International Migration Review Forum 2026 - Informal interactive multi-stakeholder hearing (Continued)

Buenas tardes.

Good afternoon. I'm going to be moderating in Spanish, so please do reach for your headphones if you need them.

TALKING SPANISH Vamos a.

We are going to begin. It is 3pm and hopefully we are energized after having something to eat at lunch. It's a real pleasure. It's an honor to be here with you and to be able to share with you, representatives of government, of UN agencies, migrants, all of the struggles that we are undertaking at these times. So we're going to be beginning the third session for pathways for safe, orderly and regular migration. That's goals mentioned in the compact. And so I'll share some opening to some housekeeping notes. Some of you have changed seats and your organizations have been allocated seat numbers so that you can be given the floor. I'd ask you then to request. Use the microphone to request the floor so that you can be. Your seat can be listed and so that we can. If you already have requested the floor, please also request the floor again so that we can take note of exactly what your seat number is, so that when you're given the floor, you're given it in the right place. There is a three minute speaking slot and you are able to make use of the floor during that time. So we're going to begin with this very important panel. So we're talking about regular pathways for migration. We have heard today, we have heard in the reviews, the regional reviews, that this is an extremely important issue for dignified and human migration and for addressing the causes and also the effects, regular pathways for migration. And we have a panel this afternoon, a wonderful panel. We're going to be able to discuss how we review progress, what progress has been made from the IMF to date, regionally, nationally and globally. What are these gaps in implementation? This morning we got the message that it's very important to report about progress. But there is a gap that we're seeing on the ground and we need to look at that at all levels, nationally, regionally and globally. And how can we close these gaps? It's important for participation to bring to the table the experiences and local feedback for closing these gaps. What have we learned? This is our collective space for sharing the learnings across stakeholders and across governments. What commitments can we drive forward? What are the good practices that can be replicated? Even though we look around and things could be very disturbing, there are examples of how we can favor pathways for regular migration. And then there are also recommendations with a view to the future. We want to set a future in the short term, so that when you come back for the next review. We also want to set goals for the midterm so that we can continue with this accountability and also long term, so that there is real transformation in people's lives and realities. So without further ado, and just recalling the importance of having an intersectional approach and with the guiding principles of the compact, I'm going to introduce our panel and I'm grateful also to Monique, our colleague, who is our liaison with civil society and building the bridges across all of us here. So I want to introduce our panelists. Mr. Stefan Meisberg, Minister of Migration over Canada. Welcome. Mario Henio Vasquez, Executive Director. And she's based in Mexico. Welcome. And Stephanie Sebuga is a specialist in migration policies and labor issues from the US Labour Department. And welcome. We have a representative also for North America and Europe. The platform for youth and young migrants. Welcome. Let me just remind you that when you want to take the floor, if you do want to take the floor, please make sure you press the microphone button so that you know what seat you're in. And so I'll give the floor to the Minister for Refugees and Migration of Canada. You have the floor, sir.

Thank you very much for giving me the floor on behalf of of Canada. And this is giving us this opportunity to share our experiences.

Canada's experience is shaped by its geography and history and we know that other countries face very different realities and our experience may not apply elsewhere. However, I think we share a conviction that safe, orderly and regular pathways can work for all. For those wanting to stay temporarily or permanently in Canada, we have a variety of pathways. Through them, newcomers fill labour market needs, enrich our learning institutions, reunite with families, support growth in our regions and communities, and find protection in Canada. Global Compact for Migration principles, including a basis in human rights and gender responsiveness are foundational in designing these pathways. For example, gender based analysis plus strengthens policy development by improving our understanding of how different people experience policies and programs due to their gender and other factors. Canada welcomes newcomers to Canada through our Immigration Levels Plan. The plan allows us to determine the number of people that we will welcome each year and the pathways by which they will arrive. Our system allows us to refine how we select those newcomers who will come on a permanent basis to help meet the needs of our economy. We are able to prioritise key skills, language ability and work experience, particularly through our express entry system. Canada also provides permanent humanitarian and family pathways. Overall, hundreds of thousands of newcomers come to Canada each year to build a prosperous life for themselves and their families, settling permanently in Canada can lead eventually to citizenship. However, regular pathways are only effective when they are sustainable. Canada found that too high levels after the global pandemic placed pressure on housing, healthcare and community services. The capacity of communities to welcome and integrate newcomers was out of step with the number of newcomers. So Canada has taken decisive steps to stabilize both temporary and permanent resident levels. Through this adjustment, we aim to ensure that migration continues to benefit migrants and host communities alike and to maintain public confidence in our managed migration system and public support for immigration and refugee protection. Well governed migration benefits communities and enables migrants to succeed. This has been Canada's experience in implementing safe, orderly and regular pathway pathways in the context of the Global Compact for Migration. I hope that's been helpful. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Stefan Miles, board, for giving us these examples of how access to rights and regular pathways to migration can function well for all. Thank you. Thank you. I will move now to the specialist from the usa. You have the floor.

Good afternoon, everyone. It is an honor to be here today on behalf of the AFL cio, the largest federation of labor unions in the United states, representing nearly 15 million working people across every industry of the economy and with every type of immigration status, and also in solidarity and unity with my trade union siblings from around the world. Every day, workers and unions collaborate to better the lives of all workers, regardless of country of origin or immigration status. Our goal as part of the global labor movement has been clear since the adoption of the Global Compact to demand a migration governance system that centers decent work and ensures rights, equality, inclusion and universal social protections for all workers without exclusions. The implementation of the GCM has not delivered on those core demands. In fact, over the past four years, we have seen an alarming increase in policies that politicize migration to create division, criminalize migrants and further commodify immigrant labor. The global trend is particularly stark in the United States, where systematic and unforgiving mass deportation policies have stripped millions of immigrants, including many union members, of humanitarian protections and work authorization over the past year and a half. The occasion of the IMRF is an opportunity to explicitly call for meaningful commitments to decent work for all migrants. Instead, the perspective of trade unions is that the priorities and approaches being pursued by many states fail to meet the needs or uphold the rights of workers. When it comes to objectives 5 and 6 of the GCM, for example, the creation of regular migration schemes alone is not enough to claim progress. Put simply, not all regular pathways are safe or fair. In fact, temporary labor migration programs systematically and structurally exposed migrant workers to exploitation by recruiters, employers and others, deepening global inequality, perpetuating precarity and vulnerability, and effectively creating a near permanent subclass of exploitable workers with limited labor, human and political rights. To achieve real progress, states must champion an approach to labor migration that empowers migrants and reduces employers control over the process in order to safeguard rights and standards for everyone in our global economy. To do so, governments must fundamentally restructure labor migration pathways to end the commodification of migrant workers and to guarantee binding and effective oversight of every step of the process, including the recruitment industry. Importantly, temporary labor migration programs are not an effective solution to humanitarian or climate displacement or to promote economic development. Instead, governments should prioritize regularization schemes and permanent rights based on channels which allow migrants the freedom to move, settle work, preserve their family unity, and fully participate in society and civic life. The question is then, how do we achieve this? To be effective, regular migration pathways must ensure full worker rights, including freedom of association and mobility. This requires cooperation between sending and receiving countries to guarantee access to fundamental rights and injustice across borders. It requires workers to have a direct role in designing, negotiating and implementing these programs. And it necessitates reliance on the international labor organizations, conventions and tripartite mechanisms to form the necessary foundation for building a fair migration governance framework. As organized labor, we see how these policies play out in communities every day on the front lines. The true benchmark for progress is whether migrant and immigrant workers are better protected and better able to exercise their rights than they were four years ago. By that measure, the progress has been largely insufficient. As a starting point, workers and their unions expect states gathered in New York this week to respect international human rights obligations and binding norms, including explicitly affirming the right to freedom of association and collective bargaining without exclusion. These enabling rights serve as a necessary cornerstone to address the major issues affecting migrants around the world and to build solutions that are based on the guiding principles of the gcm. Once again, we come together this week at the IMRF with an opportunity to strengthen, not weaken our commitments to implement strategies that promote real progress rather than stagnation or regression. We stand ready to work with all of you to advance a model that centers fundamental rights, protects standards for everyone in the global economy and puts people over profit. Thank you.

Muchas gracias, Stephanie.

Thank you very much, Stephanie, for highlighting that it's not enough for there to be regular pathways if not all of them are fair, and we need to improve them to ensure that dignity is served for all. So thank you for highlighting the needs also of that important point. So we can. We'll now hear from Sister Maria Vasquez, Executive Director of the Scala Brignana's mission with migrants and refugees in Mexico. Thank you, Sister. You have the floor.

Excellencies, distinguished delegates, we are speaking from the roots themselves. As faith based organizations, we accompany these routes. We walk alongside them every day and what we see is clear, and it was repeated this morning. There is a deep gap between the pledge of sacred, safe, regular and orderly migration and the reality on the ground. When there are no accessible pathways, people don't just stop moving, they are just driven onto more dangerous roads. Routes and pathways where there is trafficking and exploitation. This is no accident. This is the outcome of policies that have closed down legal options or pathways without offering viable alternatives. Based on our tradition and faith, we affirm that every human life is sacred and protecting such a human life is not optional. This is why speaking of safe, regular and orderly pathways cannot be an abstract principle. It must be translated into concrete decisions. Today there are too many places in the world where access to basic rights is denied and identity. Healthcare, education, housing. And this limits the very possibility of regular migration. People are driven to irregularity, irregular living, and then they are penalized for how they live. Closing down regular pathways, well, then you open up room for criminal networks to enter. In this context, migration can be neither safe nor regular, nor orderly. And we should say this clearly. There is no safe migration when pregnant women and children face risks because of a lack of access to basic services. There is no regular migration when the habitual pathways are inaccessible, closed off. It is not orderly migration when systems depend on exclusion and discretionality. If we want truly safe, regular and orderly pathways, we must act on the foundations. Firstly, we should broaden in a meaningful way the legal and affordable accessible pathways. This should be a real mechanism that meets the current needs for mobility, family reunification and protection. Secondly, guaranteeing that all routes, regardless of their status, are routes with rights. This means effective access to essential services, protection from violence, exploitation or trafficking, an end to the detention of children and adolescents, guarantee of due process at every stage. And thirdly, this means addressing the structural causes that drive people to migrate in dangerous conditions. Irregularity doesn't just arise out of nowhere. It stems from inequality, climate change, violence and a lack of real alternatives. Fourth, ensuring that technologies that are used in the management of migration does not create new barriers or lead to discrimination. Digitization cannot become a new filter for exclusion. Routes and pathways also depend on trust. Trust cannot be built in a context where faith based organizations and Civil society are criminalized for accompanying migrant persons. Solidarity should never be criminalized. On the contrary, solidarity must be recognized and is an essential part of any system that hopes to be human and effective. Migrants themselves should be recognized as key stakeholders in the design of these pathways. They're not just users, but they are participants and they should be part of building the solution. Faith based organizations are not speaking about a remote reality. We accompany individuals when they cross borders, when they face hostile systems and environments, and when they are seeking to build their lives. And it is based on this experience that we say safe, orderly and regular pathways for migration are not achieved through greater control, but greater coherence. Consistency across policies and pledges, rights and practice. Coherence between what we say here and what happens on the pathways on the roads. Because it is on those pathways and on those roads where the meaning of this forum is determined. That is where our responsibility, our collective responsibility is tested. Thank you for your attention.

