Introducing the Nafeer Community Knowledge Lab: A New Partnership for Community-Led Knowledge

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Dr Bashàïr Ahmed, Shabaka, and Professor Paul Statham, Editor in Chief, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies

In Sudan, Emergency Response Rooms coordinated the distribution of food and medicine supplies in neighbourhoods to places where international agencies could not access — and built governance structures that outlasted the emergencies that created them. In Yemen, community committees and local solidarity networks sustained civilian life through years of siege and aerial bombardment, filling critical gaps left by the collapse of formal institutions. In Somalia, community-led organisations sustained health and education services through cycles of drought and displacement that formal aid and development systems repeatedly failed to address.

In every case, communities were not just responding; they were acting, and by acting they were learning and generating knowledge. This important contribution is seldom acknowledged. Developing approaches that Indeed the wider crisis and development world has been slow to recognise — and slower still to resource – the emergent approaches generated in situ by communities. 

This crucial knowledge and know-how hardly ever makes it into academic discussions, in scholarly journals, or into policy briefs. Rarely are people from communities who have developed these understandings on the job invited into the rooms and corridors of power where critical decisions about them and that concern their livelihoods deeply — often with consequences lasting decades — are made. That is the gap we want to address through the Nafeer Community Knowledge Lab.

A partnership with purpose

Shabaka and the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies (JEMS) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding with a commitment to advance academic scholarship, debates and knowledge on diaspora humanitarian action, community-led crisis response, and mutual aid networks — that centre on scholars and scholarship from the Global South.

https://www.sussex.ac.uk/about/facts/rankings/development-studiesJEMS is an intentionally a broad church, publishing across all forms of migration, ethnic relations, and diversity from a wide range of disciplines and regions. Over the last decade, JEMS has become one of the largest and highest-ranking scholarly journals in the social sciences. With support of the publisher Taylor and Francis, the journal pursues a globalisation strategy that aims to make academic debates and scholarship on migration and related issues truly global. JEMS has mobilised specific initiatives to better include scholars from, and scholarship on, lesser included and studied regions. So far, this includes initiatives targeting SE Asia, China and Latin America. JEMS is hosted by the Sussex Centre for Migration Research (SCMR), a Centre of Excellence at the University of Sussex, ranked first in the world for Migration Studies in the 2025 ScholarGPS rankings. The SCMR migration centre is affiliated to the School of Global Studies and the Sussex School for Progressive Futures, while the University of Sussex has been ranked 1st in the world for Development Studies for ten successive years (World University Rankings). All this makes JEMS and the SCMR a natural institutional home for the type of engagement and scholarship we envisage.

Shabaka is a practice-oriented research and advisory organisation founded in 2014 in response to a humanitarian ecosystem that systematically excludes crisis-affected communities. Over more than a decade, Shabaka has built deep relationships with diaspora networks, mutual aid groups, and community-led organisations across East and North Africa and West Asia, producing evidence and shaping policy at the intersection of localisation, humanitarian and development action, and decolonial practice.

Its work is both conceptual and applied. Shabaka incubated the Crisis Coordination Unit Sudan — which documented hundreds of mutual aid and diaspora initiatives during the current conflict, and is now an independent organisation. It has established the Diaspora Humanitarian Engagement Group, a peer-learning space for UK-based diaspora organisations coordinating crisis responses. Shabaka has also seen the formation of a medics initiative, the Academy of Medical Education During Conflicts, emerging and evolving into an independent organisation which trains healthcare professionals in conflict settings using simulation-based methodologies. Shabaka has developed the Switchboard app, a platform connecting communities with services and with one another. Each initiative was designed to transition to independent community leadership, reflecting Shabaka’s foundational commitment to strengthening capacity, then stepping back.

That commitment to facilitating rather than controlling makes the Nafeer Lab a natural extension of Shabaka’s practice. The partnership between Shabaka and JEMS rests on a shared commitment to building the conditions in which scholars from under-represented regions contribute to — rather than merely feature as subjects of — global conversations about the crises that affect them.

This is not a symbolic handshake. It is a practical commitment to shifting who gets to produce, publish, and shape knowledge about communities navigating crisis.

What we’re building together — starting with the Red Sea corridor

In its first year, the Lab will focus on Sudan and the broader Red Sea corridor—from Northeast Africa to the Arabian Peninsula. This is where the need is most acute, where Shabaka’s networks run deepest, and where some of the most significant and under-documented community-led responses of the past decade have taken place.

We call our early collaboration within the Nafeer Community Lab, the Red Sea Researchers Network. Through the Red Sea Researchers Network initiative, we aim to bring visibility, legitimacy and resonance to knowledge and understandings this region. To achieve this goal we will mobilise joint events bringing scholars and community activists together, initiate special issues as an opportunity structure for scholars from the region, and provide support in research and publication.  

Researchers from across the Red Sea corridor will have structured opportunities to support their pathway to publication in JEMS. Early-career scholars will receive academic mentorship to navigate publication pathways. Joint events — panels, convenings, and international forums — will bring researchers, practitioners, and policymakers into the same room. And hands-on capacity support, from academic writing guidance to dissemination of published work, will be available to scholars working in and on crisis-affected contexts.

JEMS retains full editorial independence throughout. Rigour is non-negotiable. What we’re changing is access, not standards.

Why this matters — and what it won’t fix

Communities on the frontlines of crisis — whether conflict, climate, economic collapse, or displacement — are uniquely positioned to be producers of knowledge. Community-led responses are often the most agile, trusted, and effective. Yet, research documenting them rarely reaches the journals and policy spaces that shape how future responses are designed and funded.

Part of the problem is structural. Researchers working in or near active conflict zones often lack adequate institutional support for writing-time, editing, and translation that can lead to publication. Global South scholars are usually under-represented and less present in mainstream academic debates, not due to abilities, but because existing structures privilege authors from elsewhere.

