The British Home Office has launched a new advertising campaign on Albanian social media platforms to discourage Albanians from migrating to the UK after 2022 saw a record number of people seeking asylum in the country, but it has been branded pointless by critics.
According to the Ministry of Interior, the ads will run on Instagram and Facebook in Albanian and English, warning people about the consequences of entering the country illegally.
"If you come to the UK illegally, you face PREVENTION and REMOVAL," reads one of the ads, with a photo of a police officer.
But refugee law expert and director of the organization Stand For All, Daniel Sohege, said: “PR stunt policies may help the government distract public attention from reality in the short term, but they achieve nothing more than wasting more money.”
He added: "The reality is that Albanians seeking asylum in the UK often have very good reasons and an advertisement is not going to change that. Albania is one of the poorest countries in Europe, which fuels trafficking. Pretending otherwise is absurd."
The government declined to reveal the amount being spent on the campaign, but said it aims to "make clear the risks" migrants may face when crossing the English Channel in small boats.
According to the Home Office, Albania is a “safe and prosperous country” and many nationals “travel through several countries on their way to the UK”, before submitting “false asylum claims upon arrival”.
However, the problem with this statement is that in 2022, about half of the pending asylum applications from Albanians were approved, while more were approved on appeal. Most of those approved were women and included cases linked to sex trafficking and domestic violence, and others involved loan sharks, revenge killings, or pressure from organized crime.
A total of 13,741 applications were submitted by Albanians during this year, while almost 10,000 were submitted by those who arrived by boat.
Many Albanians made their way to the UK via small boats, following advertisements on Facebook and Instagram placed by people smugglers.
Immigration Secretary Robert Jenrick said: “We are determined to stop the boats, and the campaign, which starts in Albania this week, is just one element of the Home Office’s growing work to help dispel myths about illegal travel to the UK, explain the reality and combat the lies peddled by the evil people smugglers who profit from this vile trade.”
The Conservative government's action was condemned by the opposition Labour Party, which said "no one believes it", while others called it pointless. This is because similar campaigns had been carried out last year, but they did nothing to deter the number of people who made the journey.
Yvette Cooper, the UK's shadow home secretary, said the Conservative Party had failed at every opportunity to address the migration crisis with its proposed solutions.
"It is incredible that as the Channel crossings continue to rise and the asylum system is in chaos, all the Conservatives can think of to stop criminal gangs is a publicity campaign," she said.
"At every turn, the Conservatives' so-called solutions fail to meet the scale of the crisis. All they do is skirt around the problem."
Refugee NGOs have also risen up, accusing the government of simply repeating the myth that refugee migration is illegal, when in fact it is protected by the Refugee Convention, which the UK was involved in drafting.
Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama has also been vocal about the rhetoric and tactics used by the British government against Albanians. In March, he called the segregation of Albanian immigrants a “shameful” moment for British politics.
With information from Euractiv