Thank you very much, Sister Mario Vasquez, for raising the issue of the impacts and the causes and for raising this axis of irregularity that stems from inequalities, and for telling us that solidarity should never be punished or penalized. The impact that you are having and how far we can go, go with support and accompaniment, and many of us are doing with faith based organizations on the ground. So we're going to close this panel with Feblessi webi, representative for North America and Europe for Migration, Youth and Children platforms. She has been in the regional reviews in America, the regional fora, and she's going to tell us about the gap review that they've been conducting over there. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm speaking today on behalf of the Migration, Youth and Children platform, a network of young people with lived experience of migration, bringing their voices directly to decisions made in rooms like this one. We're here because IMRF matters, but also we're here because there is a gap between what global commitments and promise young migrants and what actually happens in their real lives. Rights are recognized on paper, but for far too many young people on the move, those rights are simply out of reach in practice. And what our consultations have shown us is clearly this. Migrants are not passive, especially young migrants. We are already shaping migration systems, supporting families, navigating complex bureaucracies, bringing solutions to our communities. This roundtable is focused on pathways for safe, orderly and regular migration. This framing matters because the absence of safe and regular pathways is itself one of the biggest drivers of harm for young migrants. When legal routes are closed, inaccessible or too slow, young People don't stop moving. They move unsafely. And when they move unsafely, they are exposed to exploitation, trafficking and abuse, and exclusion from the very systems that are meant to be there for them. The problem is not a lack of commitment. The problem is a failure to translate commitments into pathways that young people can actually use. Take education. It is one of the clearest examples of this gap. Education is framed as a universal right, but in practice, migrant children and youth continue to be locked out of schools through documentation requirements, language barriers, school fees and discrimination. Young people we consulted told us about this directly. In Tunisia and across North Africa, undocumented children are excluded from formal education entirely. Families are left relying on informal arrangements that are inconsistent and often unaffordable. In the Dominican Republic, Haitian migrants youth face such severe documentation barriers that they're unable to sit through their national exams, blocking not just education, but any pathway to employment and stability. Yet we know what works. Germany, Colombia and Uganda have all demonstrated that removing documentation as a barrier to school access is possible and effective. The solutions therefore exist. What is missing is political will to implement their everywhere. When there are no safe and regular pathways, young migrants, especially those seeking work, become easy targets for exploitation. And exploitation often begins before the journey even starts, through deceptive recruitment, excessive fees and false promises. And unfortunately, it often continues along the migration route. The rise of digital recruitment platforms have made this worse, creating new forms of online exploitation that governance frameworks have not yet caught up with. Trafficking and labor exploitation are not isolated incidents. They are systemic outcomes of governance failures of systems that push young people into unsafe pathways because the safe ones are simply not available to them. Safe migration also means access to health care along the way. But migrant youth face systemic barriers such as legal restrictions, lack of documentation, language gaps and discrimination. Fear of deportation often stops people from seeking help, even in cases of emergencies. Young people told us that experiences of racism and dismissive treatment by health providers have actively discouraged them from coming back. Mental health is a particular gap. The journey itself takes quite a serious toll. And yet mental health services for migrants remain deeply unresourced and often completely inaccessible. We are asking for universal health care regardless of the migration status and for mental health support to be integrated across the entire migration journey, not just at the destination. So let me be concrete about what we're asking for. Firstly, expand access to safe and regular pathways for family reunification. Family unity is not a luxury. It is a foundation for health, learning and safety. Children and young people should not be separated from their families for years, while bureaucratic processes slowly move forward. Second, create Dedicated pathways for education and training so that young people can move legally to learn, not simply just to work. And of course, mutually recognize qualifications across borders, so that education actually leads somewhere and does not reset to zero every time someone crosses a border. Third, remove the documentation and administrative barriers that make regular pathways inaccessible in practice. A pathway that exists on paper but requires documents that are inaccessible or impossible to obtain in general is not a real pathway. Fourth, strengthen labor protections, eliminate recruitment fees, enforce the labor the employer pays principle, and of course, ensure access to justice for those who are exploited without the fear of being criminalized for their migration status. And finally, fifth, build the monitoring systems to track whether any of this is working with disaggregated data from age, gender and migration status, as well as clear benchmarks under the gcm, such states can be held accountable. Underpinning all of this, young people must be recognized as stakeholders within gcm, with participation that is institutionalized, properly sourced and embedded across every single stage of policymaking. That means funding youth led organization. That means creating real feedback mechanisms. That means making sure young people are in the room not just to be heard, but to actually influence the outcomes. The young people in the Migration, Youth and children platform are not waiting to be invited into the conversation. We're already here. We are already shaping communities, we're already developing solutions and we're already leading. This review cycle is an opportunity to close this gap, to move from commitment to action, from recognition to participation, from safe pathways on paper to safe pathways in practice. Young migrants are ready. The real question is whether the process is ready for them. Thank you.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you very much. Febilezi for Rembi ningas of the important role of the youth as rights holders and as actors, as stakeholders and as we've heard throughout the panel, that this is an opportunity for action, for recommendations. As we've said, there are five main ones and first one is a review and a review of accountability to see what actual regular pathways exist. So thank you very much. Thank you to all of our panelists. It's been great to have here representatives of trade unions, of young people, of faith based organisations, and if we do get organized, we can reduce insecurity for everyone, men, women, children. I think we're doing fairly well on time, so thank you for that. I note that some of you have changed seats, so if we say your name or the name of your organization and you're not where we expect you to be, please raise your hand. So first we'll hear from SOS Children Village 2599. Is that your search? Thank you very much, Madam Moderator, Distinguished delegates, it's a real honor to be here to address this forum. I am Nancy Martinez, I am part of SOS Children Peru. We're a 77 year old organization. We have been also in Peru for the last 54 years trying to ensure that every child grows up cared for by a family. I'd like to base the this statement on childhood in migration. Peru is the second largest receiver of the Venezuelan population and we're facing a growing challenge. By the end of 2025, it's predicted that some 2 million people would be received in the country, including 1.3 million with extreme need. And in this context, children and adolescents are the ones that face the greatest risks. Exclusion from education and very often they lose the care of a family. Based on our technical expertise and as co leaders in our network, we have worked together with the iom, UNDP and other organizations who have addressed this crisis. And thanks to these partnerships, we have been able to help more than 18,000 people and some 12,000 of them are children or adolescents. However, these efforts continue to be insufficient in light of the scale of the challenge. We're concerned about lack of funds being available internationally and this imbalance endangers the progress that has been made and limits our ability to respond in light of this civil society. We pledge our commitment to act in peace based on the following three priorities. Firstly, strengthening governance for protection systems for children and migrants to avoid the risk of them losing the care of a family. Secondly, to scale up regional solutions through the routes of care initiatives and others to ensure safe pathways and early recovery or detection. SOS Peru is working hand in hand with partners in Colombia, Ecuador and Brazil. And thirdly, to promote social cohesion by preventing discrimination and xenophobia and strengthening coexistence in host communities. Without sustainable funding, the commit of the Global Compact could end up being just words. We maintain our firm commitment in Peru to work and to guarantee that all children, adolescents receive the care and opportunities that they deserve. I thank you.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you. Now, University of Bristol 2697.

We have been discussing about Objective 5, obviously of the Global Competent Migration, which is about pathways for regular, safe and orderly migration. But we haven't mentioned free movement regimes, which is one of those pathways. It's one of the three available pathways under Objective 5. And in that regard I would like to announce that we have made the first ever project to map, compare and analyze all free movement regions globally. This project is called Freemove Hub and you can find it under freemovehub.com and what we have found is that there are around 40 free movement regimes legally binding at the moment, involving 114 countries globally. So that's more than half of the UN member states. Obviously there are very famous free movement Mercosur, Caricom, European Union, but there are many others in other regions, other regional organizations and also bilateral free movement regimes. Obviously these free movement regions make migration safe, regular and orderly. And what you can do with this project, with this tool that we're making available to policymakers, to researchers, to civil society, is to compare the provisions of all these free movement regimes and to also analyze how they have been developing over the last 30 years. So we hope this tool is very useful in light of Objective 5 of the Global Combat Home Migration. And again, it's freemovehub.com if anyone is interested in learning more. I'm happy also to share that information later. Thank you very much.

Muchas gracias, Tomas.

Not thank you. We will now give the floor to center for migration studies, New York, seat 2667. You have the floor.

The center for Migration Studies is a US based Catholic faith based organization which focuses upon research and analysis of policies impacting the human rights of migrants. Faith based groups fill important service gaps that governments cannot or will not fill. Often in partnership with the government and always within the confines of domestic and international law. We also are called to defend the human rights of persons on the move and and oppose policies which abrogate those rights. In this regard, while we are heartened by the words of commitment to the rescue and protection of lives in the draft Progress Declaration, we are gravely concerned with the rising loss of migrant lives both at sea and on land. According to a recent IOM report, nearly 8,000 migrants have been reported as dead or missing in 2025 and 82,000 since 2014. In the Central Mediterranean Sea alone this year, nearly 800 migrants have died. One hundred and fifty percent increase over the same time period during 2025. While the loss of one life is too much, we urge Member States to work together to decrease the number of migrant deaths by at least 50% by 2030. This goal can be achieved from by refraining from not embracing the following policies. First, while we agree that nations should receive their nationals in a safe and humane manner, as is stated in the draft Progress Declaration, we also believe that nations should return migrants to their country of origin and not to third countries which themselves can be poor and unstable. Sending someone to a country they do not know and far away from their home country is Contrary contrary to objective 21, paragraph 37 of the GCM, in which member States say, quote, we further commit to ensure that our nationals are duly received and readmitted in full respect for the human right to return to one's own country. This commitment should should be reaffirmed in the Progress Declaration. We applaud the we applaud the inclusion of language in the draft Progress declaration consistent with objective 21, paragraph 37, opposing collective expulsions and requiring due process and individualized assessment in the removal process. As we have seen in the US Such policies can lead to human rights abuses of both immigrants and citizens alike. Finally, we urge Member States to resist the call to weaken or eliminate their protection systems, which would lead to greater displacement, human suffering and the loss of life around the world. Rather than destroying your countries, a strong humanitarian protection system consistent with international law strengthens your countries through the gifts immigrants bring to them, adhering to international law and contributing to the international Common.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you very much for that important message. And I would like to pay tribute to a human migrant rights defender who fight for the rights of migrants and who is missing. She dedicated her entire life to this flight. We pay tribute to her and I would like to give the floor to the next speaker that is 2668, seat

68 shaded the the youth interventions that we've had both in the morning session and now this afternoon. I think it really speaks to the importance of youth participation in these events. So with that said colleagues, family unity is a fundamental human right of all human beings. Yet every day millions of migrants are separated from their family members, often due to migration laws and policies that make it impossible for families to travel or remain together. Family separation is the backdrop to every unaccompanied or separated child story. Whether children migrate alone or are separated from their families along their journeys, family separation is an enduring trauma with lifelong impacts on a child's health, well being and long term development. Research shows that even short periods of family separation can negatively affect children's relationship with their parents, often creating feelings of abandonment. Family separation often causes acute stress in children, in some cases leading to lifelong trauma and negatively impacting their mental and physical health as well as their ability to to perform in school or to maintain friendships. At the same time, research shows that safeguarding family unity through rights based family centered pathways and facilitating swift and safe family reunification procedures when children and families do become separated improves children's sense of security and well being, reduces stress within children and their families leads to better performance in schools and facilitates children's integration into their homes, communities and societies. As highlighted by the UN Secretary General in his report on GCM implementation, family reunification remains crucial and the IMRF should expand pathways for family reunification as an urgent priority, with particular attention to migrants in vulnerable situations such as unaccompanied and separated children. To meet this call, Kids in Need of Defense is proud to be launching later this week, together with our partners the UN Human Rights Office, ohchr, UNICEF and the Migrant Youth and Children Platform, an exciting new GCM Family Unity Initiative. The GCM Family Unity Initiative is a global, multi stakeholder partnership for rights based family centered migration pathways that is open to the support and participation of all Member States and IMRF stakeholders. The initiative seeks to galvanize commitments under GCM Objective 5 and 7 and to mobilize states and other stakeholders to make ambitious and concrete pledges to safeguard family unity and facilitate family reunification. We hope that you will join us. Thank you.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you very much. We will now hear from Interpol 2604.