This partnership is one small baby step towards changing that infrastructure. While we recognise that the challenges facing communities in crisis are enormous, and our collaboration will not resolve them. But if we can help ensure that the knowledge communities are already generating reach the people and institutions with the power to act on it, we believe that this initiative is worth doing.

A lab that aims to grow

The Nafeer Community Knowledge Lab takes its name from a Sudanese concept of collective action — a call to come together, to show up, to contribute what you have. Sudan is the starting point, but the Lab’s ambitions extend well beyond it. Through new partnerships and collaborations, the aim is to expand across regions and communities over time, so that more voices — from more places — can shape the knowledge that influences crisis and development responses, globally.

As it grows, the aspiration is for the Lab to relocate — to Sudan, or another relevant Global South location — when conditions allow. We believe that infrastructure for producing knowledge should sit closest to the communities it serves. That is our direction of travel.

What comes next

Over the coming year, the Red Sea Researchers Network will launch through a founding membership and first convened meeting, while discussions on a first Special Issue proposal focussing on the region will begin.

This is the start of something. It will be shaped — as it should be — by the communities whose knowledge it is designed to serve.

The Nafeer Community Knowledge Lab is a partnership between Shabaka and the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies (JEMS) hosted by the Sussex Centre for Migration Research at the University of Sussex, UK. For more information, please contact Paul Statham (paul.statham@sussex.ac.uk) or Bashàïr Ahmed (bashair@shabaka.org).

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Posted in Migration Research

Displaced Before the Strike: Evacuation Warnings and Anticipatory Displacement in Lebanon

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Hucen Sleiman, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris.

As of 9 March 2026, around 700,000 people are displaced across Lebanon, fleeing bombardment in the south, Beirut’s southern suburbs, and parts of the Bekaa Valley to seek refuge further north. This is the latest wave in a crisis that has repeatedly emptied towns since late 2023. But behind these numbers lies a less visible pattern: in many cases, displacement begins before the bombs fall, triggered not by destruction itself but by the anticipation of it, communicated through digital evacuation warnings.

Warnings before bombs

At 11:47 PM on 3 October 2024, a satellite image of Haret Hreik in Beirut’s southern suburbs began circulating on WhatsApp. A red circle roughly 500 metres in diameter marked several apartment blocks, a mosque, and a cluster of shops. The image, originally posted on the Israeli military’s Arabic-language X account, ordered residents inside the marked area to evacuate immediately.

Within hours, the screenshot had spread across neighbourhood groups. Families compared maps, called relatives, and debated whether their building fell inside the circle. By morning, the buildings were empty. The strike came two days later.

Map produced by the author based on evacuation warnings circulated on social media during the 2024–2026 escalation in Lebanon. The diagram reconstructs the structure of typical warning maps indicating a targeted building and an evacuation radius in Haret Hreik, Beirut.

Scenes like this repeated across South Lebanon and Beirut during the 2024–2025 escalation, and again in March 2026. Between late September and early November 2024, the Beirut Urban Lab documented more than one hundred announced strikes targeting over 160 buildings, with warnings posted shortly before bombardment and rapidly recirculated through messaging networks.

These warnings are often presented as humanitarian precautions intended to reduce civilian casualties. But they also have another effect:they compel people to leave. A red circle on a phone screen can trigger hurried packing, late-night departures, and sudden decisions about where to go. Displacement begins with the warning, not only with the explosion.

What displacement looks like

The movements produced by these warnings rarely resemble the large-scale displacements that humanitarian statistics usually capture. Instead, they are smaller, closer, and often repeated.

Many families do not leave the neighbourhood at all. In Beirut’s southern suburbs, residents frequently evacuate their apartments but stay in the same building’s basement, a neighbour’s ground-floor flat, or a relative’s home nearby, waiting to see whether the strike will happen.

In southern villages such as Meiss al-Jabal or Kafr Tibnit, some residents move only a few hundred metres, relocating to the edge of the village just outside the marked radius rather than leaving the area entirely.

These movements are also cyclical. As warnings circulate, families who had returned home may leave again within days. During the 2024–2026 escalation, many households kept bags packed, keys within reach, and phones nearby, ready to move if another warning appeared.

This kind of mobility does not fit easily into the usual categories of displacement. People may not cross administrative boundaries, register in shelters, or appear in official counts. Yet their lives are repeatedly interrupted, their routines suspended, and their homes treated as places that might have to be abandoned at any moment. Even without immediate destruction, evacuation warnings create a persistent sense of insecurity and fear. As anthropologist Stephen Lubkemann has shown in other conflict settings, wartime mobility is often fragmented and localised, shaped by conditions that do not amount to permanent flight but still fundamentally reorganise everyday life.

Why this matters for displacement research

These patterns matter because not all displacement looks the same, and contemporary conflict often produces forms of mobility that fall outside the categories through which displacement is usually measured, including short-distance or repeated relocations  

First, many of these movements remain statistically invisible. Humanitarian figures tend to count people who enter collective shelters, cross districts, or register for assistance. They often miss those who stay with relatives a few streets away, move temporarily within the same village, or return home between strikes. The International Organization for Migration has repeatedly noted the difficulty of capturing dispersed, short-term, and informal displacement in Lebanon, where families frequently rely on personal networks rather than official shelter systems. As a result, a significant share of wartime mobility never appears in the numbers that guide humanitarian planning.

Second, invisibility has concrete consequences. Even short-distance displacement can disrupt work, schooling, healthcare, and access to land. Children may miss weeks of classes, farmers may be unable to reach their fields, and daily routines may be suspended for long periods, even when families remain within the same locality. When such movements are not recognised as displacement, they often fall outside the scope of assistance and policy response, despite producing real social and economic strain.

Third, evacuation warnings raise difficult questions about responsibility. Military authorities present warnings as measures intended to reduce civilian casualties. Yet when warnings repeatedly compel people to leave their homes without offering any guarantee of safety, they also function as a form of governance. By designating certain buildings or neighbourhoods as temporarily uninhabitable, warning maps reorganise how civilians move, where they stay, and how they plan their lives under threat.

