Valetta Summit: Dialogue with civil society

ICMC Europe, NRC and MADE Africa are hosting the “Valetta Summit: Dialogue with civil society” event.  This event will take place on 5 November 2015 (Thursday from 9.00hrs to 18.00hrs) in Brussels (final location will be communicated shortly) with the financial support of the EC.

The Africa-Europe Summit on Migration will take place in Valletta, Malta, on 11 and 12 November 2015. The Summit will build on existing cooperation processes between Europe and Africa, particularly the Rabat and Khartoum processes on migration, and the EU-Africa Dialogue on Migration and Mobility. The Valletta Summit will result in a political declaration and an action plan.

In order to provide civil society inputs to the “Valletta Action Plan”, we have carried out consultations among African and European civil society platforms and organisations, resulting in a civil society joint statement. Given the short timeframe until the Summit and the sometimes heavy internal processes for sign-offs, this joint statement has been conceived as a summary of the consultation outcomes and as a support tool for regional and national advocacy ahead of the Summit.

As a follow-up to this statement,  this one-day event in Brussels will be the occasion for civil society to call on African and European leaders to focus first on human rights, decency, dignity, wellbeing and welcoming of people in need.

The event will bring together the views of African and European civil society representatives - including migrant and diaspora organisations, policy-makers, international organisations and academics - and will focus on areas that have emerged as common priorities during the consultations, as follows:

5. tackling the root causes that force people to migrate while respecting rights to mobility; 
5. providing access to safe and regular migration routes to Europe;
5. strengthening international protection;
5. improving migration and asylum governance in Africa and Europe; and
6. facilitating and supporting migrants’ and diaspora’s contribution to development.

African and European civil society organisations have a wealth of expertise and decades of field-based experience in developing approaches and programmes to address crises in Africa and Europe: by providing humanitarian assistance, and supporting resilience and recovery, livelihood opportunities and development.

This event will be the occasion to share this invaluable knowledge and experience and to remind all stakeholders of the need for meaningful civil society engagement prior, during, and after the Summit.