Thank you very much. Dear colleagues, Irregular migration and associated crimes such as human trafficking are among the most pressing transnational threats of our time. Migrant smuggling is a low risk yet highly profitable enterprise driven by sophisticated criminal networks that operate much like global businesses. They systematically offer service, smuggling services, arrange transportation, forge documents, and circumvent border controls, all in pursuit of substantial financial gain. Their operations span multiple continents and involve a wide range of actors moving across land, air and sea routes. They routinely leverage emerging technologies and online platforms to advertise and coordinate their activities. The use of encrypted communication and anonymity tools has further enabled them to expand their reach while evading detection as economic hardship, armed conflict, degraded security conditions and climate change force more people to leave their homes in search of safety and opportunity, including in revenge. In reverse migration flows, criminal networks are exploiting vulnerability at a scale. Smuggling and trafficking activities are increasingly converging, orchestrated by polycriminal groups. Colleagues against this backdrop, Interpol, as the world's only global police organization, supports its 196 member countries in dismantling these networks and restoring justice for victims. In view of the second imrf, we urge Member States to take four key actions. First, fully leverage Interpol's global policing tools, including its database notices and analytical capabilities, to strengthen investigations and prosecutions. Second, deepen partnerships with NGOs, the private sector and law enforcement actors, including Interpol's Human Trafficking Expert Group, to ensure a coordinated victim centered response. Third, support Interpol's projects targeting irregular migration and human trafficking at regional levels, including hima, Turkisa and roc. Fourth, actively participate in Interpol's multinational operations to disrupt criminal networks, protect victims and bring perpetrators to justice. Operation Libertera 3, for example, brought together 119 member countries in late 2025 and resulted in the detection of approximately 13,000 irregular migrants and the arrest of over 1,100 suspects for migrant smuggling crimes in two weeks. Only Only through stronger international cooperation can we effectively combat these crimes and safeguard the dignity and security of at risk populations.

I thank you.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you very much. I'm sorry if I mispronounced the name of this, but you have the floor.

Good afternoon, distinguished delegates, colleagues and fellow participants. My name is Daniel Lohman and I'm speaking today as a youth representative of Clinique Juridig Hira as well as a student from the Free University of Amsterdam. As part of our Global Migration Governance course, we conducted research on the implementation of objectives 6 and 13 of the GCM through shadow reports based on civil society and policy analysis on GCM champion countries. Let me begin with Canada. In terms of progress, Canada demonstrates strong formal commitment to international labor standards and has ratified a wide range of ILO conventions. It had also established labor migration programs and legal protections that in principle guarantee equal rights for migrant workers. However, in practice, important challenges remain. Based on our research, states with tight work permits bind workers to a single employer, creating structural dependency and increasing vulnerability to exploitation. This also disencourages workers from reporting abuse due to the fear of deportation. Enforcement mechanisms are also widely considered inadequate. Labor inspections are often ineffective and complaint systems remain inaccessible, particularly for workers in precarious situations. Recruitment related abuses also persist, including illegal fees, lack of access to contracts in a language workers understand and cases of document confiscation. Based on these findings, we recommend for States such as Canada to replace tight work permits with open permits, enforce prohibition on document retention and ensure penalties for non compliance and guarantee equal labor rights in practice, including access to collective bargaining for all migrants. Turning now briefly to Portugal, GCM champion country in terms of progress, Portugal has established a relatively strong legal framework aligned with international labor rights and protections. The government conducts targeted labor inspections in high risk sectors such as agriculture and has taken steps to combat undeclared work and the labor exploitation. Yet, similar to other GCM champion countries, challenges remain in implementation. Irregular migrant workers continue to face significant vulnerability, particularly due to particularly due to the lack of effective safeguards against employer retaliation, while compliant mechanisms exist, their accessibility and effectiveness remain limited, undermining the firewall between labor enforcement and immigration control. We therefore recommend to strengthening the accessible complaint mechanisms with safeguards against retaliation and ensure a clear separation between the labor inspections and immigration enforcement. Thank you very much.

Muchas gracias. Damos la palabra Escalabariniani International Network thank you very much.

2687

See Adelante Lamano.

Go ahead.

You have the floor.

International Network Victoria Scalabrine International Network Nomre

Caritas Internationalis initiar Expressando mia pollo I

would like at the outset to say that I support what Kadimaria Yumhenya and the CMS said. The Caritas Confederation is present in 162 countries. It is a key actor for the migrant community

of violence directed towards migrants and the increase in their deaths. Because of this, we call states to address the root causes or drivers of migration, including geopolitical competition with governance, conflict and climate change. We also call for action against the criminalization of migrants and also the criminalization of those who provide aid and support to them along the route. This very concerning trend we are seeing every day in our activities to save lives. As we have heard here in this session, we need to expand the safe pathways and carry out regularizations as courageously as the government of Spain has done recently. Let's remember that as Kevin mentioned, 82,000 lives of migrants have been lost since 2014. In relation to returns, we strongly oppose border externalization, offshore return hubs and return to at all costs policies. We call for access to essential services, especially health care and education, with the full participation of migrants and host communities in the design and implementation of these policies. They are not objects, they are subjects and their agency has to be acknowledged. And finally, migrants need real and effective solutions. As Sister Maria Eugenia mentioned, coherence between declarations and policies is fundamental. We should deliver not only for migrant sakes, but also for the sake of multilateralism. We know very well that if we don't do that, the narrative that is based on the premise that the UN is an expensive and irrelevant body is going to be reinforced. So we need to deliver for migrants, because that is delivering for peace and development worldwide. Thank you.

Muchas gracias a Caritas International.

Thank you very much, Caritas International. And I now give the floor to the national humorous Institute of Morocco. 2635.

Thank you, Chairperson. The National Human Rights Council of Morocco welcomes the debates around migration issues in this forum and would like to share with you nine practices it has identified in its work in recent years regarding the monitoring of the legal framework, the NHRI of Morocco has been advocating for the adoption of two significant laws on migration and on refugees to be in line with the Constitution as well as Morocco's international engagements, especially the Convention on Migrant Workers and the Global Compact on Migrations. Concerning the case management, the CNDH or the NHRI of Morocco and its 12 local presences are quasi judicial mechanisms and in 2024 we received 96 complaints related to the situation of migrants and refugees and we have engaged with the competent authorities to address those cases as to adherence to international standards. We hosted in 2025 debates on general observation number six of the CMW which looks into the convergences between the CMW or the Convention and the Global Compact on Migrations. Debates were attended by the iom, OSHR members of the CMW as well as national authorities and sister African nhris. Concerning field monitoring, the CNDH has been monitoring instances of attempted irregular crossings by migrants in border areas throughout the country. The action by the CNDH and its 12 regional commissions ensured that intervention by law enforcement authorities are carried out in compliance with the international human rights standards regarding peer to peer learning experiences have been exchanged with sister African nhris Africa as part of the African Working Group on Migration chaired by the NHRI of Morocco and this concerned the NHRI's actions including in times of crisis such as COVID 19 as well as the rights of vulnerable migrants regarding capacity buildings for fellow African NHRIs. It is also of paramount importance to us in our cross border cooperation and as chair of the Working Group on Migration we hosted delegations from Djibouti, Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Cote d' Ivoire and Burundi and provided courses including on Migration Dimensions. The SENDH also proposed a Convention of Cooperation to the network of African NHRIs which was signed in Rabat with the UN Committee on Migrant Workers to help ratify and adhere to the Convention and support NHRIS in Africa in monitoring the implementation of the Convention by States. One dedicated section in our annual report is devoted also to the right of people on the move and all reports of the CNDH are available in our website and I thank you.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you.

Now,

Province of Aswai from the local government of Aswa, you have the floor. 2515 Province of Aswai, if you could raise your hand. Sorry, 2519. Hi.

Yes, thank you. Thank you very much. Good afternoon to all. Very warm greetings from the province of Asuai. We are in the south of Ecuador and what I'd like to do Here in this forum is first to recognize and congratulate all of the participants. But I also want to share some more profound thoughts about the world that we are building. If it is a world, is it a world for people or for the mobility of capital and commercial goods, but where people cannot move freely, is that the world that we are moving to? I think this is the right space to talk about the reality that we're experiencing. In my province, we are a region where a large proportion of our population has been driven to migrate over the course of three periods, the space of around 50 years. It's calculated that some 100,000 people from my province are in the United States or in Europe. And so we know this, this reality of migration. And we must think about the future, as I said, the future that we are building because capital can move around the world, it seeks profit and it has very flexible rules. And people also have some even. And weapons also have this possibility of moving, just like commercial goods. They have their clear rules for goods and capital and arms to travel around the world. But when it comes to people and people needing to move from one place to another, we find there are limitations. And so this is what leads me to ask, what world are we building and for whom? Is it a world, a future for capital, for merchandise and commercial goods? Or is it a future, a world that is designed for people? And I think we have a major challenge before us now, given that we must generate a sense of solidarity and humanity in order to achieve that. In the guidance for governments, we tell them to build a world for people with free mobility, free universal mobility for all people, to allow everyone to enjoy human rights. Everyone on this planet should enjoy human rights. I don't want to discard the possibility of local compact amongst civil society with NGOs, IOM, they have local policies where they guarantee, with ordinances and effective actions that we can guarantee things at a local level in terms of rights for migrants. Thank you for your attention.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Now justice is in motion. 2609, you have the floor.

Muchas gracias. Buenas tardes.

Good afternoon. I am from Guatemala. I also represent justice in motion and I'm also part of the movement for migrants. We are a transnational collective individuals and organizations who defend the rights of of migrants here. We would like to encourage states to continue strengthening migration governance and individuals and their dignity should be the central axis as part of the pathways for regular, orderly and safe migration. We encourage them to guarantee increasingly progressive rights for migrants Especially the right to to decent and dignified work. The right to work is a right and so we would encourage ethical recruitment to support the rights of migrant workers. Ensuring justice to ensure that cross border access to justice is also ensured. Together with regular pathways, we are trying to ensure that migrants can have access to justice in their countries of origin, transit and destination. With norms, we can ensure decent treatment of migrants both through the recruitment process, but also in other processes. Ethical recruitment establishes clear rules, avoids discrimination and guarantees equality unequal conditions for migrants, especially in labor sectors they're considered most vulnerable. We also encourage States to create regular review mechanisms in workplaces to ensure that employers are fulfilling existing labor contracts, avoiding exploitation or human rights violations. We also urge the creation of an economic fund funded by destination countries to ensure ethical recruitment from sending countries. And we support destination countries signing the relevant conventions of the ILO on the workers rights, including migrant workers and their families. And we also subscribe to the compact. Thank you.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you. Next National Network of Nepal National Network for Safe migration of Nepal 2641. Sorry, I'll need you to raise your hand so that they can see you.