In this sense, warnings do not simply inform. They actively reshape everyday life by producing conditions in which people must live in anticipation of possible destruction.

Not only Lebanon

Lebanon is not the only place where displacement begins with a message on a phone.

In Gaza, residents often receive phone calls or text messages ordering them to leave buildings before strikes, a practice documented by organisations such as Amnesty International.

In Ukraine, air-raid alert applications send constant notifications that structure daily routines in cities under threat.

In Sudan, local Telegram and Facebook groups circulate informal “danger zone” maps that compel people to move before fighting reaches their neighbourhoods.

In each case, the warning arrives before the violence, and civilians move in anticipation of threat. In each case, there are implications for the ordering of space, the legibility of the disruptions of armed conflict, and for how responsibility for this displacement is framed.

Conclusion

The hundreds of thousands displaced across Lebanon today include those who fled bombardment, but also those who left because a warning appeared on their phones. Evacuation messages circulated through social media have become part of how contemporary conflict reorganises space, compelling civilians to move before violence occurs. These anticipatory displacements are often small, repeated, and difficult to measure, yet they profoundly disrupt everyday life. Paying attention to them shifts how displacement is understood: not only as the result of destruction, but as a condition produced through the management of threat itself. In this sense, war displaces not only through what it destroys, but through what it makes people expect.

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Posted in Migration Comments

When “return” does not last: internal displacement in Lebanon from 2024 to 2026

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Cristina El Khoury, postgraduate researcher University of Geneva and former SCMR Visiting fellow, 2025

9 March 2026: 700,000 people are displaced across Lebanon.   
 
Behind this number lies a familiar yet devastating pattern: families leaving southern towns in the middle of the night, carrying what they can, uncertain when (or whether) they will return. Since late 2023, hostilities along Lebanon’s southern border have repeatedly emptied villages and towns. After a fragile ceasefire in November 2024 allowed thousands to go back home, renewed escalation in early March 2026 has once again triggered large-scale internal displacement across the country. 

A crisis that keeps returning 

In southern Lebanon, displacement has become cyclical. Families flee bombardment, find temporary refuge elsewhere in the country, return home after a ceasefire, and then leave again when violence resumes. The latest wave of displacement follows renewed military escalation affecting southern Lebanon as well as parts of Beirut’s southern suburbs and the Bekaa Valley. Airstrikes, artillery exchanges and evacuation warnings have forced civilians to flee districts such as Tyre, Bint Jbeil, Marjayoun and Nabatieh, often with little time to prepare. 

Traffic in Beirut, one of the main destinations for families displaced from southern Lebanon.  
Internal displacement often takes place within urban spaces rather than in formal camps. Photo by the author (February 2025)

The scale of displacement increased dramatically in early March 2026. Within less than a week, humanitarian organisations reported hundreds of thousands of people leaving their homes. By 6 March, 300,000 people had already been displaced within less than 100 hours as evacuation warnings and attacks intensified. A few days later, Lebanon’s Minister of Social Affairs reported that around 517,000 displaced people had been registered on the government’s emergency relief platform. Of these, more than 117,000 people were hosted in approximately 538 collective shelters across the country. As of 9 March, 700,000 people were displaced.  

Yet official shelter figures capture only part of the crisis. Many displaced families rely on informal arrangements, staying with relatives or friends or moving between temporary accommodation. This dispersed pattern reflects a defining characteristic of displacement in Lebanon: rather than large camps, displaced populations are spread across host communities. The current escalation builds on an already fragile situation created by previous waves of conflict. During the major escalation of late September 2024, internal displacement in Lebanon reached unprecedented levels, with around 1.2 million people estimated to have fled their homes. 

Although the ceasefire reached on 27 November 2024 allowed many families to return during the following months, return did not necessarily mean recovery. Entire neighbourhoods had been damaged, infrastructure remained partially destroyed, and unexploded ordnance made some areas unsafe. By late February 2025, the International Organization for Migration reported that 949,571 people had returned, yet nearly 100,000 remained displaced. 

In other words, the post-ceasefire period did not resolve displacement; it merely changed its form. The renewed escalation in 2026 therefore affects communities that had only recently begun reconstructing their lives. 

Moving north: how displacement unfolds across the country 

Internal displacement in Lebanon rarely takes the form of large, centralized camps. Instead, it unfolds through a dispersed pattern of mobility that stretches across multiple regions of the country. As violence intensifies in the south, families typically move northwards, relocating to Beirut, Mount Lebanon, the Bekaa Valley, and in some cases further north to cities such as Tripoli or districts such as Akkar. 
 
Family and social networks play a crucial role in shaping these movements. Many displaced households initially seek refuge with relatives or friends living in safer areas. However, as displacement persists and the number of displaced families grows, the capacity of host households to provide accommodation quickly becomes strained.  
 
Public infrastructure therefore becomes an essential part of the emergency response. Schools, community centres and municipal buildings are frequently converted into collective shelters to host displaced families. During the escalation of 2024, hundreds of public schools across Lebanon were repurposed as emergency shelters, and similar arrangements are once again emerging in 2026 as municipalities attempt to cope with the increasing number of displaced households.   
 
This dispersed pattern of displacement also creates uneven pressures across the country. While southern districts experience rapid depopulation as residents flee ongoing violence, central and northern regions must absorb sudden population inflows. Municipalities in Mount Lebanon, Akkar and cities such as Tripoli have therefore become key receiving areas for displaced populations. 

Unlike camp-based displacement contexts, Lebanon’s urban and socially mediated displacement makes it harder to monitor needs and coordinate humanitarian responses. Displaced families are scattered across apartments, temporary shelters and host households, creating a less visible but highly complex displacement landscape. 

The ripple effects of displacement 

Beyond the immediate humanitarian emergency, internal displacement produces far-reaching social, economic and environmental consequences. 

