Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/313770
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 18 MAY 2014 4 News MATTHEW VELLA A legal notice issued on Friday has removed an important clause in Malta's refugee law, prohibiting the forced repatriation of asylum seekers. The so called 'refoulement' of asylum seekers – pushing back or removing people to other ter- ritories where their lives could be threatened – is an established prin- ciple of international law. Non-refoulement forbids send- ing back a person who could be a victim of persecution, to a place where they can be persecuted and it is officially enshrined in the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, the 1967 Protocol and the Convention Against Torture: all treaties Malta has ratified. Under the new legal notice, Arti- cle 14 of the Refugees Act has now been removed. Originally, the Article 14 read that "a person shall not be expelled from Malta or returned in any manner whatsoever to the fron- tiers of territories where the life or freedom of that person would be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or po- litical opinion." However, this week Legal Notice 161 completely removed this pro- hibition from the Refugee Act. Instead, it was substituted with a new clauses that spells out Mal- ta's obligations under EU law to give refugees and people granted subsidiary protection the right to freedom of movement; a residence permit for a period of three years that is renewable; a convention travel document in the case of a refugee and a travel document for a beneficiary of subsidiary protec- tion, entitling him to leave and re- turn to Malta without the need of a visa; access to employment or self- employed activities, social welfare, appropriate accommodation, inte- gration programmes, state educa- tion and training, and state medical care. Persons granted the status of ref- ugee or subsidiary protection shall also be granted access to existing recognition procedures for foreign diplomas, certificates and other ev- idence of formal qualifications. Pushbacks are illegal under Arti- cle 3 of the European Convention of Human Rights, which obliges countries to protect any asylum seekers from torture and inhuman or degrading treatment. In July 2013, the European Court of Human Rights blocked a govern- ment pushback of 45 Somali mi- grants after NGOs filed a prohibi- tory application. In addition, in 2013 a Constitu- tional Court ruled that Malta had violated the rights of two Somali asylum seekers after they were re- patriated back to Libya in 2004 without a prior, individualised as- sessment of their situation. Simi- larly, in 2012 the European Court of Human Rights had decreed that Italy had breached the fundamen- tal human rights of Somali and Eritrean asylum seekers after they repatriated them back to Libya. The new legal notice also removes a much criticised anomaly under a 2008 legal notice, that granted the Commissioner of Refugees the right to exclude applications by asylum seekers not presented within two weeks of their arrival. In practice, asylum claims are be- lieved to have never been excluded on these grounds. Originally, human rights lawyers said the 2008 amendment, planned to expedite the procedures for processing refugee applications, was not in the spirit of the 1951 Ge- neva Convention, because it would spell an end to the right to asylum seekers living lawfully or unlawfully in Malta, to apply for refugee status at any time. In fact, the 'deadline clause' was in breach of the Geneva Conven- tion, which obliges state parties to recognise and protect all refugees within their territory from forced return to a country where they could face a threat to their life or liberty. Non-refoulement clause removed from refugee law If you receive the screening kit, use it and return it Colorectal cancer is preventable if stopped before it starts For more information: Please phone the National Screening Centre on 21227470/1 Facebook Malta National Health Screening Programme Website www.bowelscreening.gov.mt JAMES DEBONO DRAFT bills on noise pollution and climate change are expected to be presented in the next weeks before the summer recess of parliament. The main emphasis of the new law regulating noise pollution will be that of giving citizens redress against flagrant abuses in a sector presently governed by fragmented legislation. "Frustration over noise pollution is often compounded further by the fact that the fragmented manner in which noise pollution is regulated, often makes it difficult for ordinary citizens to know who to turn to when existing laws are flagrantly abused of," a spokesperson for the Ministry for the Environment and Sustainable Development told MaltaToday. Although substantial work on noise legislation was carried out under the previous government, this did not come to fruition. The main objective of the bill is to ensure that regulations will be imple- mented. The environment ministry said that once the Environment and Resources Authority is set up there will be properly trained personnel on noise pollution issues. Under the present set-up, Malta Environment and Planning Authority lacks per- sonnel to address noise pollution is- sues on a full-time basis. Work is also going ahead on cli- mate change legislation and a tech- nical team has been appointed to prepare draft legislation which will be ready by summer. Once the climate bill is approved by parliament, Malta will be one of the few EU member states to have actually legislated on the matter. The environment ministry con- firmed that it was the minister's in- tention to consult the Opposition on both sets of legislation way ahead of the relevant parliamentary discus- sion. Government also intends to con- sult key stakeholders on both pieces of legislation at the appropriate moment. NGOs like Friends of the Earth had lobbied hard for the intro- duction of climate legislation but the idea had been shunned by the previ- ous government. Both bills were promised during Budget 2014 while the PL had also proposed a framework bill covering climate change when in Opposition. Hate fireworks? Noise pollution law on the way