Okay. So. Respected Chair I speaker, I'm Luvaraj Neopane, Executive Committee Member of National Network Policy of Migration Nepal and Executive Director of Rule Over Nepal. It's my pleasure to inform you that Nepal has fully adopted the whole of society approach in bringing out the national GCM implementation framework. The government claims that it is acknowledged as the GCM champion country. However, we as a country in Global south, we have experienced many challenges in achieving the goal of safe or alien regular migration. Despite existing international frameworks, millions of migrant workers, especially from the Global south are not able to enjoy basic human rights as they face systemic exploitation, social exclusion, economic exploitation underpaid and wasted especially in the emergencies, gender based mobility ban and also legal invisibility. Implementation gaps in the global compared for safe oil and regular migration remain substantial in this slide. National consultations held in Nepal for Preparation of the second IMRF participated by members and partners of NNSM. Calls for urgent action on Social Security portability, 24 hours insurance facility equal treatment to all migrant workers, Occupational safety and health. Addressing the issues of climate mobility under the parish agreement, Fair and ethical recruitment practices Dismantling of employer tight visa systems as ensure human rights based reintegration. We demand enforceable Balder Labor Agreement mechanism to respect and include grassroots voices in migration governance and accountability Mechanism placing workers dignity and economic independence at the center. We also need a paradigm shift from managing migration to Protecting migrants as right holders all states must certify ILO 189 and 190 and ensure no migrant workers dies without justice or lives without dignity without. We believe that a strong global framework that reflects the voices and conclusion of regional processes and agreed upon by the meaningful BLMAS is foundation to the protection, promotion and fulfillment of the human rights of the migrant workers and the members of their family. Finally, I would like to conclude saying nothing about us, without us, grassroots voices from the global south must lead this reform. Thank you, Chair.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you. We will now hear from the last two speakers. Alepha, Diaspora and 2523, you have the floor.

Thank you very much. I will speak French because we've really been a minority to speak French today. I'd like to talk to you about the daily lives of the volunteers from the other diaspora. We work in a reception center for refugees. These are people who come legally because they obtained refugee status. But unfortunately, these people arrive already traumatized due to what they've been through. These are families. We're in a family situation center. And they're so traumatized that even making a phone call is very difficult for them. We have volunteers that support these women and who help them every day because they have difficulty just making a phone call. We stand next to them, we support them during the phone calls. These are women who need to write a CV resume, and we send them to centers where they can receive help with that. And there are also women who are looking for jobs. They may have worked in their countries of origin. They might have 15 years of experience as seamstresses, for example. They're very specialized in their work, and they end up being forced to work as, for example, cleaning ladies. So what can we do? As a small association? We are all volunteers who are not paid for our work. To help them, what we do is try to raise money and we try to buy them sewing machines so they can continue their work that they were trained for. So for us, these small associations of the diaspora, we are doing our part on the ground where the government cannot help, because there is not enough funding, not enough funding for welcoming refugees. We help to send the children to school. We help them to find jobs. Do you know how we help them? We use our network in society and we organize job fairs. During these job fairs, we have, say, 50 people who might be there. We have companies, businesses that come, and therefore we arrange these encounters because we are well established. And these people come to us completely without any resources or opportunities. So that's what I want to tell you that even when we. When people come legally, it's still very difficult for them. Even when they come legally, we still need help. And so I thank all of our colleagues and other diaspora associations who are helping these women and these children. Thank you.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you.

So we'll now hear from the last speaker in this round, Scalabrinian International Migration Network 2676, please. Thank you.

Madam Moderator, distinguished delegates, distinguished colleagues, on behalf of the Scalabrinian International Migration Network, we'd like to say that we're grateful for the opportunity to participate in this forum. The second review. Forum, we feel, is the second review of the International Compact for Safe Order and Regular Migration. And based on our regional global experience, the current environment, marked by multiple crises, is increasing irregular migration and deaths on migration routes. And this shows that no state can manage migration alone. This, to us, seems to be a fundamental concept, because sincere dialogue between states, civil society, faith based organizations, the private sector, sector, trade unions, all of civil society, and any dialogue with a real interest in understanding the migrant as a rights holder is a necessary condition for implementation of the compact. And while progress has been made, which we recognize and we applaud, this progress has been insufficient and is still too, too hard to access, especially for the most vulnerable migrants, including children, adolescents and women who are migrants. Creating safe, regular and orderly pathways is essential to reduce irregular migration, to prevent the exploitation and trafficking of humans and the illicit smuggling of migrants, and also to support social cohesion and socioeconomic integration. Migration is a human structural phenomenon. Migrants are human rights holders. They are not a security problem. And the lack of regular pathways fuels irregularity, violence and criminalization. Social inclusion based on rights is a necessary condition for human rights and for migration governance. The priorities and scope for working together towards a new culture of migration through some of these initiatives that have been mentioned. We could call them regular pathways or pathways to regularization as part of inclusion. Access to basic services, local governance and civil society as central stakeholders for the promotion of human rights and inclusion. Responsible narratives. Thank you.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you very much. Thank our panelists all for their interventions and for everybody who spoke from the floor. I hope that everything that has been shared today, even from this morning and throughout this panel, we hope this will be heard, and we hope that this will lead to real transformation on the ground. Thank you all for your contributions. And let me introduce the next one, drivers of social inclusion. That's our next panel. Mama Du Goita is going to join us. Professor Jibril Foul. Professor Carolina Gotado, Mr. Gabriel Venganovinaka and Ms. Faiza Ali, please come and join us up here on the podium. Thank you. And we will continue with the next session.

Can Carolina Gotardo please come to the

panel and Gabriel from NYCP significant.

So we are starting, please, can you have your seat, please? We are starting. Can you please have your seat? We are starting. This is the last session. Let's start so that we finish on time.

Colleagues, please take your seat. We'll be beginning the last session. We want to make sure everyone has a chance to speak.

Who'd like to take the floor, Please take your seats.

You thank so we could try to accommodate that. Thank you.

So we are starting this. We'll continue with informal interactive multi stakeholder hearing taking place prior to the International Migration Review Forum. The thematic discussion that we'll be having just now is untitled Drivers of Migration and Social Inclusion. So my name is Mamadou Goita. I'll be moderating this session and like the others that we'll be hearing from the panelists and then after that that we open floor for interaction with with the floor. So you all know that this thematic issue has been very instrumental in the very beginning of a negotiation process, the key drivers of migration. And it has been also subject to different narratives that led to policy framing, some of the. Some being very positive on the migration debate, but others also being very controversial. So we'll have an opportunity to listen to free speakers today. Four speakers, three speakers because the fourth one couldn't join us because probably of some of the visa issues. So Gabriel cannot join us. So we'll just have free contribution and it will give us also time for interaction, more person to contribute to the discussion. So we'll now hear from the panelists and thereafter the floor will be open for comments, observations and questions. Those wishing to intervene are invited to press the button on the console as you have been used to it, and the version will be on the automatic discussion will be limited to three minutes, which will be strictly enforced through an automatic microphone. So you all realize that when you continue to speak it will be cut off and a timer will be projected on the screen. So just look at the screen to ensure that you are on time. Now I will give a floor to Professor Jibil Fal Obey, founder of Remit8 and the professor in practice, London School of Economics will be the first one and it will be followed by by Mrs. Carolina Gatordo, Director of International Detention Coalition. Then we'll follow Mrs. Faizali, Commissioner of Immigration affairs, on the new York City Mayor's Office. So I give a floor to Gabriel, please, for five minutes maximum, and then to allow other panelists to contribute. You have the floor.

We were still in celebratory mode when I published a paper in December 2017 proposing that significant effort should be spent on what I call delivering and demonstrating migration dividend through the implementation of of the Global Compact for Migration. Alas, like many papers before and since, it troubled no one. Mr. Chair, thank you for giving me a chance to have another go at proposing a social enterprise approach to migrant social inclusion. Indeed, there may be lessons we can learn from the world of private sector business as we seek enduring social justice and human rights. I have long theorized that the driver of all human migration remains the same through time, namely the pursuit of the five L's to protect life, limb and liberty and to enhance livelihoods and lifestyles. If this was a fundamental truth, what then are the drivers that can create and maintain migrant social inclusion? Sir, it is only a relatively small group of xenophobes, nativists and other extremists who deny the value of migration or reject the fact that migration is as as humanity and as inevitable as living. One of the root causes of anti migration sentiments and social exclusions comes down to the perception and conviction that the socio cultural and political economic costs of small and large scale migration are greater are greater than the actual and supposed benefits. This skeptical and cynical undercurrent is reinforced by normal human nature itself. Psychologically, migrants are the quintessential outsiders, are they not? The foreign outsider irrationally despised and conveniently blamed for the multifaceted ills of local society. Perceptions and emotions are more potent than actuality and reason. This strange reality is accepted as a given in the world of business. As such, ruthlessly effective marketing and influencing tools are strenuously developed and dexterously deployed to address antipathy, suspicion and apathy to new and existing products and services. The private sector bottom line imperative goes beyond preventing antipathy and skepticism to even providing for needs and necessities. It positively and proactively seeks to create perceived and actual wants and coax paying users to integrate their self identity with the product. Chair, I invite colleagues in this forum and development actors everywhere to consider how we can borrow wonderful tools from those cunning capitalists and deploy them deftly to actualize and normalize migrant social inclusion. Migration dividend as an approach and composite indicator can capture benefit or loss incurred by the principals as well as the order direct and indirect migration stakeholders. It offers the simplicity of a bottom line derived from a mass and mess of complexity. It presents the multifaceted rewards gained by host communities that receive and integrate migrants. It can focus the migration narrative and discourse on the legitimate interests and concerns of affected stakeholders and help limit or neutralize the toxic, extremist and xenophobic rhetoric. Importantly, sir, it can be fully integrated in the migration life cycles. Thank you.

Thank you, Professor Jibril, for highlighting the complexity of drivers of migration that need to be analyzed on a holistic way, online practices, but also the policies and you highlighted also solutions that exist but need also to be addressed to address the root causes of migration and at the same time show the perception of people under the narratives particularly. So I give the floor to Mrs. Carolina Gotardo, who is the director of International Detention Coalition for five minutes, please. Carolina, you have the floor.

Thanks, Mamadou. And good afternoon to everyone. And just before starting my presentation, I would just like to pay a tribute to to our friend and colleague Claudia Interiano, who as a tireless advocate for the rights of missing migrants and also for women rights and who we will all deeply miss. I'm going into the presentation, so I'm thinking about drivers. When we discuss migration, we tend to focus on issues such as borders or pathways or transient destination countries. But we also need to focus to the point where decisions on migration are actually made. Because in reality, for far too many people today, migration is not a choice, but it's a necessity. And people decide to move or people are forced to move because of reasons like poverty, inequality, climate, climate, situations, violence, family situation or lack of services and lack to rights, or because they like to find better opportunities. And these decisions, all these decisions have of course, gender elements such as SGBB and others. But the decisions reflect deeper gaps in access to rights and to protection and to services and to inclusion. And the GCM itself outlines what addressing these drivers requires. So for instance, investment in poverty, eradication, access to education, decent work, climate resilience, gender equality, justice, inclusive institutions. And I mean, looking at the reports on GCM implementation and making an analysis of those of the national implementation reports, we can see that there are important efforts in this direction. For instance, recognition that like. And this demonstrates issues like addressing poverty or related to climate and this demonstrates that migration is closely linked with the development agendas. But here there is a problem and is that this is treated often like drivers are treated as external problems rather than as outcomes that result from policy choices. And I want to highlight different aspects of this issue. The first one is that we need to acknowledge that people are not moving for a Single reason, they are moving because of overlapping pressures that are cumulative over time and that leave them with no meaningful choice. And this means that this traditional distinction in between what is forced and voluntary migration is actually very blurry. And the legal and policy frameworks that are addressing this issue have not evolved with time and an insufficient mean for protecting people or for ensuring that no one is falling through the gaps. The second is that national experiences show us that migration policies themselves contribute to precarity and can often themselves become drivers of migration, especially of secondary movements or onward movements. So these restrictive policies and limited access to pathways, which is so important, create conditions where people are actually focused into unsafe journeys. And then the third is that we cannot discuss only drivers of migration without considering specific situations in countries of origin, transit and destination. Because when there are no pathways, or when pathways are limited, people are left with no options and the journeys become more dangerous. And for instance, the situations experienced by women and gender diverse people during migration journeys need to be specifically considered under a gender lens. So addressing drivers cannot be separated from pathways, and pathways is an essential element for that. And now, right now, if we look at the world that we're living in, we are seeing serious regressions in different countries and in different regions. And migration is being treated through a lens of surveillance and a lens of criminalization. So this undermines rights, but it doesn't actually address the drivers of migration and can also reinforce those very conditions that compel people to move. So this criminalization of migrants and migration that we're seeing in different parts of the world, with symptoms like, for instance, the trend of externalization and third country agreements, detention, pushbacks, forced returns, deportations, and all these restrictive mission symptoms are seen, symptoms precisely of this criminalization. And the evidence also show that it doesn't have to be this way, and that alternatives exist, and that there are countries where migration is governed without reliance on dispunitive measures such as detention and criminalization, and these are countries where they prioritize regularization and access to services. And for instance, talking about detention, there are alternatives to detention that work and that protect people rights and that are effective and that are cheaper as well. So if we are serious about addressing the drivers of migration, we need to then think about going beyond addressing conditions at origin and ensure that the migration policies themselves do not create or reinforce vulnerabilities as such. Finally, just to begin to finalize, addressing the drivers of migration does require the involvement of different actors, including migrants themselves, civil society, local authorities, because migration decisions are shaped by lived realities, access to information and trust in institutions. So we are not talking here about preventing migration. Addressing drivers cannot be about preventing migration. It just means investing in rights and in opportunities and in resilience at home, while ensuring safe and regular pathways for those that decide to move. And this needs collaboration, which is much more important in the current context when we're seeing a massive reduction of international cooperation, where we're seeing threats to multilateralism and we're seeing cuts in funding in different parts of the world. So migrants need to be recognized, including migrant women, not through the lens of vulnerability, but as rights holders, with agency, with aspirations and with the ability to contribute in countries of origin, transit and destination. Because it's not possible to address drivers in isolation. We need to acknowledge that policies that criminalize migration can deepen precarity and rights based approaches work and can ensure that migration is actually a choice. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Carolina, for this very powerful saying. I just written one invest in right and opportunities for those who decide to move. This is really a very strong statement that needs really to be addressed in all the three levels that she has been talking about. The departure, transit and host countries. I will give the floor to Mrs. Faizali, who is a Commissioner of Immigrant affairs of a New York City mayor's office, for five minutes, please. Thank you.