One of the most immediate effects concerns education. During displacement crises in Lebanon, public schools are often repurposed as emergency shelters for displaced families, interrupting the academic year for thousands of students. In a country where the education system is already struggling with the consequences of economic crisis and institutional instability, repeated school closures risk widening learning gaps and increasing the likelihood of long-term school dropout. 

Displacement also severely affects livelihoods. Many families fleeing southern Lebanon depend on agriculture and small-scale rural economies tied to the land. As hostilities intensified, farmers were forced to abandon olive groves, tobacco fields and other crops during critical cultivation and harvesting periods. Agricultural production has therefore been disrupted not only by direct damage caused by shelling but also by the absence of farmers who are unable to safely access their land. 

The environmental consequences of conflict further complicate prospects for recovery. Bombardments have damaged agricultural land, irrigation systems and water infrastructure in several southern districts, while unexploded ordnance poses serious risks for cultivation and reconstruction. These environmental impacts may significantly delay the possibility of safe return. 

Finally, host communities across Lebanon face increasing pressure as they attempt to accommodate large numbers of displaced people. Municipal services such as housing, water supply, waste management and healthcare are already under strain in a country experiencing one of the most severe economic crises in its modern history. The arrival of hundreds of thousands of displaced families therefore places additional burdens on local infrastructure and public resources. 

The long shadow of displacement  

The Lebanese case illustrates how internal displacement can evolve from a temporary humanitarian emergency into a recurring condition shaped by cycles of violence and fragile recovery. Families flee, return after ceasefires, and then find themselves displaced again when hostilities resume.  Yet the significance of displacement in Lebanon goes beyond the number of people forced to move. As this crisis shows, displacement reshapes territories and societies in lasting ways – interrupting education, destabilizing agricultural livelihoods, and placing new pressures on already fragile urban infrastructures. In this sense, internal displacement in Lebanon is not only a consequence of conflict but also a process that gradually transforms the social and spatial landscape of the country. 

For many of the 700,000 people currently displaced, the central question is therefore not only when they will return, but whether the next return will finally be able to last. 

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Posted in Migration Comments

Damned if you do, damned if you boat

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Dr Ceri Oeppen, Co-Director of SCMR

Two days ago, the British Government announced it would halt student visas for nationals of Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar and Sudan (and for Afghans, skilled work visas too). 

The Government claims that students from these countries are conducting “visa abuse” by arriving in the UK on a student visa and subsequently applying for asylum.

Mahmood delivering a speech at the Institute for Public Policy Research in Westminster on Thursday. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

We need to unpick statements from the Government’s announcement, illustrating why it’s hypocritical, unfair, and misleading.

The government’s announcement

“Tough action is required as asylum claims from legal routes have more than trebled since 2021”

Both the current Labour Government and previous Conservative Governments have repeatedly (in speech and practice) penalised asylum seekers for arriving via so-called ‘illegal routes’, notably via the ‘Stop the Boats’ discourse.  Meanwhile, the UK Government’s current asylum and returns policy describes safe and legal routes as, “the right way for refugees to enter the UK and benefit from our protection” (Home Office, 2025).

Given their wish to prevent people claiming asylum via ‘illegal’ routes, if three times more people are claiming asylum after arriving through legal routes, shouldn’t they see this as a win? 

Student visas are one of the few ‘safe and legal’ routes available for people from countries affected by conflict.  Whilst a student visa is clearly not designed as a protection mechanism, UNHCR has identified it as an important complementary pathway to protection, a ‘win-win for refugees and host communities’, encouraged by the 2018 Global Compact on Refugees.  Fellow SCMR Co-Director Tahir Zaman, and I, wrote more about this for IOM’s journal, Migration Policy Practice.

More importantly, for an individual fleeing conflict and persecution, a student visa is one of a vanishingly small number of ways to travel to the UK in a regular, safe, manner; without putting themselves in danger crossing the Channel in a small boat (see also, Naimat Zafary’s recent SCMR blog about desperate journeys from Afghanistan). 

“Britain will always provide refuge to people fleeing war and persecution, but our visa system must not be abused”   

UK asylum grant rates for Afghan nationals have fallen from 99% to 38% between 2023 to 2025.  This is not because the situation in Afghanistan has improved.  Indeed, for the kind of young people who might be interested in studying abroad – particularly women – it has got worse.  For anyone familiar with the situation in Afghanistan it’s not at all surprising that most Afghan students in the UK find the idea of returning to Afghanistan a dangerous prospect; and with limited other options (including shorter graduate visas), decide to seek asylum.  

It is not ‘abusing the system’ to apply for asylum after you arrive in the UK – it is a human right, protected by international law.  A right with the very peculiar requirement that you must be physically present in the country where you wish to seek asylum.  It’s clearly better for everyone if you arrive in a safe and legal manner, on a visa.      

“The Government has also pledged to open new capped safe and legal routes as an alternative to dangerous small boat crossings”

The Government has done this but, in Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood’s own words to parliament, “the numbers [arriving via these routes] will be in the low hundreds”.  Clearly this does not even begin to address the needs. 

These aren’t the only numbers I have issue with in the Government’s announcement.  They make ‘interesting’, and varied use of either percentages or whole numbers, in their statement, according – I assume – to the message they want to convey.  For example, in the opening they say, “Asylum applications by students from Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar and Sudan rocketed by over 470% between 2021 and 2025”.  This emotive language – ‘rocketed’, ‘470%’ – doesn’t tell us how many students from these countries applied for asylum.  Even Colin Yeo – a leading immigration barrister and founder of the Free Movement immigration law website – couldn’t fully work out exactly what this 470% increase represents in total numbers, although he points out that in 2025, 227 Afghan student visas were issued, so even if most subsequently apply for asylum, we are not talking huge total numbers.

