Suchergebnisse

The thirteenth session of the Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) was held in Geneva, December 1–9, 1960.1 Ambassador Max H. Wershof, permanent representative of Canada to the European Office of the UN in Geneva, was elected chairman.

The Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration was established during the fourth session of the Provisional Intergovernmental Committee for the Movement of Migrants from Europe which met in Geneva from October 13 to 21, 1952. Twenty member governments sent official delegations to this session, which had been called to discuss the need for the continuing existence of the migration committee beyond the twelve month period ending December 1952 and to decide whether the experimental plan of attack on Europe's chronic surplus population problem during the previous year should be broadened or abandoned. Count Justo Giusti del Giaro (Italy) was unanimously elected as chairman and A. L. Nutt (Australia), N. Hadji Vassiliou (Greece) and Fernando Donoso (Chile) as first and second vice chairmen and rapporteur, respectively. During the nine-day conference, the committee voted to change its name to Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM); to continue the activities of the committee in Geneva through, 1953 and to make plans during the coming year for the future; to set themselves the 1953 target of moving 120,000 of western Europe's surplus to new homes overseas; to authorize the committee to attempt to improve the selection and settlement services involved in the movement of migrants in the expectation that this would substantially speed up and increase movement;, to establish a $2,147,000 administrative and a $34,608,475 operational budget to effect the 1953 movements; and to continue investigations and discussions on the possibilities of securing outside financial and technical assistance for the establishment of land settlement projects in immigration countries.

The fourteenth session of the Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) was held in Geneva from May 11 to 17, 1961.1 The Spanish Minister Plenipotentiary, D. José Manuel Aniel-Quiroga, permanent delegate to the European office of the United Nations, was elected by the Council to chair the session. During the first day of the session the United Kingdom was unanimously admitted to membership in ICEM, bringing total membership to 30 countries.

The twelfth session of the Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) was held in Naples, May 5–13, 1960. Representative Francis E. Walter of Pennsylvania was chairman of the session. A highlight of the meeting was the ceremony honoring the one millionth migrant to be resettled by ICEM, an eleven-year-old Latvian boy named Andrejs Suritis, who subsequently flew to the United States with his father.

The Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) met in Geneva from April 27 to May 4, 1955, after a week-long meeting of the ninemember Executive Committee. The Council approved a $48 million budget, of which $2.5 million was earmarked for administrative expenses. The $46.6 million operational budget would finance the processing, transport and resettlement of the 142, 165 Europeans the Committee hoped to move in 1955. The major countries of immigration were expected to be Australia, United States, Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Venezuela; major countries of emigration were expected to be Trieste and Italy, Germany, Austria, Greece, Netherlands.

The Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) held its fifteenth session from October 23 to October 27, 1961, in Geneva, under the chairmanship of Dr. Mario Raul Pico (Argentina). During the first day's meeting, the delegates granted observer status to delegations from Japan and the European Economic Community (EEC). The Council examined a progress report in which it was noted that the Committee had helped re-establish in new homes 56,462 migrants in the first seven months of 1961—a drop of almost 3,000 from the same period in 1960. The decline resulted chiefly from a slowdown in migration to Australia. The total number of workers—both industrial and agricultural—leaving Europe for Latin America under ICEM auspices during the seven-month period was almost double that of 1960.

The Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) held its eighteenth session on November 12–16, 1962, under the chairmanship of Mr. Peers L. Carter, United Kingdom permanent representative to the European Office of the United Nations. The Canadian ambassador informed the Council that Canada would resign its membership in ICEM, effective December 31, 1962. The Canadian delegate stressed that his government's departure from ICEM in no way diminished Canada's interest and concern for refugees. He said that the Canadian government would examine from year to year proposals to make a special voluntary grant to ICEM for the transport of refugees. The Council took note of the Canadian government's decision with deep regret.

The Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) held its twentieth session on October 14–18, 1963, under the chairmanship of Mr. D. Ramon Huidobro, permanent Chilean representative to the European Office of the UN. ICEM Director B. W. Haveman keynoted a discussion of ICEM's proper role with his request that fuller use be made of ICEM's migration machinery which, he pointed out, had aided in the resettlement of some one and one-quarter million people during the past eleven years. Mr. Haveman's proposals for future action included: 1) making the good offices and machinery of ICEM available in areas in which ICEM did not at present operate; 2) establishing improved reception and placement services, especially in Latin America; 3) exploring the possibilities of making the fullest use of ICEM in carrying out governmental migration policies and programs; and 4) encouraging the settlement of European farmers in Latin America.