Good afternoon, everyone. It's a privilege to be here to provide a local perspective. My name is Faiza Ali. I'm the Commissioner for the New York City Mayor's Office of Immigrant Affairs. It's really an honor to be here to join you at the International Migration Review Forum alongside leaders, advocates and pilots, policymakers from around the world. I also want to thank the International Organization for Migration and the Office of the President of the General assembly for convening this important and timely dialogue. Migration does not happen in a vacuum, and as we have heard, it is driven by a range of forces. Economic instability, climate change, conflict, and the search for safety and opportunity. Cities are where migrants arrive, where they access services, and where they begin to rebuild their lives. And that places a unique responsibility on local governments. New York City in many ways, is a global case study in migration. Immigrants are central to our story. They have shaped our neighborhoods, our culture and our economy across generations. Today, nearly 40% of New Yorkers are foreign born and almost half of our residents speak a language other than English. At home, our experience shows us that the question is not whether migration will shape our cities, it already does. The question is whether our systems are built and designed to include. For me, this work is personal. I Am the daughter of immigrants from Azad Kashmir in Pakistan. My father arrived in this country in the late 1960s and my mother arrived in the early 1970s. My father started out as a dishwasher. He worked at a local knitting factory and eventually secured a good union job as an elevator operator. And my mother, my Ami, she raised five children, worked from home as a seamstress sewing chawarchemis and opened our two bedroom rent stabilized apartment to other newly arrived families from our community. Our home often served as their first port point of stability in this country. Like so many immigrant families, they came in search of stability and they found it through hard work, but also through community and access to opportunities. That experience shaped how I understand my role, the role of community, and the responsibility of local government. Inclusion is not just something you know, is not just about welcoming. It's about infrastructure. It's about whether a city's systems are built to ensure that people can access services, that they can participate in the economy, and that they feel a sense of belonging. At the Mayor's Office of Immigrant affairs, we approach this through three core areas. First is ensuring access to services and protections. We operate the largest municipal immigration legal support network in the country that helps immigrants, regardless of status, navigate complex systems, understand their rights, and remain connected to essential services, especially in moments of uncertainty. And we saw how critical this was in the beginning of 2022, when New York City experienced a significant increase in newly arrived migrants from Latin America, West Africa and from other regions. The city had to respond in real time and that meant expanding shelter and creating intake and case management systems, ensuring access to health care and education, and scaling up our city's legal services, we are now helping many recent arrivals navigate an even more complex immigration system. Today, under a federal administration that has taken a more aggressive and violent, frankly, approach to immigration enforcement, in New York City, we are supporting legal and language services while also focusing on the long term integration, especially helping people access work authorization. Because the goal is not just immediate support, but stability and self sufficiency. The second way is focused around building pathways to economic inclusion. You know, we've heard this time and again throughout today's forums that migrants move in search of opportunity and cities must be ready to meet them with real pathways. Immigrants are essential to our economy. You know, in New York City, our city's workforce, about half, nearly half of the workforce is actually immigrant and they contribute billions in taxes and economic activity every year. We are expanding English language learning and strengthening workforce pathways so immigrants in New York City can fully participate in our economy because inclusion in the labor market in is actually what is central to the long term integration of our communities. Third is by advancing language access and civic participation. You know, in a city as diverse as ours, language access is essential. We are working to ensure that immigrants can access services, can get information, can engage in languages that are available to them, in languages that they can, that the communities actually speak in. So participation is not real. It's actually, it is real that it's not something that's theoretical, it's a priority. But just as important as what we do is how we do it. Our work is built on partnership with community based organizations, with advocates and across government, because local governments cannot address the drivers of migration alone. But we are essential in shaping what happens when after folks arrive to our communities and into our cities, we are where inclusion becomes very real. And when we get it right, the benefits are shared throughout our cities and our communities. New York City's experience shows that when immigrants are supported, entire cities thrive. So as we move forward in this forum, I would offer this. If we want to advance the goals of Global Compact, we should and must invest in cities. We must equip local governments with the resources, with the flexibility, with the partnership that they need to build inclusive systems. Because ultimately, the success of migration policy is not measured at the border. It is measured in whether a family can find stability, in whether a worker can contribute with dignity, and whether a person can truly belong in a place that they now call their home. That work happens in cities. It happens when we invest in inclusion at the local level. We don't just support migrants, we are strengthening societies as a whole. Thank you and I look forward to the discussion.

Thanks a lot, Mrs. Faiziali, for highlighting the role of municipalities in making migration really liveable for people, not only on the social life, but also on economic side. And what the Mayor's office in New York City is doing just to make this possible for those who are coming from different places and contributing to the development of this city. So we hear the last speaker of the thematic discussion number four. And now we'll have. We'll open the floor for those who want to contribute. And I have a list here and the first one will be Agency Dumoradou. The number is 2658. 2658. Seat for three minutes.

Thank you, Excellencies, distinguished participants. I represent Agency de Morado, a civil society organization from Ukraine. In discussing the drivers of migration, it is important to move beyond simplified narratives. Migration is not driven by a single factor. It is shaped, among other, by the interaction of worse conflicts, economic insecurity, demographic change and systemic inequalities. In Ukraine today, these drivers are deeply interconnected. The ongoing full scale scale war of Russia against Ukraine has triggered forced displacement of large scope. At the same time, economic disruption, labor market instability and demographic pressure continue to influence migration decisions, particularly for women, older person and transnational families. However, one key driver is often underestimated. The lack of access to predictable and portable social protection. When people cannot rely on stable income, pensions or Social Security, migration becomes not only a necessity, but often a repeated cycle. Our experience demonstrates that social protection is not only a response to migration, it is a factor that shapes it. Through our work with Ukrainian migrants, in including cooperation with Global Network Patronato acli, we see how access to pensions and social benefits can directly influence decision to return, reintegrate or remain abroad. In fact, around 2/3 of the pension beneficiaries we support are return migrants. This shows that when people have access to stable income, they are more likely to reintegrate and contribute to the processes in their country of origin. This leads three key priorities. First, we must integrate social protection into migration governance, not as an afterthought, but as a core element of sustainable solutions. Second, we must strengthen the link between reintegration and economic stability. Stability including through access to pensions and long term income mechanism. Third, we must promote social inclusion policies that address the specific needs of women, older person and displaced populations, ensuring that no one is left behind in recovery processes. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next is alliance for Venezuela. 2636. 2636.

Mucha gracias, Senor Moderador.

Thank you very much, Mr. Moderator, ladies and gentlemen, Distinguished panelists in this roundtable, distinguished delegates, as was already said, speaking about migration means speaking about human rights. We must recall that behind the figures are many stories, human stories of families, decisions that had to be made by necessity. Not free, freely. I come from Venezuela, a country where migration is no longer an option. It's a direct consequence of a human rights crisis that has been protracted over time. Millions of people have left the country in quest of a way to live with dignity. This is not spontaneous migration, but forced migration caused by systematic violations of human rights, the closing of civil space and a lack of fundamental guarantees. My organization, alliance for Venezuela, supports the region's migrant communities and we have seen the resilience of these migrants. We have also witnessed the profound gaps in the protection system. We have seen cases of integration. But we also, far too often see a silent exclusion, precarity, structural obstacles preventing them from enjoying their rights in full. We must say this clearly. There are people who are responsible for this. There is responsibility when non democratic governments create situations involving a human train crisis is the case in Venezuela. The undermining of fundamental guarantees and freedoms. They force millions to flee, but also they impact their enjoyment of their rights, including outside of Venezuela's borders. Migration out of Venezuela is a choice for survival. Recently we've seen that migration has become criminalized by leaders who are blaming migrants and depict them as a threat. This rhetoric distorts reality and it also adds fuel to the fire of discrimination. That's why we firmly oppose this rhetoric that criminalizes migration. We also call for an end to to all speech that promotes hate and exclusion as well as an end for arbitrary deportation in all contexts. We must respect human dignity of migrants. Thank you.

Thank you very much. International association of University Professors and Lecturers 2591. What is the new number? 2556. 2556. There is a MIC that is open.

Yes. Distinguished colleagues, ladies and gentlemen, distinguished representatives of civil society. Higher education is an integral part of SDG 4 and access to to university education and decent work. But it also requires international recognition for university diplomas as well as lifelong learning as well as safe employment. And this requires academic freedom in universities. When it comes to implementing the policy on academic mobility, the International association of Professors wants to highlight the experience of the Global Convention on Recognition of Higher Education Qualifications adopted by UNESCO in 2019, according to which academic mobility, safe mobility, is a crucial part of all training and employment for migrants. The first point recognizing their studies in passports. This provides access for university researchers through collegiate qualifications in accordance with the principle of academic freedom. And more generally, there is a close link with the recognition of diplomas with a UNESCO passport, the qualification for vulnerable migrants and refugees. This is the outcome of a conference of States parties to the UNESCO Convention. Secondly, creating platforms for digital training would be a new tool for universities to provide upskilling in order to ensure safe and orderly migration and potential return to their countries of origin after their studies. As for UNESCO's participation program, in 2022 we held a conference at the Qadayad University in Marrakech, which also hosted a conference on the Global Migration Compact a while ago on the recognition of university qualifications for African development. The contribution of this conference for member states is to promote academic diplomacy, that's to say, pedagogical innovations and international training that are focused on academic freedom, academic mobility and aim to promote the recognition of qualifications at their true value, allowing for orderly migration and other points in the Global Migration Compact which ought to be integrated upstream in university training for professors. I can cut off of the speaker. Thank you very much.

America friend services committee 2583.