There’s more to say on how the announcement uses numbers to convey their message, e.g. “asylum support … costing more than £4 billion a year”; “supported at public expense, including over 6,000 in hotels”, but I’ll leave that for another time.  Suffice to say, the cost of the asylum system, and the misuse of hotels as temporary accommodation is certainly not the fault of asylum seekers, however they arrived!

What next?           

This is the first time the UK government has issued a blanket ban on visas for specific nationalities.  This is an extremely concerning development, one which paves the way for further use of (actual and threatened) visa bans for countries that do not cooperate with the Government on – for example – return agreements.

It’s also a further blow to UK universities who have already seen massive drops in international student numbers due to increasing financial maintenance requirements, changes to graduate routes, restrictions on dependent visas, and threatened caps on numbers of visas for students from certain countries (e.g. Pakistan, Nigeria, Sri Lanka).

Most significantly, the hypocrisy of stopping people from conflict-torn countries obtaining visas to travel through ‘safe and legal routes’, whilst also heavily penalising those who arrive via so-called ‘illegal means’, is appalling. Earlier this year, I wrote about how migrants’ manner of arrival is becoming a (racialised) proxy for ‘good’ and ‘bad’ immigrants .  But this latest announcement makes it clear that even those arriving via ‘safe and legal routes’ are apparently unwanted too.  Whilst officially the language and slogans of the ‘hostile environment’ and ‘stop the boats’ may have been dropped by Labour, it is clear that the spirit of hostility, and the Kafkaesque array of obstacles put in the way of those seeking safety, continues apace.

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Posted in Migration Comments

The Bitter Duality of Winter: Kabul’s Snow and the Frozen Dreams of an Afghan Child

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Dr Naimat Zafary, Department of International Development, University of Sussex.

Last week, Kabul was transformed into a landscape of pristine white. The Afghan capital, Kabul, , draped in a heavy blanket of snow, sparked a wave of nostalgia and celebration across social media. Citizens shared vibrant photos and videos, echoing the centuries-old proverb: “Let Kabul be without gold, but not without snow.” 

The snowfall was uncharacteristically widespread. It reached into the eastern provinces—regions that rarely witness such a winter spectacle—bringing families out of their homes to marvel at a phenomenon that usually symbolises life, agricultural fertility, and a brief respite from the country’s hardships. 

Kabul – Photo by Mohammad Mehdi Rezai on Unsplash

However, beneath this picturesque surface lies a devastating contrast. While families in eastern Afghanistan were celebrating the snow, one of their own was fighting for his life against it. 

A Heartbreak on the Border 

As the snow fell in the East of Afghanistan, a harrowing video began to circulate among Facebook users, grounding the festive atmosphere in a grim reality. It featured a young boy, barely 12 or 13 years old, who was discovered by a group of Afghan rescuers on the treacherous border between Iran and Turkey. 

The footage is difficult to watch. The boy, small and frail, was found half-frozen, his legs turned a bruised, stony black by severe frostbite. He could barely whisper his name or identify the  smugglers who had abandoned him. In his innocent, wide-eyed gaze, viewers saw a reflection of the profound humanitarian crisis that continues to push Afghanistan’s youth into the mouth of danger. 

For the rescuers—men searching for their own missing relatives—finding the boy was a moment of bittersweet relief. For the boy’s family, the joy of the winter snow likely vanished the moment they saw the images of their son, immobile and broken, thousands of miles from home. 

The Anatomy of a Desperate Journey 

This teenager’s plight is a vivid illustration of a traumatic journey driven by a volatile cocktail of intersecting issues. At the heart of this struggle is extreme poverty, where families facing the immediate threat of starvation begin to see migration not as a choice, but as a final, desperate investment in survival. This financial despair is further compounded by widespread unemployment, which strips the youth of any tangible future prospects within their own borders. Underlying these economic pressures is a persistent state of political instability, leaving many living in the constant shadow of insecurity and injustice. 

These children are sent on paths that would break grown adults. They navigate illegal crossings, rely on smugglers who can be ruthless in their pursuit of profit, and face increasingly hostile anti-migration policies in transit and destination countries. When a child falls in the snow, unable to move, his final thoughts are likely of the parents and siblings he may never see again. Conversely, back home, the silence of a disconnected phone becomes a deafening source of agony for the family left behind. 

A Plea for Change 

The story of the “frozen boy” is not an isolated incident, but it should be a turning point. While the boy was eventually rescued and shown in a subsequent video receiving shelter, his journey back to health—and potentially back to his hometown—will be marred by the physical and psychological scars of his ordeal. 

To the Families: We must speak honestly within our communities: No dream of a better life is worth the sacrifice of a child’s life. The dangers of these journeys are not merely risks; they are often death sentences. We must prioritise local alternatives—such as community-based vocational training or small-scale local cooperatives—that keep our youth rooted and safe. The gamble of the “black road” is a game where the house always wins, and the stake is our children’s lives. 

To the International Community: When a refugee finally reaches a new land, the citizens and government of that country must understand the sheer weight of the journey. These are not just “migrants”; they are survivors of a gauntlet of hunger, cold, and injustice. 

To prevent children from being pushed into the frozen shadows of our borders, the global community must uphold its fundamental obligation to protect human life. This commitment requires an immediate end to violent border “push-backs,” a practice that callously forces vulnerable groups into even more dangerous and unmonitored mountain terrain during the height of winter. Instead of deterrence through displacement, the world must invest in humanitarian corridors—secure passageways that recognize the inherent dignity of the human person as a priority over the technical legality of their status. Only by prioritising the sanctity of life over the fortification of borders can we ensure that no child is ever forced to navigate the “Death Road” in a desperate search for safety. 

We celebrate the snow in Kabul because it promises water for the crops and beauty for the soul. But we must never forget that for many young Afghans, that same snow is a cold shroud. We can only hope that this boy’s story is the last of its kind—that no more children will be buried in the frost in a desperate search for safety. 

A life is a heavy price to pay for a chance at a future. It is a price no child should ever have to carry. 

