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Intergovernmental Conference to adopt the Global Compact for safe, orderly and regular migration

Marrakech, Morocco

10 December 2018 to 11 December 2018

Overview

 The Global Compact for Migration represents a historic opportunity to improve international cooperation on migration, and to strengthen the contributions of migrants and migration to sustainable development. Today, there are over 258 million migrants around the world living outside their country of birth. This figure is expected to grow as a result of a number of factors including overall population growth, increasing connectivity, trade, rising inequality, demographic imbalances and climate change.

Migration provides immense opportunity and benefits – for the migrants, host communities and communities of origin. However, when poorly regulated it can create significant challenges. These challenges include overwhelming social infrastructures with the unexpected arrival of large numbers of people and the deaths of migrants undertaking dangerous journeys.

In this context, following and , UN Member States have agreed to adopt a (draft outcome document available in all official languages). It is the first-ever UN global agreement on a common approach to international migration in all its dimensions.

The Global Compact for Migration is non-legally binding. It is grounded in values of state sovereignty, responsibility-sharing, non-discrimination, and human rights, and recognizes that a cooperative approach is needed to optimize the overall benefits of migration, while addressing its risks and challenges for individuals and communities in countries of origin, transit and destination.

The Global Compact for Migration comprises 23 objectives for better managing migration at local, national, regional and global levels. The Global Compact for Migration:

  • aims to mitigate the adverse drivers and structural factors that hinder people from building and maintaining sustainable livelihoods in their countries of origin; 
  • intends to reduce the risks and vulnerabilities migrants face at different stages of migration by respecting, protecting and fulfilling their human rights and providing them with care and assistance;
  • seeks to address the legitimate concerns of states and communities, while recognizing that societies are undergoing demographic, economic, social and environmental changes at different scales that may have implications for and result from migration;
  • strives to create conducive conditions that enable all migrants to enrich our societies through their human, economic and social capacities, and thus facilitate their contributions to sustainable development at the local, national, regional and global levels.

Documents

 

Organization of work

  • A plenary debate on the 10th and 11th of December (9 am - 8 pm) during which Member States will confirm their political commitment to the Global Compact for Migration.

  • Two dialogues on the 10th and 11th of December (10 am – 1 pm and 3 pm – 6 pm) which serve to pave the way for concrete avenues for implementation and partnerships at all levels and with all relevant stakeholders. Both panels will be interactive, and will have one keynote speaker, and three panelists. Note Verbale OSRSG – 13 November 2018.

 

Monday, 10 December 2018

10 am – 1 pm and 3 pm – 6 pm

Promoting action on the commitments of the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration

 

Statements 

 

The panel provides an opportunity for Member States to announce and kick-start practical efforts to implement the Compact at the global, regional, national and sub-national levels, in line with the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and other policy frameworks.

 

 

Co-Chairs:

 

  • Amb. Mehmet Samsar, Ambassador/Director General of Consular Affairs, MFA, Turkey (biography)

 

  • H.E. M. Negash Kebret Botora, Ambassador of Ethiopia to the UN in Geneva (biography)

3:00 pm

Keynote remarks

 

  • Ms. Madeleine Albright, Chair of Albright Stonebridge Group  (remarks)

 

Panelists:

 
  • Mr. Angel Gurría, Secretary-General of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) () 

 

  • Ms. Tendayi Achiume, Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance () 

 
  • Dr. David Fine, Global Head of McKinsey’s Public and Social Sector Practice ( 

Tuesday, 11 December 2018

10 am – 1 pm and 3 pm – 6 pm

Partnerships and innovative initiatives for the way forward

 

Statements

 

This panel discusses how local authorities, the private sector, trade unions, civil society, academia, parliamentarians, national human rights institutions, the media and other stakeholders – including migrants and diaspora groups – can work together to support the implementation of the Global Compact and make migration work for all.

 

 

Co-Chairs:

 
  • Mr. Md. Shahidul Haque, Foreign Secretary, Bangladesh (biography)
 
  • H.E. Mr. E. Courtenay Rattray, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the UN NY, Jamaica (biography)
 

 

Keynote remarks:

 
  • Ms. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, chair of the High-Level Panel on International Migration in Africa (biography)
 

Panelists:

 
  • Ms. Manuela Carmena Castrillo, Mayor of Madrid (biography) 

  • Ms. Joanne Liu, President of Doctors without Borders (biography) 

  • Mr. Tarik Yousef, Director of the Brookings Doha Center () 

 

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