Excellencies, honorable delegates and panelists, My name is Pedro Rios and I work with the American Friends Service Committee and I've worked on the U. S. Mexico border now for several decades. I'd like to express my deep consternation on trends to militarized communities and the normalization of state violence as a formal response to migrating people and what they've experienced in particular in the United States. The constriction of pathways and especially with the budget allocation of over $170 billion last year, means that what we will begin to see will be much more concerning regarding the treatment of of migrant workers and their families in the United States. Strategies of deterrence manifested by physical barriers that injure and kill migrating people complement legal barriers that diminish basic protections and violate human dignity. The presence of paramilitary border forces in interior cities replicates the state violence many border communities have faced for decades. And this foments the xenophobia as part of the ideological framework that allows for the same funding to go through what we are witnessing. As some colleagues have described the border externalization of those same policies. I would suggest that it's also the border internalization or as a colleague has mentioned in the past, the borderfication

of

urban cities where migrant workers and their families are targeted by unaccountable immigration agents. This is a threat to the rights of people everywhere. The principles of non refilement, of non discrimination are no longer respected as we see people are turned and sent to countries of which they have no prior connection to. Now there is a movement to stratify membership to the nation state whereby the concept of irregularity expands again, threatening anyone who could be stripped of their status. And we've seen of course, the threats to people who are naturalized in the US the threats that their status could be removed as well. It is imperative that in declarations and formal positions that states member states take, must be bold to truly move towards protecting the dignity of migrants and upholding human rights, including labor rights. And those. And the protections.

Thank you. Transnational corridors 25, 22.

No.

Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share my perspective. Many things have been told, but not everything. Migrants are not always and only victims and weaks. They are also agents of their lives, of the life of their families and of their communities. They are agents of change and they can smartly take advantage of Migration opportunities.

That's one point.

The second point, what I observe in my daily life, it's that migrant and migrant organizations craft solutions, very practical solutions.

They create, they innovate.

And I think it would be a very important aspect for policymaker to promote this creativity.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. Migrant Women Forum 2576 if they don't, they didn't move. Migrant women's forum is 2576. Did we change the seat? What is the new number? 26 99.

Okay, thank you. Dear colleagues and Member States, I'm Abigail Guevara. On behalf of the Grassroots Forum on Migration Governance and also part of the Migrant Women Forum, I just want to highlight that migrant workers are not only affected by crisis, but we must highlight that whether they are facing climate disasters or conflict, they are systematically exposed, left unprotected and deprioritized within crisis response systems. When systems collapse, migrants are often the ones who absorb the shock. We cannot continue to say that we are unprepared. COVID 19 pandemic made it painfully clear how existing systems can be exploitative and treat people as disposable. Wage theft persists and social protection systems remain inadequate, unsustainable and far from comprehensive. Why do we default to security first response responses rather than human survival, dignity and rights? And then now we claim these measures are for their protection. Too often we focus on progress indicators and commitments while avoiding direct confrontation with ongoing crises and the root causes. I would like to express my appreciation to His Excellency a while ago, Secretary Hans Kakdak, for bringing much needed attention to the realities of the conflict in spaces like this. We cannot continue to frame migration governance as merely a technical exercise. IMRF must speak clearly and without hesitation about war, militarization and geopolitical instability. Our desire for peace. If we are here only to neutralize, normalize or remain silent, then it defeats the very purpose of why many of us traveled across the world raising our own funds to be here. We are here to carry the voices of our brothers and sisters who cannot join us because of conflict and crisis, leaving uncertainty and fighting for their lives every single second. We call on Member States to resist toxic narratives on migration, to reclaim space for truth and dignity, and to realize that in the face of escalating crisis, time is not on our side. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Kafami and Latin American block 2584 2584.

Good afternoon. AS Kaffami and the Latin American Bloc for Women, Migrants and Justice in Motion Current policies are influenced by the externalization of borders. This has a differentiated impact on women, girls and adolescents with diverse identities and migratory trajectories. In this context, deportation has been used as a way of expulsion, violations of human rights, separations of families without due process, where families are forced to return without transnational protection mechanisms. It's fundamental that we address these needs comprehensively and in a personalized way given the characteristics that individual characteristics and the specific circumstances of each individual. This vary according to different factors such as how long they have been in the country, gender disability, sexual identity, indigenous background or other because of the expression of their gender, their culture or many other things. The specific recommendations are that we must differentiate between forced return and other situations. There's a differentiated impact on individuals, families and communities and we must recognise that very often return is not voluntary. It is a result of policies of exclusion and persecution, legal recognition of people forced to return because of situations such as violence and others, gender based violence, sexual identity or other factors, the public database register of Pearsons who have been forcibly deported and details of their forced disappearance. There should be public policies for integration and reintegration together with access to rights, the accessibility of access to rights and simplified pathways for administrative procedures and documents to enable access to programs for accreditation of identity, education or work permits. International cooperation for access to rights following deportation or forced return into institutional coordination reception countries, Persons with international protection needs, children, LGBTIQ plus and elderly people.

Thank you very much. Asia Pacific Forum on women Law and development 2683 2683. Asia Pacific Forum on Women Law and Development not here. Which number now? 2618 or 80?

18.

26 80.

Thank you. Good afternoon everyone. My name is Aliza Yuliana. I am representing the Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development. In this opportunity, I would like to reiterate the importance of placing migrants, especially women, in the front and center of the GCM. Its implementation and the review processes. Within the 12 diverse stakeholders group mentioned in the GCM, migrants should be recognized as the primary key stakeholder, including migrant advocates, migrant association and unions. Grassroots migrants especially are the ones facing the realities in the ground and within this group, women migrants face systemic social, economic and political inequities compounded with limited access to information, exclusion from decision making and discrimination, as well as stigmatization relating to the sexual and gender roles. It is important to ensure that meaningful participation in the mainstream of national, regional and international processes for a better gender responses and human rights based GCM implementation. In order to assert that all rights of migrants, including human and labor rights, are protected, it is crucial that Their voices are heard, accounted for in the formal discussion and included in the actual Global Compact document and its later implementation. However, learning from the previous IMRF migrants who are facing challenges and barriers to participate in persons or engaged in the GCM review processes, in particularly the IMRF due to the visa and work permit issues, language barriers, the lack of financial support as well as other challenges. So it is crucial to improve debt review processes by making sure that Migrants and Migrants Rights organization can meaningfully participate in the upcoming imrf. We need to make sure that the place for the review process is accessible, affordable, safe and migrant friendly. We stay committed and continue our collective effort to improve the access to information, language, justice and secure a safe space for meaningful and active participation of migrants, particularly from the marginalized group.

Thank you. Act alliance 2511 act alliance 2511.

Excellencies, distinguished Delegates and colleagues. Migration today is shaped by a convergence of crisis such as conflict, climate disruption and inequality. Yet instead of a stronger protection, we are witnessing rising deterrence, securitization and narratives that erode human dignity. I myself am was born, raised and am currently based In Ukraine, just 100km away from the front line. During the harshest times of relentless bombing and shelling, I had to leave my country and become a refugee myself, a kind of migrant you never want to be. Eventually I came back home because I couldn't handle being displaced. So I relate on a personal level to the hardships of losing a home, being lost, scared and confused. Strangely, risking my life every day back home was somewhat easier for me than handling displacement somewhere in safety. As a faith based and rights based coalition, ACT alliance sees migrants first and foremost as human beings and as rights holders rooted in communities. Faith based actors provide services, combat xenophobia and advance governance grounded in dignity, compassion and justice. Migration governance must be anchored in human rights. Borders cannot justify harm. Migrants must be recognized as leaders and partners. This requires concrete actions such as ending child immigration detention, guaranteeing due process and prohibit pushbacks ensuring returns are voluntary, safe and dignified Expand safe regular climate responsive mobility pathways Ensure gender transformative migration policies and implementation Protect data privacy and accountability in digital systems Safeguard civic space and those who defend migrants. IMRF 2026 is a choice between fear and solidarity, between exclusion and dignity. Let us choose rights. Let us choose hope. Thank.

You.

Thank you very much. Sisters of Mercy of Americas 2631-2631-2026-3232, 2632. Okay, it's fine.

Dear friends and colleagues, Mercy Sisters, associates and partners are active in 47 countries worldwide and focus on advocacy and care for people in vulnerable situations, including people who have migrated due to conflict, economic and environmental vulnerability and those who face social exclusion after migrating to a new environment. Our presence in Australia, for example, focuses on grassroots support for migrants who face severe xenophobia and social exclusion within their communities, face language barriers and experience financial hardship in an intersecting way. Young Mercy Links, a movement of young people, facilitates community based programs recognising that social inclusion and community building require an ongoing, community led and localised approach. Mercy International association continues to advocate for stronger laws and policies that protect migrants and enable them to thrive in countries built on diaspora and migrant contributions rather than letting them slip through the cracks of welfare and social protection. The vulnerability and social and economic exclusion faced by migrants create heightened risk for human trafficking and modern slavery. Young Mercy Links provides ongoing support walking alongside people affected by those exploitative systems. Survivors face severe challenges in reintegrating into regular society and often face language and education barriers. In collaboration with anti human trafficking agencies, Young Mercy Links in Australia has developed learning modules with several tertiary institutions that develop an awareness for modern slavery and the indicators of trafficking. This has already had real impacts on people who often remain in the shadows. Mercy International association continues to call for systemic accountability and regulation to deincentivise the industries and policies that exploit and abuse migrants. Our work is served by tireless volunteers and staff on the ground, but it must be aided by a paradigm shift at national and international levels. The 2026 IMRF is an opportunity to identify institutional accountability mechanisms and for States to recognise the positive contribution of migrants and diaspora to communities throughout the world. During this IMRF and moving forward in a constantly changing world, we emphasise that faith based organisations are integral in addressing the root causes of vulnerability, accompanying people facing exclusion and amplifying the voices of migrants. And we remain ready to join Member States and all stakeholders in a more inclusive and just implementation of the Global Contract for Migration. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Footage Foundation 2592 Footage Foundation 2592 yes, thank you.

It's a privilege to speak here today. My name is Dr. Kristinelli Eglinton and footage is a feminist research and action organization that has worked for close to 20 years with migrant and displaced communities and gender based violence around the globe. In human rights contexts, we aim to move from dehumanizing narratives of migration to humanizing ones that recognize people's worthiness, dignity and compassion. Too often migrants are described as flows or risks, not as people with relationships, hopes, emotions, worthiness. We know that dehumanization is a tool to justify gender based violence, exploitation, exploitation and neglect. We also know migration is intersectional, that women, girls and LGBTQIA people face specific risks including gender based violence and trafficking, especially in conflict and crisis settings. For example, in Ukraine at footage we work with migrant and displaced women as co designers and see community and compassion as central to policy. Recognizing each other's suffering and worth and acting on that recognition is how we find solutions and make decisions. One example is our FEMSMS project focusing on information, poverty and mental health co led by Ukrainian women displaced in Europe and internally displaced women inside Ukraine and now being adapted with migrant communities including LGBTQIA people in exile from authoritarian context here in New York City. Folks who live with a double precarity, targeted at home and still unsafe and marginalized when they arrive in a place where they hope for sanctuary. Through this feminist research intervention we have created participatory trauma informed tools including mobile messaging service and so people as co researchers are uplifted as leaders and vital community members and they can put their experiences of violence and discrimination in what they actually need at the center of our action. From this experience we offer three recommendations for implementing the Global Compact on migration, especially objectives 7, 16 and 17. We realize this is not new, but we will keep saying it until wider actions truly match these words. No more lip service. First, integrate intersectional compassion led participatory methods into the design and monitoring of migration policies. Include the voices of those most affected from the very beginning as part of the DNA. We must serve those as co researchers, co designers and compassionate leaders. Second, invest in migrant led compassionate narrative work using the science of narrative and compassion, directly addressing vulnerabilities and discriminatory discourse. And third pair quantitative indicators with qualitative participatory evidence stories and feminist ethnographic findings, ensuring humanization remains central to the monitoring of the Compact. We call on member states to embed participatory trauma informed compassionate methods into the Compact. Thank you all.