Posted in Migration Comments

SCMR and Sussex University of Sanctuary tribute to Richard Williams

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It is with deep sadness that we share this tribute to Richard Williams, a longstanding member and friend of the Sussex Sanctuary and Migration research community. 

Richard Williams speaking at Refugee Week, 2018

Richard was a specialist independent consultant with an in-depth knowledge of UK and EU refugee and migration policy, with expertise in evaluation, training, policy analysis and advocacy, having previously worked in broadcast journalism. 

He was affiliated to University of Sussex School of Global Studies as an Associate Researcher for many years, and an inspiration and advisor to many projects including University of Sussex’s ‘University of Sanctuary’ initiative. 

Among his many roles, Richard was a Trustee of City of Sanctuary UK, having co-founded and then chaired the local City of Sanctuary group in Brighton and Hove, Sanctuary on Sea, and a Trustee of the Hummingbird Refugee Project, which supports young unaccompanied refugees.

Richard was a remarkable person we felt privileged to have known and spent time with. On Thursday 15 January, in jam-packed rooms at Stanmer House in Brighton, tributes and memories were shared. 

Richard’s kindness, generosity, non-judgemental nature and willingness to listen were mentioned many times over, amid anecdotes about the difference he had made, especially within Brighton and Hove’s refugee and sanctuary communities. People described how Richard’s small acts, as well as his support and friendship, had a profound impact on their lives.

Last year some of us wrote a blog post about the power of community to support those displaced by environmental disaster, conflict and violence. We wrote:

Community is not a thing that exists before the interactions that create it. It makes no sense to think of community as separate from exchanges and connections within a group of people. It is the very act of exchange that forms a community. 

In this way, Richard helped create community through the connections he made. His work and friendships in the local community facilitated the exchange of knowledge, language, humour, music, food: helping build what we often describe as the sanctuary community in Brighton and Hove. 

‘Show of hearts on the beach as part of the Together With Refugees week of action in 2021

Richard recognised the different spaces in which communities could grow. In a piece about the City of Sanctuary initiative during the COVID-19 pandemic, Richard was quoted as saying:

We found different ways of connecting people inside our city and far beyond … [with] dozens of online events to make participants laugh, cry and be inspired, in an imagined world where everyone feels safe and welcome and can realise their dreams.

Richard was an ever-present at the Sussex Centre for Migration Research conferences and dinners over the last decade. He always made himself available to support and lead local causes. He made a lasting impact on support for refugees in Brighton alongside many other social justice causes. We will miss him deeply.

In memory of Richard’s rich contribution to our university and local community, SCMR plans to dedicate a prize in his honour to the MA migration student who does most to raise and support refugee voices through research and/or activism. 

Richard’s family have requested that those who wish to remember Richard can do so by making a contribution to Hummingbird, one of the organisations that he held so dear: https://chuffed.org/project/163825-in-memory-of-richard-williams 

Individual tributes 

Since I arrived in Sussex in 2016, Richard was always a recurrent name. Someone people encouraged me to contact, someone who knew what was going on in the region in relation to migration and asylum, someone who was not only well networked but always supportive and constructive. My individual interactions with Richard confirmed that. When I started working on setting up a Migration Law Clinic at the University of Sussex together with Judith Townend, Richard was there, available to offer wise words of advice, useful tips, and suggestions about the possible scope and priorities of the Clinic. The Clinic eventually came to fruition, thanks to Richard and other wonderful supporters. Richard was also a beacon of hope in relation to a range of other social justice causes, and key to rallying interest for so many community activities. The way he combined knowledgeable advice, calm demeanour, and a friendly smile was so inspiring. He’ll be sorely missed. (Nuno Ferreira, University of Sussex)

It was over a decade ago that I made contact with the fledgling Sanctuary on Sea group to see how I might become involved as a volunteer. I expect it was Richard who answered my email, and I met him for the first time at a meeting where he and other members were very warm and welcoming; I remember being struck by what a lovely and interesting group of people they were. I’m grateful that I was able to become part of that community too, and thankful for the connections and friendships that Richard and others helped facilitate. In the years I knew Richard I was impressed by his kindness and deep commitment to building community for those seeking sanctuary, and have greatly benefited from his generosity of time and expertise. Richard encouraged those of us based at University of Sussex with our application to become a University of Sanctuary, which we did in 2020. In the years since, he was on hand for advice and guidance based on his many years working as a migration specialist. Behind the scenes, he was often advocating for individuals and providing an invaluable source of support for those from backgrounds of forced migration. Re-reading old messages now, I’m struck by the care and detail of his replies, and always encouraging and open to hearing the views of others. In recent years, I enjoyed conversations with him at the annual SCMR dinner in Brighton and learning a bit more about his other interests, experiences and travel; I was always pleased if I’d been seated near him. Richard will be so missed by those in the Sanctuary and University community. (Judith Townend, University of Sussex) 

I met Richard while I was still a practising lawyer, when I was asked to work on a research project at Migration Work, a consultancy CIC that he was one of the founders of. I had an ‘interview’ with him and one of the other co-founders in a cafe in the North Laine and immediately knew we were going to be friends. He was so much at the heart of everything to do with refugees and migrants in Brighton, as well as nationally and internationally, that we saw each other often. He was also always up for a birthday party – one of my nicest recent memories is of sunset drinks on the hillfort on the evening of my 50th birthday. We were in the same room, having a meeting about another project, when the news came through that the Supreme Court had concluded the Rwanda scheme was unlawful, so we all shared the enormous relief and joy, which is all too rare when you work in anything related to migrant and refugee support at the moment! A wonderful man, friend and colleague, and I miss him. (Jo Wilding, University of Sussex)

