As of 28 September, Sri Lanka, with a population of 21.5 million, had detected only 3,360 cases of COVID-19. Although the country has been lauded for its containment of the virus, members of Sri Lanka’s Muslim minority have allegedly become stigmatised as carriers of the virus. There is also little information available concerning the impact […]
Detention Blog
02 October 2020 – North Korea
Having closed its borders in January in an attempt to prevent the spread of the virus into the country from China, North Korea has declared that it has no cases of COVID-19. The country is believed to have established anti-coronavirus rules that involve “indiscriminate shooting” of anyone approaching its borders illegally. On 24 September 2020, […]
01 October 2020 – United Kingdom
The Covid-19 pandemic appears to be fundamentally altering how migrants and asylum seekers arrive in the UK … and how the UK responds to these arrivals. So far this year, some 7,000 people have arrived irregularly on small boats that have made the perilous crossing of the Channel–more than three times the number during all […]
01 October 2020 – Tuvalu
Like other Pacific-island nations that this platform has reported on (like Samoa and Tonga), Tuvalu had yet to report any COVID-19 cases as of October 2020. In March, the country instituted a State of Emergency and shut its borders to all inbound flights and vessels. Tuvalu has one hospital for its approximately 11,000-person population, with […]
30 September 2020 – Nauru
During a near 20-year period (2001-2019), the tiny island nation of Nauru hosted a controversial offshore processing centre for Australia that confined asylum seeking men, women, and children in order to prevent them from making their journeys to Australia. Since the facility officially closed, refugees and asylum seekers on the island have faced a precarious […]
30 September 2020 – Tonga
In March, Tonga instituted a State of Emergency and shut its borders in order to prevent a domestic outbreak. As with other Pacific-island nations like Palau and Samoa, Tonga remained as of October 2020 one of a small handful of countries that had not reported any COVID-19 cases. Historically, Tonga has not been a destination […]
29 September 2020 – Myanmar
There have been some 7,500 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 147 deaths in Myanmar. After weeks without any local transmissions, Myanmar reported an outbreak in the western Rakhine state in mid-August that has since spread across the country. As of September 21, 45,000 people had been quarantined in the country’s attempts to contain the virus. […]
29 September 2020 – Palau
Palau, a Pacific archipelago nation made up of more than 300 islands, has not been a significant destination for asylum seekers or refugees. However, its location–shared maritime borders with Indonesia, the Philippines, and Micronesia–is adjacent to important migration routes in Asia. Nevertheless, the country does not have national asylum legislation and the country is not […]
28 September 2020 – Bahrain
Responding to the Global Detention Project’s Covid-19 survey, Migrant-Rights.org, an advocacy organisation that aims to advance the rights of migrant workers, reported that in Bahrain, due to Covid-19, the Ministry of Interior issued a circular ordering authorities not to detain migrants because of their irregular status until the end of the year. Another circular has […]
27 September 2020 – Mongolia
Mongolia has been lauded for its efforts to contain the coronavirus despite having a long, porous border with China. As of 23 September, there had been 313 confirmed cases of COVID-19, and no deaths. However, there appears to be no publicly available information indicating the impact of the virus on migrants or asylum seekers, or […]