The tenth session of the Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) was held in Geneva, April 7–10, 1959. Ambassador Alberto Berio, chief of the permanent delegation of Italy to the European Office of the UN, was elected to succeed Ambassador H. de Souza-Gomes (Brazil) as Council Chairman, following which Mr. A. Yerocostopoulos, chief of the Greek delegation, asked immigration countries to increase the numbers of Greek workers admitted as migrants. Citing the facts that his country had the highest net annual birth rate in Europe and that the Greek economy could absorb barely half the 50,000 new workers entering the labor market each year, he expressed the hope that the level of ICEM-assisted migrants might be raised and maintained at 10,000 per year, that is, almost double the current intake.

The ninth session of the Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) met in Geneva, November 13–19, 1958. At the opening meeting of the Council the government of Panama was welcomed as the 28th member of ICEM. On November 14, the Council approved two pilot projects for developing services to assist migrants and the governments of emigration and immigration countries. One was the establishment of an international vocational training center at Cattolica vocational training center at Cattolica in Italy to train workers for emigration to overseas immigration countries, as well as for intra-European emigration. The second project was the organization of a training course for immigration and placement officers to be set up by migration officials of the Canadian government; the task of this course was to give theoretical and practical training to officials of various immigration countries to fit them for selection, counselling, and placement of immigrants. At the same meeting, the Council decided to make fresh appeals for further financial contributions from its member governments to pay for transport of European refugees from the Far East to countries of asylum.

The Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) held its fifth session in Geneva, October I–10, 1956; prior to the session the nine-nation Executive Committee held a private session beginning on September 20. After adopting the Director's progress report, a final 1956 movement program of 126,160 Europeans, and a budget of $44.5 million, the Council approved the 1957 plan for resettlement of 122,000 European migrants at a cost of nearly $44 million. Delegates from ten nations pledged contributions amounting to $680,680 for a special fund of nearly $1 million established by the Council for assistance to refugees and migration services. The ICEM Director, Harold H. Tittmann, reported the decline in 1956 of movements to Latin America, and suggested the possibility of increased migration to Colombia, which had accepted relatively few European migrants. A United States delegate (Walter) announced that the United States was prepared to allocate part of its $15 million Latin American Development Fund to promote land settlement programs in Latin America. He stated that the United States could not originate such programs, but required a Latin American nation to make land available for resettlement of migrants and a migrant-sending European nation to contribute its share of financial and economic assistance. In accordance with the United States offer the Argentine delegate said his government would set aside 70 plots of land to assist immigrants in the Melchior Romero colony near Buenos Aires. In addition, 23,000 hectares of land owned by the Banco de la Naoion and located in various parts of the country would be earmarked for other projects.

The Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) held its eighth session in Geneva from May 7 to 13, 1958. The session opened with the unanimous election of Marcus Daly as Director of ICEM to succeed Harold H. Tittmann. In his report on ICEM activities in 1957 Mr. Tittmann announced that during the year ICEM had moved 194,000 migrants and refugees, bringing the sixyear total to 775,000. The retiring director suggested that the future program of ICEM should include 1) consultations between the emigration countries of Europe and the immigration countries overseas with regard to the planning of migration programs; 2) the closest possible relationship between ICEM and the European Economic Community, and the free trade area if it were set up, which were concerned with the mobility of manpower within Europe; and 3) efforts to make effective activities of ICEM other than transport which helped develop and improve migration and to assure stable financing for them. It was announced that an estimated total of 126,000 migrants would be moved by ICEM in 1958, representing a decrease of twenty percent below the total previously estimated and a decrease of 67,747 from the number of migrants moved by ICEM in 1957. The decrease was ascribed to reductions in immigration programs and stricter selection requirements imposed by receiving countries as the result of economic retrenchment. ICEM expected to spend $34,575,767 in effecting the movements.

