to look at how many want in. And how many want out.” – Tony Blair

Mad Mankind, Fury Road: War makes refugees. For the first time in modern history, people fleeing conflicts now make up 1% of the global population. A report published by the Institute of Economics & Peace says the world is less peaceful today than at any time in the last 10 years, with terrorism and internal conflict the two biggest contributors pushing down the 2018 Global Peace Index. Data from the UN High Commission on Refugees shows that by the end of 2016, there were 65.5 million refugees, or internally displaced people, the majority coming from Syria and South Sudan.

Under the international 1951 refugee convention, immigrants have the right to cross borders to seek asylum. But the convention doesn’t require its signatories to give anybody asylum, only to hear their case and not send them back into danger. The definition of “refugee” status is really political and sets up a constant struggle over who deserves to enter and who does not. The refugee crisis dominating the news in 2015 and 2016 accrued primarily from the sharp rise in the numbers of people coming to Europe to claim asylum. Misconceptions about who the migrants are, why they come and what it means for Europe continue to fuel overreaction and panic, fears easily exploitable by governments favoring protectionism over the idea of universal human rights.

Research performed by sociologist Hein de Haas indicates that as a proportion of the world population, the total number of international migrants of any kind has stayed relatively steady at roughly 3% since 1960. It’s the origin and direction of migration that has changed. Haas found more people are leaving a much wider range of countries and heading to a much narrower range of destinations than ever before, primarily wealthier countries. And those wealthier, powerful countries are utilizing increasingly severe efforts to keep out the uninvited.

– Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross announced Thursday a deal had been reachedwith Chinese telecommunications company ZTE wherein the company would pay a $1 billion fine for violating US export controls. Senators in both parties immediately criticized the deal, with one saying: “The Trump administration is giving ZTE and China the green light to spy on Americans and sell our technology to North Korea and Iran, as long as it pays a fine that amounts to a tiny fraction of its revenue.” (NPR)

– Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation, is also one of the world’s biggest marine polluters. Now the government has announced it will join up with the country’s two biggest Islamic organizations to encourage consumers to reduce plastic waste and reuse their plastic bags. Together the two Islamic institutions have more than 100 million followers. Religious leaders will visit prayer groups across the country to preach about the importance of reducing plastic waste. (The Guardian)

– A homeless man in his seventies died while sitting at a table in a 24-hour coffee shop in downtown Vancouver, Canada. The elderly man was living on a fixed income and battling cancer. He had made the coffee shop his de facto home for the last 10 years, sleeping and eating at a table near the washroom. Homelessness advocates say the man’s death is a tragic indictment of Vancouver’s housing crisis. (The Guardian) – It’s the case(s) of the Mysteriously Odd Sounds. The US has removed several more employees from Guangzhou, China after they reported experiencing abnormal sensations and pressure, and hearing weird noises. Last year, 24 US staff working at the Cuba embassy suffered brain injuries after reporting “auditory sensations”. Concerns have been raised that a government or agency may be targeting the US with a new type of sonic weapon. (BBC)

Americans Divide Immigrants and are Divided on Immigration: For years members of the US Congress have talked about wanting to pass comprehensive immigration legislation, but the will to come up with a compromise bipartisan bill has been completely absent. Moderate Democrats thought they were getting close to agreement on legislation to protect the Dreamers, young people who have grown up in the US after having been brought illegally as children by their parents. At the opposite end of the spectrum are conservative Republicans loathe to loosen the rules for Dreamers, which their constituents consider “amnesty.” Thursday Speaker Paul Ryan said in the coming weeks House Republicans would draft legislation on immigration for a floor vote, which is certain to set up a showdown on one of the thorniest political issues possible just as campaigns for the midterm elections ramp up.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration is accomplishing by bureaucracy what it couldn’t do by executive order. It has managed to almost completely halt the flow of refugees into the US by way of diminished staff and red tape. Employees who conduct interviews overseas have been significantly reduced, the screening process for refugees has been intensified, and the number of “high-risk” individuals who need to be screened has doubled. Just 20,000 people are projected to gain entry into the US by year’s end, the lowest number since the passage of the Refugee Act of 1980 which created the resettlement program.

President Trump has put another border enforcement policy in place that is breaking up hundreds of migrant families and channeling children into shelters and foster homes across the country. Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced last month that the government would criminally prosecute everyone who crosses the border illegally. In the first two weeks of Trump’s family separation policy, 638 parents who arrived with 658 children had been prosecuted. KIND, an organization that provides minors with legal counsel, says it knows of at least six children left behind after their parents were deported, including a 2-year-old girl.

A Nervous Society With Lethal Weapons: A new study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, just published in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, showed that suicide rates have been going up in almost every state in the US over the past 20 years. Half of the states have seen suicide rates increase more than 30 percent. The study looked at the period from 1999 to 2016. 54% of the people who killed themselves didn’t have a previously known mental health issue; almost half the deaths were from gunshots. (NPR)

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