01/10/2025
The 15th Global Forum on Migration and Development - GFMD Summit in Colombia, a country that has pioneered large-scale regularisation programmes, was the ideal venue to discuss why regularisation saves lives and must be grounded in human rights.
Together with colleagues from the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), civil society delegates and partners from across regions, we co-hosted the side event “Securing lives through regularisation: a rights-based agenda,” during the first day of the Summit.
🔗 Read our short recap of the event and why regularisation, done right, is a win for everyone: https://gfmdcivilsociety.org/civil-society-highlights-positive-impacts-of-regularisation-for-migrants-and-communities-at-the-gfmd/
The conversation was practical and pointed, with four overarching takeaways:
1️⃣ Regularisation protects. It stabilises and opens access to work, health care and education, reducing exploitation and precarity for people on the move and benefiting host communities and local economies.
2️⃣ It must be doable. Procedures should be simple, accessible, and affordable, with clear information, timelines, and other relevant factors.
3️⃣ Rights first, always. Gender- and child-sensitive design, due process, data protection and firewalls are critical.
4️⃣ Joint action is a must. Progress depends on cooperation between national and local authorities, consulates, employers, trade unions, and migrant-led and community organisers.
💭 If there’s one thing attendees took away, it’s that this isn’t theory. We heard concrete experiences from the ground: the Freemove Project, presented by Professor Diego Acosta, showing how legal design can open (or close) real pathways; the State of Tlaxcala on linking regularisation to services and decent work; Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights on anchoring programmes in rights and accountability; and civil society voices from Alianza Americas and Platform for Undocumented Migrants - PICUM on closing implementation gaps, strengthening community accompaniment, and keeping migrants’ rights at the centre.
