Four human rights organisations – the Association for Juridical Studies on Migration (Italy), Network of University Legal Aid Institutions (Nigeria), Avocats Sans Frontières (Belgium), and Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (Egypt) – have expressed worry over border externalisation policies by the European Union and its member states.

The rights groups said the EU’s externalisation policies “severely” restricted the freedom of movement of African citizens and, as a result, constitute a serious obstacle to the fundamental right to asylum.

The groups said this during a three-day conference which ended on Friday with the theme, ‘Border externalisation policies: consequences on mobility in Africa and on the right to asylum.’

During the conference, which took place simultaneously in Abuja, Roma, Tunis, and Libya, the organisations, in collaboration with experts, developed transnational strategies to fight against the EU’s externalisation policies.

They said the European externalisation policies were part of a broader global migration management strategy, in which the reinforcement of borders, security policies, rushed expulsions, and delocalisation of border control play a central role.

The groups also referenced the new externalisation agreement between the EU and Libya, in which the Libyan government would prevent African migrants from departing Libya and arriving in the Southern borders of the EU.

The rights groups, in a statement after the conference, worried that the externalisation policies violated the rights of migrants and refugees.

The organisations said part of the objectives reached at the conference include ensuring the accountability of African and European states for “grave fundamental rights violations of the rights of people on the move, especially the right to liberty and security, including by advocating for the strengthening of human rights sanction mechanisms and universal jurisdiction.”

They also said they were committed to monitoring free trade agreements among African, ECOWAS, and EU countries, and highlight the ways in which they limit the freedom of movement and encourage human trafficking.