Thank you very much. ICVA om Habibe Foundation 268985852685 oh, that's me.

Thank you so much. My name is Kadri. I lead a local organization in Egypt called Omahabiba Foundation. We are located in the city of Aswan in the south of Egypt. The geographical location of Aswan in the south of Egypt made it a gateway for migrants. People passed through Aswan between Sudan and Aswan. Sudan, Egypt. Sorry. The eruption of civil conflict in Sudan in 2023 changed this fact. Today, Egypt hosts millions of Sudanese who fled the conflict in Sudan to Egypt. Cities like Aswan are no longer a transit point. They are cities of refuge. This shift placed significant pressure on the local system. We are now hosting significant number of refugees in the city and in the country in general and facing growing demand on essential services and infrastructure. And I guess this sounds very familiar in many contexts. The need increased rapidly and as always, the international support have not kept pace. Local capacities are stretched and we are now facing the risk of tensions between host communities and refugees and migrants. At Omahabiba foundation, our approach is simple and principled. We support people in need wherever they are, whoever they are, without distinction. By integrating migrants into our broader development programs, we help expand access of services for all the people who need and strengthen the trust across communities. Basically, this experience point to a clear lesson. Social cohesion must be built through practical, inclusive approaches that addresses the need of both host communities and migrant communities. Local efforts alone can't meet the scale of the challenge. Especially that when conflict is protracted, like in Sudan, they need the increased a demand or the increase in demand doesn't stop. As Member States consider their commitments in the days ahead, we urge three one, sustained support to frontline local actors like CSOs in cities of refuge. Two, support and invest in areas that benefit all, both host communities and migrant communities. And three,

Yeah, unfortunately, we'll have a last one now because it's. It's time for us to just go for the next session. So I would like. I will call mary jo foundations 25:49 to speak as the last speaker for this afternoon. 25:49. Yeah, it's fine.

My name is Paola Goel. I'm a student of International Migration at Georgetown University and a Congressional fellow at the U.S. house of Representatives. I'm here on behalf of the Mary Jo Foundation, a nonprofit that provides services to marginalized children, women and migrants in Nigeria and the state of Pennsylvania. Before this, I was an interpreter with Team Libertad, an initiative that greets and receives individuals as they are released from U.S. immigration and Customs Enforcement detention in the state of Georgia. One night, after conversing with one woman from Colombia who had spent five months in detention, I learned that she had valid employment authorization. This woman was wrongfully detained for two reasons. She could not communicate with the officer in English, and she did not have a good understanding of her legal status. And without the linguistic and legal knowledge, there was no way for her to advocate for herself. This is not an isolated incident. Over 47% of all immigrant adults in the United States have limited English proficiency, and nearly 71% have no criminal record. Across the United States and beyond, migrants with valid documentation remain in detention because of language barriers and limited legal literacy. The Global Compact on Migration GCM recognizes under Objectives 3, 7 and 12 the obligation to provide accessible information, reduce structural vulnerabilities, and ensure screening procedures are rights based. Language access is not a supplementary service it is the infrastructure to which every other GCM commitment is either realized or denied. A migrant who cannot communicate with an official, interpret a form, or understand their rights is effectively without protection regardless of what their documents say. As an immigrant and as a legal interpreter on behalf of the Mary Jo Foundation, I implore the delegations present to treat language access and legal literacy as core components of social inclusion policy in lines with objectives 16 and SDG 10 target 7 ensuring that no migrant is left without protection simply because they do not have the tools to advocate for for themselves thank you,

Thank you very much. I'm sorry that those who there is a long list already also here, but we cannot just listen to everybody because of a time limitation and I deeply hope that we'll use the coming days just to contribute to the different sessions for this IMRF and I would like to thank the panelists Jamil Fall, Carolina Gutardo and Faiza Ali for their really contribution to this discussion and before concluding because I will come back again with the summary session. Before concluding, I would like to remind participants that the next session untitled Group Reflection will begin immediately after the conclusion of this segment. I would now like to hand over to conduct of a meeting to be moderator of a group reflection. Mrs. Irem Arf policy advisor International Trade Union Confederation ITUK the thematic discussion from 1 to 4 is now concluded.

I would like to welcome everyone to the Group Summary session. I know it's been a long day, but I hope you will bear with us for this last last bit of the long day. Do you Dear colleagues, friends, as we are nearing the end of this long day and before I turn to the speakers, I want to thank every one of you for your incredible engagement and unwavering commitment to ensure that the Global Compact for Migration is more than just words and commitments on a paper, but a framework that truly leads to impact on the ground for positive change on the lives of migrants. I will have the honor and the challenging task of bringing all the nuanced positions and the wealth of information and concrete solutions you have shared throughout the day as well as during numerous consultations since the regional reviews have started until today. I won't now draw any conclusions as we will have the pleasure pleasure of hearing from the moderators of the previous four thematic sessions their own summaries. However, I want to acknowledge that we were unfortunately not able to hear many of the stakeholder voices, civil society and trade union representatives, including migrants and migrant workers themselves, due to lengthy visa procedures or even visa refusals. It's important that we acknowledge and we miss their presence here. Without further ado, I turn to the speakers for key outcomes and recommendations from the thematic discussions they have moderated. Considering the lateness of the hours, I remind that we will all have three minutes each. I now first give the floor to Dr. Leah Zamor from Zolberg Institute on Migration and Mobility, the new School for Social Research. She was the moderator of thematic discussion 1 Human rights of all migrants.

Thank you, thank you, thank you so much. Colleagues, delegates, everybody that's still here. If you are like me, you are feeling a bit under caffeinated and so I will be quite brief. It is also impossible to. To summarize in the due diligence that it deserves our first session, but I want to bring a few key points to the fore. One, and I look to my colleague Ian for this, is that the data, the academic data, is more positive than many of us may think. And so I think this requires us to think deeply about narratives about data, about how we use it and how data and research and academic information informs policymaking. The other one that I would like to emphasize, and this came up in other sessions as well, so I am probably cribbing on my fellow moderators. But this idea of regardless of status status that, that our worldview must be, and, and the GCM requires that we mainly think about a regardless of status world. And so I just want to emphasize that the other one that I want to bring to the fore, and this has come up not just in the first session, but in other sessions. And for us academics, we. We attribute this mainly to a man named BS Chimney. Is this idea between external and internal bias, the idea that migration is mostly driven or rooted in the conditions or policies or governance or mal governance of the countries of origin, as opposed to thinking about migration as a group global phenomenon that has everything to do with, for instance, the policies of destination states, the policies of middle states, you know, when we think about, for instance, wars and whether they are global in nature. And that has to do with what we think about migration. And so just to put on the table that we are, I think, discerning by the idea that migration is simply looking at what is going on in the country of origin as opposed to looking at what is going on globally, economically, militarily, politically, et cetera. The last point I want to make, and this definitely comes from our panelist Blanca Gomez, is the right not to migrate that there is this idea that and in fact increasingly the regional human rights courts, national courts, courts in countries around the world are recognizing that people that don't want to flee, that people that are being uprooted forcibly have a right not to migrate and putting that to the fore. And so those would be my concluding thoughts.

Thank you very much Lea, for this excellent summary. I directly move to Ms. Paola Camilli, Global Campaigns Director, Building and with Workers International. She moderated the thematic discussion too on labour rights and protections. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, thank you Chair. I'll try to be brief also because my fellow moderator here already mentioned some of the conclusions that also emerged from the stakeholders discussion on progress and gaps in the implementation of the GCM when it comes to protection of labor rights and protection for migrant workers. We the stakeholders and the panelists recognized efforts that are being made on recruitment frameworks, on bilateral cooperation systems, on labor inspection and on access to protection systems. But recurring challenges remain and they give the sense of a systemic challenge that we all face when it comes to labor rights. That means precarious works, that means rampant wage theft, unsafe conditions, barriers to social protection and justice, over reliance on temporary migration schemes and uneven enforcement of standards. All stakeholders, or at least this is the sense I had from the room, is that many stakeholders highlighted the principle of non regression from existing obligations, namely fundamental human rights and international labor standards. As my fellow moderator says, these are universal and unconditional regardless of status. They include freedom of association and collective bargaining, decent work both in countries of destination and in countries of origins, so that migration is a choice and not economic coercion, equal treatment and safe working conditions and environments free from violence and harassment. Without these rights, without these enabling rights and coherent system protection can't function. Several areas of convergence have also emerged that includes strengthening fair and ethical recruitment, promoting predictable rights based migration pathways instead of temporary and employer tied visa system that allow workers to change employers access to justice and living dignity, reinforcing labor inspection and enforcement of standards and ensure safe and effective access to to justice and remedies and cross border skills recognition. I hope I did justice to all the inputs received from the many different stakeholders involved. The way ahead is pretty clear. Deepen implementation nationally, locally and cross border without lowering the standards. Ensure that protection systems are accessible in practice and in reality and on the ground and anchor labor migration governance in international labour standards with trade unions, employer organization, social dialogue and migrant workers representation embedded by design.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Paula. It's amazing how you managed to capture all these details. Thank you so much. It's also very helpful for me. Now I move to Ms. Berenice Valdez Rivera from Block Latinoamericanos Obremigration Latin American block on migration. She moderated the thematic discussion 3 on pathways for safe, orderly and regular migration.

Verines, muchas gracias.

Thank you. Thank you, colleagues. This is a huge challenge. I will try not to repeat what has already been said said. So I will focus on the emphatic underscoring that we have heard over the thematic panels that it's important to look at the causes and the inequalities in order to address our recommendations at that Migration, irregular migration, migration without documentation is not an obligation on people. It is a response to policies of inclusion, of exclusion. And the solution to those policies of exclusion lies with states. States such as Spain, Canada, Uruguay and some others have mentioned that it is possible to find regular pathways that are beneficial to all. The first panel and the first intervention this morning we heard how access to rights and just policies and decent employment, family reunification, all of this can have an impact on an individual's life, but also on collectives and on the whole system. And the rollbacks, the retrogressions that we're currently experiencing and restrictions on rights affect people's very lives. As Blank said, we don't want more disappearances, more deaths. We don't want to be looking for the families of people, family members. We have a right to migrate or to not migrate. We've heard a lot of recommendations addressing the root causes, accountability. That's what we heard from the Youth and Adolescent platform. Bearing in mind the overriding best interest of of the child, all of the reasons that we are here, equality, intersectionality must be a real approach and above all consistency. We must be consistent, as we've heard from the local level upwards. We need to allocate more resources. We must have greater indicators and we should have greater participation of the migrants themselves, their families and civil society. And if we do that, we can transform the lives of all migrants and everyone who is here. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Berenice. Now I move to Dr. Mamadou Gaita, executive Director, Institute for Research and Promotion of Alternatives in Development and Pan Africa Network in Defense of Migrant Rights. You moderated thematic discussion 4 on drivers of migration and social inclusion.

Merci beaucoup.