Richard has been such a key part of the local migrant and refugee rights community, it’s hard to imagine how it will be without him. Richard was a regular at our SCMR events and always an authoritative source of information, as well as a lot of fun to chat with. When the Taliban regained power, Richard was a huge support to our Afghan students who needed to be evacuated. He was extremely generous in providing practical advice and guidance to them, and sharing access to his extensive network of contacts. But most importantly, he was a friend to them and a kind listener, spending hours on the phone and WhatsApp with them, as they went through such a confusing, chaotic and scary time.  They, and I, will always remember his support, and I imagine that’s multiplied many times over given the huge number of people he’s worked with and helped over the years.  Richard, you will be sorely missed. (Ceri Oeppen, Co-Director of SCMR, University of Sussex)

I am grateful that I was able to meet Richard and learn from him over the years. He was a kind, warm and deeply knowledgeable person who led the way, consistently and in so many ways. A true inspiration who left a deep impression on me – personally and professionally. I lack words, beside that he will be so, so missed. (Sarah Scuzzarello, SCMR, University of Sussex)

It’s hard to remember exactly when I first met Richard, because he was someone who was always just there — quietly working in the sanctuary community, generously sharing his knowledge and wisdom. I remember we began working together more formally around a decade ago, when I joined Sanctuary on Sea. Richard, nearly always accompanied by his dog Chester, chaired our meetings with his characteristic warmth, modesty, and gentle humour. He had a way of making everyone feel heard and valued. Richard was generous with his time and believed deeply in community and in the need to work together to build a world that was more compassionate, and more just for people seeking sanctuary. He was a beacon of light and we will miss him greatly.  (Linda Morrice, University of Sussex)

I found Richard to be quiet and unassuming as a person but a strong presence whenever we bumped into each other. These encounters were usually social justice campaigns or academic events with public outreach where Richard had done much of the background heavy-lifting to make them happen. I recall the launch of Brighton as Sanctuary on Sea, where three of our fantastic MA migration students were strongly involved in bringing things together and how warmly they spoke of working with and learning under Richard’s guidance. We opened the Migrant Lives Matter arts and music festival together at the ACCA some years back. By that time Richard was already a regular at our SCMR conference and famous dinners, something that continued even this October. Richard was funny and had a dark slightly sarcastic sense of humour, always asking me what he had done to deserve an invite this year. To which the correct reply would be: probably as much if not more than anyone else in stitching together the networks of Brighton’s progressive NGO community linked to the University than anyone else. I always enjoyed chatting and catching up – there was a lot of mutual respect between Richard and the SCMR community. He was one of the family.

Alongside Richard’s strong dedication to supporting the refugee community and a myriad of social justice causes, for which he is probably known most locally, he was a Europeanist and we often chatted about Europe, politically and culturally, before Britain’s opportunity to participate in those ideas and projects was brutally cut off to no benefit nor purpose. I didn’t know Richard well personally, but our lives had put us on the same side of most arguments. He was omnipresent at progressive community events I attended and a calming and gentle presence. I am saddened by his passing and will miss him, not least at next year’s SCMR-JEMS conference. I’m pleased that we at the SCMR are going to dedicate a prize in his honour to the MA migration student who does most to raise and support “refugee voices” through research and/or activism.

When I look at the remarkable sizeable donation to be made to Hummingbird in his honour and I think about the massive number of people crammed into Stanmer House at his memorial event -I even met my greengrocer there!- it is clear that many people appreciate, value, and are touched by Richard’s contributions as a person and an activist. Perhaps Richard was not able to fully appreciate this himself at times, but I truly hope that in better moments he was. Brighton has lost the go-to person joining all the dots of the progressive NGO community. We will miss him. And so will future refugee communities who will not know him. What to say? Perhaps the best way to commemorate Richard is to keep the light burning on the causes he held so dear in the difficult times we face today.    (Paul Statham, SCMR Director, UoS)

In celebrating Richard’s 50th birthday – I remember telling him that he was the ideal global citizen. That term was out of fashion, even then, but Richard always embodied the combination of analysis and activism that I think it required and his vision was always big. He was always so thoughtful, and clear on the practical implications of concern for others; so insightful in his strategies for turning ideas into actual change and so inspirational in his continual, tireless effort to do the often thankless work of making that happen. I was always very proud to consider him a friend.

I first met Richard in 1998 in Brussels where he was the EU Representative for the European Council for Refugees and Exiles (ECRE). I was a PhD student and had made an appointment with him for my own research – he always had a particular interest in, and patience for research that was not very common amongst that very high level of EU focused activists. He took time to explain the implications of various arcane bits of legislation and whenever I was back in Brussels, he gave up time to meet. A decade later and we were both back in Brighton. We set up a visiting fellowship for him at Sussex and renewed it every three years – 2008 until now. Richard was the longest running visiting fellow in the School of Global Studies. Others have spoken about the impact he had on the University, but more than a decade of cohorts on our MA Migration programmes and doctoral researchers got to know him and those with an activist interest have become close friends.When Richard set up Sanctuary on Sea, in 2014, I was excited to get involved. Having worked for so long at a national and international level, Richard really understood the value of work in the city. I took over as chair on a temporary basis when he stepped down in 2024 and only then realised quite how much work he had been doing across the community. He had set up new networks during Covid, a new listserv for refugee support in the city that now has more than 100 people on it and pretty much single-handedly kept an active social media profile and regular newsletter going. He also developed connections with the Council and was regularly involved as a trustee of City of Sanctuary UK. He was a one-man campaigning organisation. His impact remains across the city and beyond. He has been, and will always be, an impossible act to follow. (Mike Collyer, Head of Geography, University of Sussex).

Posted in Academic Life, Migration Comments

Borders, belonging and ballots: the electoral marginalization of self-settled refugees in Tanzania

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Leonard Chimanda, Postgraduate Researcher, Faculty of Social Sciences: School of Law

Until refugees acquire the nationality of the host state or return to their states of origin, several years can pass. In that period, what are the avenues of political voice available to refugees? Voting rights are not the only conceivable avenue yet a central one (Dana Schmalz, 2021, p. 95) 

With just few weeks to go until Tanzania’s General Election on October 29, 2025, my mind turns to the significant democratic process unfolding in my home country. During my fieldwork in Kigoma villages, Tanzania, earlier this year, researching durable solutions for self-settled refugees in the area, the lack of voting rights for this population became apparent. Many refugees in the villages fled the Hutu-Tutsi conflict in Burundi and arrived in Tanzania in 1972 and are approaching their 53rd year without the right to vote in not only general elections but also local government elections. This creates a clear democratic gap in the country, which hosts a significant group in a situation of protracted displacement and whose political needs and preferences are ignored. 

