DESPITE the efforts that Cyprus is making to stand by its international obligations on refugees, it is still a country dealing with xenophobia and prejudice against an increasing tide of immigrants, according to one human rights observer.
A UN report on refugees in Cyprus highlighted a number of problems faced by immigrants, including lack of refugee travel documents and ID cards, high rents for accommodation, discrimination in employment, and the need to have adequate knowledge of the Greek language.
Refugees also reported to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) the lack of information available regarding their rights. One notable complaint was the hostility and racism they faced in society, with several complaining of being typecast and named as “black” or “Arab”.
According to the report, there are currently 400 registered refugees in Cyprus while thousands of others have sought asylum from the Cypriot authorities. At the beginning of October this year, there were 7,975 asylum applications pending.
UNHCR representative Betsy Greve noted that the government of Cyprus had contributed to a great extent to solving some of the problems faced, but underlined that more could be done.
Law Commissioner and President of Ethnopad (the National Organisation for the Protection of Human Rights) Leda Koursoumba told the Cyprus Mail yesterday that she agreed there was a problem of xenophobia and prejudice in Cyprus.
She noted that there were a huge number of people coming from abroad seeking work or asylum or both, and mainly from non-EU countries.
“There is a problem in that some speak dialects of languages that we can’t find interpreters for. Also many come from the Green Line area as well. These are problems that I recognise, but notwithstanding that, there is xenophobia here, especially of colour,” she said.
The human rights officer maintained that the problem was in all sections of society. “This is not just illiterates, but upper society too, although no one admits it.”
Koursoumba highlighted that the biggest prejudice could be seen with foreigners who were not from western countries. “This is probably due to general stereotypes and prejudices, and the history of the island. I don’t wish to get into an analysis of the reasons, but there is a history of isolation and tragic events in Cyprus. Added to that are the incidents that have never occurred here before like burglaries in your neighbourhood. For this, you get the prejudiced assumption that the mavrous or ‘blacks’ are to blame,” she said.
Koursoumba said she recognised the problems brought by large numbers of asylum seekers coming to the country, but that the problem would not be solved by a wrong handling of the situation.
“Refugees find it difficult to integrate in schools and neighbourhoods, and this reflects on to their children. They learn to hate the authorities and the prejudice.”
As a country, however, Cyprus was making an effort to abide by refugee conventions and the EU laws but many practical problems still existed,” said Koursoumba.
“How will they process all the applications? There is a big number with plenty of backlog. They have problems with the language and the lack of staff.”
The ETHNOPAD President said the country had legal problems dealing with the application process. Under the laws, applicants have the right to appeal a decision, but without interpreters and adequate staff, this was impossible.
“This slows down the process,” she noted. “We need more staff to clear pending applications. It would cost less to Cyprus to bring more staff in and process applications than keep applicants here and provide them lodging, grants, jobs, schooling, as we are obliged to do.
“This way we would eliminate a lot of the applications that don’t stand. But even if you know someone is lying in their application, they still have human rights, and you can’t imprison them. They must be processed,” she said.
Koursoumba noted that prejudice existed even among government officials. “We have had a lot of complaints about civil servants who often in the past, didn’t even know the rights of asylum seekers. The government is trying but there is a lot more to be done.”
Koursoumba said one way to deal with the prejudice was to let time and EU accession take its course and open people’s minds to other ethnicities.
“By nature though, we accept people of our religion and our colour, and are more reserved towards others,” she added.