Thank you very much. I'll speak in French now. So thematic discussion number four was about the root causes of migration and analysis there. And there were a number of Vesalian points that have been mentioned today by previous speakers. The first of those is the complexity of the causes of migration. It was said here, I believe, and that is in line with all of our experiences, that there rarely is a single cause that forces someone to leave their country. There is a whole set of causes. And when people leave, it means that the solution we need to find is a holistic one at various levels that not only should be considered on the level of practice, but also in terms of discourse and politics as well, policy as well. The question of social protection and prospects for that protection today, with the stock taking we engaged in during this session, given all of the xenophobia, the racism, the violence, and the participation in this phenomenon from various stakeholders, means that social protection has become a very thorny issue in the sense that there have been many tools mentioned today. But in practice, it's clear that the practice is not aligned with all of the rhetoric we're hearing in terms of policy and the changes that we want to see at that level. So we have to go further. Our recommendation fundamentally is to go further than just politics and rhetoric to ensure we have implementation that is aligned with what has been done social protection already, including through the Global Compact. There also is another important conclusion that is to push states to invest in rights and to support opportunities that allow those who decide to leave their countries to flourish. Because that is a very important point that was raised by this panel that is preventing people from leaving, or rather reflecting on how it can encourage them not to leave. That's no longer a relevant issue. Instead, we ought to see how laws or how states can act to make sure that opportunities are more equitable for migrants, whether in their countries of origin or with countries of transit and destination. So investment has to go beyond words in order to address these root causes. There also is a firm recommendation that is that all of the decision making instruments we have at the state level today ought to humanize migration, to humanize rhetoric and practice as well as public policy linked to migration, so that we can have a different view of migrants. And this would encourage collaboration between states, between regions to address the root causes of complex migration. So those were the affiliate points I wanted to touch on as we close this session. Number four. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I thank all the speakers for the excellent summaries of the four thematic sessions they have moderated. I will now actually close this session before giving my closing remarks. But. But we will move to the closing session right away. I thank all the speakers. Please don't remain seated. We will directly move to the last closing segment where we will have the migrant youth speaker, Ms. Casey Cruz and Ms. Ugochi Daniels, Deputy Director General of Operations of International Organization for Migration. I invite them to the podium. Thank you very much again everyone. As we're really moving to the end of today, I'm not going to do a summary of the summaries, excellent summaries provided by the previous speakers, but just some points that they all converged on and I think you would all believe agree with this. First, that I think in this room, stakeholders do not accept any backtracking from existing obligations, no regression in human rights and international labor standards. Second, stakeholders here do not accept any differential treatment of migrants based on any distinction, whether they are in an irregular or regular situation, whether they earn high wages or are employed in precarious work. All migrants have human rights and fundamental principles and rights at work apply to all migrant workers. Third, regular pathways are not enough. They must be rights based, lead to decent work, ensure protection and family unity and regularization is a key solution. As reiterated several times. Meaningful inclusion of migrants and local communities in decisions that impact them is not an optional add on, but a requirement to find and implement effective and sustainable solutions. Five drivers are complex and require policy coherence and holistic approach to address. From ensuring adequate responses to climate change and environmental degradation, decent job creation, social protection and investment in quality, accessible, equitable public services to ensuring peace, human rights, equality and socioeconomic inclusion in origin countries as well as in transit and destination. And finally, Global Compact for Migration is a recognition of the fact that no one country, no one government or entity can achieve by itself the objectives we set out. We need cooperation at all levels. I thank you all and the distinguished speakers. We will Now I will invite Ms. Casey Cruz from Komunita and Migration Youth and Children Platform to provide closing remarks. Thank you.

Good day.

Delegates and fellow migrants. I am here today on behalf of the Migration Youth and Children platform. My father worked at the sea for 27 years. I grew up recognizing the sound of his voice long before I could truly know his face. Hearing from him only during brief phone calls, but perhaps once a month, often lasting less than an hour. Long before I came, an advocate like everyone else in this hall, migration had already defined my life. Today I stand before not just as a youth representative, but as a daughter of a labor export, because that is often what migrants are reduced to, we are treated as cheap labor exports. And so, as a migrant myself, I speak from a reality shared by millions of individuals and families across the world. We often speak of migration in technical terms, but behind these are stories. A mother's hands, a father's ears, a young person's future are too often treated as commodities that governments are markets agreed for a price package and send abroad when opportunities cannot be created and be prioritized at their home countries. I speak on behalf of the migrant children from Myanmar whose schools were forced to close, pushing them across borders under conditions no child should endure. While the military junta continues to be condoned and its versions of democratic elections is even being supported by states to legitimize the rule. For Cambodian families internally displaced within their own land due to border conflict, and for countless Filipinos whose labor sustains economies abroad, while our humanity is reduced to the value of the labor alone, enduring grueling and often unimaginable working hours and conditions in exchange of remittances, only to be subjected by bureaucratic corruption that further impedes our national development across the globe. Migration is shaped not simply by choice, but by forces beyond individual control, beyond economic reasons. Many are also forced to leave because of political violence and impunity. It means years of separation, miss birthdays and family milestones, growing up with absent parents and carrying the quiet pain of leaving home, our loved ones and parts of our identity behind. And yet endurance alone should never be the expectation and the norm. Migration governance is our shared responsibility. Frameworks such as the GCM and ICRMW have already laid out the vision. But the question before us now is how do we ensure that protection at every stage of the journey, rights upheld in practice, families are supported rather than separated, and returning home shaped by opportunity and security rather than uncertainty. These are not questions for one actor alone. It's high time to stop passing the blame and ensure that host, destination and even transit countries take equal accountability in protecting migrants far beyond the status and categories imposed to us. Governments, civil society, the private sector, international organizations and communities must work together across borders and sectors because migration is indeed transnational and extends beyond domestic laws. As we close this hearing, I return to where I began, with families and stories like mine, and with the countless others whose lives continue to be shaped by migration. I think of those whose voices remain unheard beyond this room. Undocumented migrants living in fear and invisibility. Refugees and those who have never been given the chance to speak for themselves. In our story of migration, choice is a privilege. Few can afford because for many the journey begins where options end. For countless migrants, returning home is not truly a choice when there is no opportunity in their home country and no dignified future waiting for them. Our representation here means creating spaces where youth engagement is not occasional or symbolic but embedded in decision making process and we are treated as trusted partners in shaping what comes next. So let this not be the end of the conversation. Throughout this hearing we have spoken about the impacts of migration on children and young people like us and the contradictions between migration policies and our rights. Let it also be said clearly, we young people refuse to be treated as a problem that needs to be managed and this addition to long list of statistics. We dare to transform our stories and experiences of migration into resistance and power. We are here asserting our place and demanding recognition. We have a long way to go and we the young people are ready to lead alongside you. Thank you,

Thank you very much Casey for also bringing once again the human stories behind all these discussions we have had. Now I turn to Ms. Uguchi Daniels, Deputy Director General of Operations of iom, for the final remarks and to close this meeting today.

To you.

Thank you, thank you very much. It's a great honor and pleasure to be here. I was here in the morning sitting up at the back listening to all of you and what you had to say and the passion and the energy and the really important topics. So as I close, I know you've had a whole full day of discussion, so I hope we still have energy for the last few minutes. So with that I want to recognize colleagues, friends, migrants, stakeholders for your time here today. Especially to the migrant leaders, the civil society partners, community organizations, faith leaders, trade unions, mayors, researchers, private sector representatives, um, partners you've all shared. Oh and how can I forget the youth, the young people, you've all shared your perspectives today. Thank you. But not just for participating. For participating with passion, with principles, with your personal stories. I have a couple of shout outs that I want to make starting from first of all with the President of the General Assembly. She was here this morning for convening this dialogue and assuring that as we start the imrf, we begin by listening to you as key stakeholders. This is important as it sets the tone for the conversations and it frames the issues. The decisions made this week must pass grounded in experience, in expertise, and the lived realities of people closest to the issues at stake.

So

it reflects one of the most important principles of the Global Compact for Migration. And as much as it is great to be gathered here, progress happens when it is shaped in communities, in workplaces, in schools, shelters, border regions, churches, mosques, temples and cities all around the world. At the heart of this conversation, people are making deeply human decisions to find safety, reunite with family, build a future, contribute their skills and create opportunities for themselves and their families. Migration has always been part of the human story. It can be a powerful force for growth, resilience and connection. But we know all too well that people are often left without safe, regular pathways and face unnecessary risks, exploitation and abuse as a result. Conflict, displacement and instability, economic instability, continue to place enormous pressure on people and communities. We have heard many times today, too many migrants face discrimination, detention and barriers to basic services. Harmful narratives are only growing louder. And many of you have spoken about shrinking civic space, funding pressures and and the increasing challenges of defending migrant rights. We are very clear eyed about these challenges, but we also recognize something equally important. Progress is happening and much of it is being driven by all of you. So my second shout out is for all of you and the work that you're doing. You are not retreating to, you are not giving up. It is hard, there is a lot to do, but you are all very, very committed. So a big shout out to all of you for that. Migrant led organizations are creating solutions rooted in lived experience. Whether it's civil society organizers delivering services and defending rights, or local communities opening doors, researchers bringing evidence, advocates holding institutions accountable and pushing all of us to do better. That work has turned the Global Compact from a set of commitments into tangible progress in people's lives. Over the past several months, stakeholders from all 12 sectors of the Compact have helped shape, shape this process through regional consultations, written recommendations, side events, joint pledges, national review processes in nearly 50 countries. Even with administrative barriers and financial constraints. You found ways to participate and we are proud to help support broader participation through the Migration Multipartner Trust Fund with contributions from partners. And this is my third shout out, including the United Methodist Church, in particular, Reverend Jack Amick, I don't know if he's still in the room, and the Robert Bosch Foundation. I also must give a shout out to a dear colleague who is no longer with us. So I have to take a moment here to honor the life and work of Claudia Interiano, a deeply respected member of this community. Through her work with the foundation for justice, the Latin American Bloc and the Women in Migration Network, she stood alongside families searching for missing loved ones and seeking justice. Claudia helped ensure that lived experience shaped policy discussions, including through her engagement in the Global Compact process. From the beginning. We honor her legacy and we carry it Forward. That kind of commitment, shared by all of you here, reflects something fundamental. Meaningful. Participation must be protected, must be expanded, and it must be properly resourced. And your message today has been clear. Human rights must remain at the center of migration policy. Dignity belongs to every migrant, regardless of status. Children and vulnerable migrants deserve special care and safeguards. People need safe pathways, decent work and access to services. And those defending migrants rights must be able to do so safely. These are decisions that shape whether people can move safe, safely, whether families stay together, and whether migration creates opportunity for individuals and communities alike. And that's why the Global Compact remains so important. Now, something that is really important, and it's a request I have to all of you. We often talk about the Compact, the Global Compact on Migration, the gcm. This week, I want to give you all a target. At least speak to five people you haven't spoken to before. And when you're speaking about the gcm, don't say gcm, don't say Global Compact. Don't say the Compact. Say the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration. Safe, Orderly and Regular. Okay, you remember your target. Okay, good. It gives us a practical roadmap for cooperation at a time when cooperation feels very hard. It helps countries build policies that we know are effective, humane and grounded in evidence. And it reminds us that migration, when managed well, can create enormous benefits for communities around the world. So as we kick off the week ahead, I hope we stay focused on outcomes people can feel in their daily lives. Our rights being upheld, our lives being saved, our people able to move safely and with dignity, our communities seeing the benefits that migration can bring, and our migrants themselves helping shape the decisions that affect their lives. This is what meaningful progress looks like. The conversations beginning here must continue well beyond this week here in New York. The partnership strength in here can drive action at all levels where real change happens. And the UN Network on Migration remains committed to working alongside all of you to help turn commitments into action. Today has demonstrated the expertise, compassion and determination in this community. So let's carry that energy into the week ahead and into the work that follows. And now my final shout out. Speaking of work, and before we close, I would like to give a word of utmost gratitude and appreciation to send someone whom most of us are very fortunate to know very well. And this is Ms. Monami Mawlick. Monami, thank you. You have worked tirelessly since the inception of the network to ensure that stakeholders have a meaningful seat at the table. And that includes your efforts to support the office of the pga, the President of the General assembly in helping bring around the meeting we're having here today. And it was truly a team effort. To all members of the team out here, you get a general shout out. But that Monomi deserves praise, particular recognition for her work in building partnerships and trust with all of us here today. And we thank her. So thank you, Monami, for your trust, for your openness, for your determination. And to all of you, thank you once again.