After Habitat III and ahead of the Global Compact of Migration, Belgian government and the city of Mechelen host global conference on “Cities and Migration”

The Belgian government and the city of Mechelen will host a “Global Conference on Cities and Migrants” on the 16th and 17th of November 2017, together with the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the UN Human Settlements Program (UN Habitat) and United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG) as institutional partners.

In October 2016, UN Member States adopted the New Urban Agenda (NUA), at the Habitat III Conference, establishing that migration is one of the key governance areas that requires policy coherence and coordination mechanisms at central, local and regional levels, in order to ensure the proper management of diversity necessary for social cohesion and indispensable for sustainable urban development.

The Conference will aim to facilitate key decision makers’ views on actionable recommendations on cooperation for migration governance and local and national levels in follow-up to Habitat III and as input to the stocktaking meeting for the GCM, hosted by the Government of Mexico (December 2017).

Highlights for our consituency

► Thursday 16 November 2017

- 9:00 – 10:15 - Key note remarks by institutional partners, UCLG President Parks Tau, will address the audience at the Opening Ceremony.

- 10:30 – 12:00 - Guided discussion: “What are the key elements that can inform the Global Compact on Migration” , the session will be moderated by Mohamed Boussraoui, Director of Programme, United Cities and Local Governments.

- 12:45 –14:45 - Side-event: Human mobility and the right to the city, organized by UCLG.

- 15:00-16:30 - Human rights of migrants, the Committee on Social Inclusion Participatory Democracy and Human Rights will participate in this session that will look at the role played by local actors in supporting migrants exercise their rights, specifically in terms of access to services to which they are entitled by law, employment, housing and access to justice.

► Friday 17 November 2017

- 09:30 – 11:00 - Guided discussion: Implementation of migration-related commitments of the New Urban Agenda, the session will be modereated by Emilia Saiz, Deputy Secretary General of UCLG.

[See the programme of the full event here]

In 2018, UN member states will gather at a conference to endorse the first Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM). The GCM is intended to present a framework for comprehensive international cooperation on migrants and human mobility and set out a range of actionable commitments, means of implementation and a framework for follow-up and review among Member States regarding international migration in all its dimensions.

This is an opportunity for states to commit to a unifying framework on all aspects of international migration, integrating humanitarian and development work, and based on human rights. Local authorities can make important contributions towards the preparation of this agreement, particularly through innovative and more effective approaches to urban governance that accounts for greater diversity, including migration policies for inclusive growth.