Eighth SessionThe eighth session of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) was held in Geneva from November 30 to December 4, 1954. With the opening of the session, the Constitution entered into force, the required sixteen ratifications having been deposited by Argentina, Australia, Austria, Canada, Chile, Denmark, German Federal Republic, Greece, Israel, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Paraguay, Sweden, Switzerland and the United States During the session, Costa Rica deposited its instrument of ratification. A final revised budget and plan of operation for 1954 was approved which provided for the overseas migration of 119,261 persons at a total cost of $48,782,776, as compared with $25,855,416 in 1953 to move 143,420 persons. On the recommendation of the Director of ICEM (Gibson) a budget of $46.5 million was approved for a 1955 program to assist the movement of 143,420 persons. Problems of the future budgetary position of ICEM were discussed at the meeting; a member of the United States delegation (Jensen) warned the meeting not to assume "that the Committee may go on indefinitely with a higher budget each year than the year before, unless the Committee can increase each year the proportion of its operations that are on a self-reimbursable basis". Various proposals to meet the expected budgetary deficit of $1.8 million in 1955 were discussed. The Director proposed that part of this sum could come from token prepayments by emigrants or partial reimbursement after settlements. Other delegations, including the Netherlands, opposed the principle of payment by emigrants and proposed as alternatives either that countries in which ICEM made contributions to the national income through contracts for shipping or other services repay ten percent of these amounts (an estimated $1.5 million in additional income) or that each sending and receiving country pay an additional $10 per migrant moved (an estimated $2.5 million).

The Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration held its fifth session at Geneva from April 16 to 24, 1953. Representatives were present from 21 of the 22 member governments, and several non-member governments and agencies sent observers. The subcommittee on finances reported that gross income had amounted to $26,114,357 in 1952, and gross expenditures totaled $19,446,549, leaving a budgetary surplus of $6,667,808. Reimbursements for movements completed in 1952 had been "most satisfying", but it was anticipated that a slower rate of reimbursement would prevail in 1953, and that additional funds would therefore be required. The subcommittee also re-ported that between February 1, 1952, and December 21, 1952, 77,626 persons, among them 31,226 refugees, had been moved from Europe. The Director, Mr. Hugh Gibson, reported the following developments in the activities of ICEM: 1) provision had been made for training building laborers in Italy destined to migrate to Brazil (in collaboration with the Brazilian and Italian governments and the International Labor Organization), and for a number of preselection projects; 2) in Greece, in collaboration with UNESCO, a language training program for prospective migrants to Australia had been initiated; 3) Brazil, Argentina, Chile and Venezuela were making "definite progress" in the area of land resettlement; and 4) other projects of a "technical nature" were being considered. The fifth session also studied a draft constitution for the Committee which had been prepared by the Director at the request of the fourth session. The delegates concluded that eventual acceptance of the constitution by member governments would give the Committee "more stability and an anticipated life span of from three to five years", and decided to refer the draft agreement to governments for comment before the next session of ICEM.

The Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) held its sixth session in Geneva, April 8–12, 1957.1 The Council took note of two reports submitted by the Director describing the work of the Committee from January 1956 through February 1957. The reports pointed out that there had been a further decline in overseas emigration from Italy and Greece, especially to Latin American countries, and an increase in emigration from Austria, the Federal Republic of Germany, and the Netherlands. On the other hand, migration to the United States had reached a high level due to a sharp increase in the rate of issue of visas shortly before the expiry of the Refugee Relief Act atthe end of 1956. Discussing the reports, Council delegates expressed their concern at the decrease in movements to Latin America, especially movements of workers as distinct from those of persons emigrating under family reunion schemes. With regard to land settlement the Council was informed that the decision of the United States to devote part of its Latin American Development Fund to the promotion of land settlement schemes had stimulated interest in this field. Eight projects prepared with the cooperation of ICEM had been submitted by the governments concerned to the United States authorities. With respect to transport, the reports drew attention to the difficulties resulting from the progressive increase in passenger fares and the withdrawal of vessels formerly available for the movement of migrants. During the discussion, several delegates emphasized that the continuous and orderly movement of migrants depended on the availability of adequate transport facilities. The Council learned that the United States was considering the possibility of making available to ICEM three vessels formerly used as United States troop carriers.