This blog is a platform for our members’ opinions and debates on development and the law. Please join our Facebook group and/or LinkedIn group if you would like to participate further in these discussions.
Legal organisations in the Moria camp in Lesvos call for urgent measures to protect asylum seekers on the island Thousands have been left without shelter or adequate access to food and water since a fire earlier this month completely destroyed the camp. Many have been re-located to the neighbouring camp… Read more
LAP members recently approved a grant of £15,000 to increase access to vital legal services in the Lesvos refugee camp through Oxfam’s partnership with the Greek Council for Refugees (GCR). On the night of Tuesday 8 September, a fire completely destroyed the infamous Moria ‘hotspot’ camp, leaving 12,000 people that were… Read more
Covid-19 has made us all wonder what to expect from “the new normal”. For Philip Worthington, managing director of European Lawyers in Lesvos (ELIL), one of LAP’s local partners in the Moria refugee camp, its meaning is crystal clear. “Once, spending one night in a refugee camp was considered unacceptable…. Read more
On the 21st of July 2020 Lawyers Against Poverty hosted an online webinar with Oxfam, discussing the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic upon human rights. If you missed the event, both the slides and the webinar are now available on our website. If you would like to download the Oxfam… Read more
The start of a new year in Lesvos has seen the arrival of a paradoxical new challenge: while a bottleneck of asylum seekers applying for settlement has been the problem to date – many wait up to two years for an interview – speed is now the enemy. On 1st January… Read more
Is the right to asylum related to the language spoken by the asylum seeker? Could a victim of torture be deprived of his right to apply for international protection due to lack of interpretation? Not according to international law, but in Lesvos, from 15 to 20 November 2019, 28 asylum… Read more
Report on Lawyers Against Poverty and guest speakers event, November 2019 On 14 November Lawyers Against Poverty hosted an evening of talks on the topic: How lawyers can use their legal skills in order to promote rule of law and access to justice. This discussion took place in the context… Read more
According to the World Health Organisation, it is estimated that more than 200 million girls and women alive today have undergone Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), with three million at risk every year. FGM is defined as the removal of the external female genitalia for non-medical reasons (whether complete or incomplete)… Read more
With a population of around 7.6 million, Togo is one of the smallest countries in Africa, bordered by Benin, Ghana and Burkina Faso. Agriculture accounts for about 30% of its economy and it enjoys a well-developed export sector due to valuable phosphate deposits. Despite this, the country is suffering an… Read more
Research by Amnesty International exposes the inhumane and unsafe conditions that women refugees suffer in the course of transit to Europe and once they arrive. Interviewing 40 women and girls who had travelled from Turkey to Europe through Greece, the organisation recounted the consensus among them of feeling threatened or… Read more
