Among the most critical issues confronting industrial and post industrial societies is their need for immigrants to handle the dirty jobs of life, but the ongoing prejudice of populations against foreigners. Several days ago, refugees at the Bicske integration center in Hungary, held a demonstration before the UN’s refugee office in Budapest to protest against conditions in the camp. Most of the refugees are asylum seekers and those seeking a new life in Europe. Part of the problem of refugee centers is bringing together people from diverse backgrounds who share nothing in common other than desiring a job in a European country. Last week fighting broke out over, ironically, the issue of access to Internet. Over a dozen people were injured in the fighting.
As refugees enter European nations, the cost of their maintenance is not always welcomed. Social workers and psychologists have to be hired in addition to medical staff so when government feel the need to reduce costs, a refugee center invariably is among their initial targets. UN officials believe the Hungarian situation is all too common– asylum seekers lack access to quality medical care, they are unable to work to provide for some necessities of life or even have enough money to travel around seeking work. Food may be nutritional, but it usually is not the food they are accustomed to back in their homelands. The UN also believes language issues and communication invariably become problems between refugees and host nations.
Perhaps, it is time to examine the issue of the 200,000,000 refugees who currently are working in nations other than their own on a much broader scale and identify key issues that must be addressed by host nations.