Contextualizing the 2025 Tanzanian General Election 

Tanzania’s electoral landscape is dynamic, with the National Electoral Commission pledging a transparent, fair, and peaceful process. The commission has confirmed arrangements for 99,911 polling stations across mainland Tanzania and Zanzibar, with over 37 million registered voters. Notably, for the first time, prisoners will be allowed to vote in the presidential election, albeit with certain security restrictions. I find it striking, and somewhat confusing to understand, that prisoners are being granted this right while refugees, who have committed no crime other than fleeing war, are excluded; a disparity that feels contrary to principles of humanity, equality and social inclusion. 

The context of Refugees in Kigoma villages 

The plight of self-settled Burundian refugees in Tanzania is particularly complex. The Hutu Burundian refugees in Kigoma villages share the same ethnic origin as the surrounding local Ha community; their languages are mutually intelligible, reflecting the arbitrary nature of borders drawn during the 1884 Berlin Conference. This cultural and ethnic affinity with their host community is one of the factors that underpin my argument that a grant of voting rights to these refugees should be considered. Furthermore, repatriation to Burundi is challenging due to their lost connections with their country of origin, and resettlement to a third country isn’t a viable option for most. As such, for the more than 20,000 refugees present in Kigoma villages, a local solution (naturalization or grant of permanent residence status) in Tanzania would be the most plausible path. The majority were born in Tanzania, fostering deep bonds and potential sense of belonging with the country. I imagine as a parent seeing my child grow into adulthood without ever having voted and this makes me think of my own lovely daughters Samantha and Sharon, the thought fills me with sadness. 

Village market used by both locals and refugees at Kinazi village in Buhigwe District, Kigoma region. Photo by the author.

What are the Legal Standards on Voting Rights for Refugees? 

There is a developing scholarship advocating for the enfranchisement of refugees. Bender for instance, argues that, if they are affected by decisions of their host state, refugees should be granted the right to vote immediately after they get refugee status. Nonetheless, the presumption that refugee status is temporary has generally led to limited right to vote. The general presumption has been that refugees will go back to their countries of origin, immediately after the situation that made them flee ceases. This presumption has made most countries in the world exempt refugees from voting.  

Only a few countries allow refugees to vote. In Malawi, for instance refugees who have stayed in the country for at least 7 years can vote in general elections. The same is accorded to refugees in Chile, Ecuador, New Zealand and Uruguay with varying length of residency requirements; from 1 year in New Zealand to 15 years in Uruguay. Other countries though do not allow refugees to vote in national elections they grant voting rights to refugees during local government elections. In Sweden for instance, refugees who have been in the country for a minimum of 3 continuous years are allowed to vote in municipal and county elections. Another example can be picked from the United Kingdom where though voting rights are not granted to refugee per se, refugees who are Commonwealth citizens have voting rights during parliamentary and local government elections.  

While refugee exemption from voting rights can be justified, especially because of the temporality of the refugee status, the protractedness of refugee situation presents a separate case worthy to bring a different policy paradigm. In a protracted refugee situation, refugees stay in a host country for a long time without a prospect of a durable solution. In these circumstances and with time, refugees become detached from their countries of origin and become attached to their host states to the extent that the host state becomes their only hope where their rights including voting rights can be realized. The United Nations Refugee Convention of 1951 is silent on refugees’ right to political participation, as is the OAU Refugee Convention of 1969. This brings me to a question: to what extent does international refugee law address refugee problems, especially protracted refugee situations in the Global South? This question aligns with third world approaches to international law (TWAIL). TWAIL critiques the relevance of international law for marginalized groups in the Global South. Particularly, the second phase of TWAIL (TWAIL 2) while acknowledging the coloniality of international law, holds States in the Global South responsible for their failure to protect their own marginalized people even in circumstances where they can. TWAIL 2 points out human rights violations as an example of state oppression against marginalized people in the Global South countries. Affirming this TWAIL 2 proposition, Tanzania, which hosts over 200, 000 refugees (including refugees in Kigoma villages) in situation of protracted displacement, does not grant them voting rights neither during national elections nor during local government elections.  

The Global Compact on Refugees (GCR), a current implementation framework of international refugee law, while silent on political rights for refugees, nonetheless recognizes the precarity of refugee livelihoods especially in a protracted situation. The GCR calls for international cooperation in finding solutions for refugees in protracted displacement appreciating the fact that most of these people are in Global South countries whose economy is unstable.  

Refugees in Kigoma villages have not exercised voting rights for more than 50 years since their arrival in 1972. Most of them were born in Tanzania and there is currently a fourth generation of these refugees in the country. Many of them know next to nothing about Burundi (their country of origin) and they consider Tanzania their ‘home’. They are emotionally and materially attached to Tanzania, making important economic contributions to the country, unlikely to return to Burundi, and they are affected by decisions made by political leaders elected through general elections. It is therefore pivotal and logical that the country re-considers extending voting rights to this population. 

Way forward 

Tanzania approaches its general election: a critical moment in democratic states. Reflections on inclusivity, democratic engagement, and the rights of all residents including long-standing refugee populations are vital. Recognizing the fact that protection of refugees is the responsibility of the international community and informed by the spirit of the Global Compact on Refugees, I call for effective international cooperation especially in identifying protracted refugee situations and offering appropriate support to host states towards comprehensive solutions.   

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The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the individual authors and do not represent the Sussex Centre for Migration Research (SCMR).