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Support message to Deaf women fighting deportation WinVisible (for women with visible and invisible disabilities) and Crossroads Coalition for Justice for Asylum Seekers sent a message of support to two Deaf women in Manchester fighting for the right to stay in the UK. They have a campaign going. To: deafstudentsmuststay@yahoo.co.uk Dear Sameeha and Kristine, We are with you in your struggle to be granted the right to stay. We are a multi-racial grassroots organisation of women with disabilities - both visible and invisible - facing discrimination, like you. We are Black and white women, some of us are immigrant, some seeking asylum, some British. We are based at the Crossroads Women's Centre in London, and work with the No School Apartheid Campaign and the Crossroads Coalition for Justice for Asylum Seekers (see attached article from Observer Online which tells you more). We are not able to travel up to Manchester for your court case tomorrow, but we send our heartfelt support and wishes for you to win your right to stay. We are planning to publicise your case in London tomorrow at the lobby of Parliament by Our Rights Now disability coalition, with placards and circulating information about your struggle. We are delighted that the UK Deaf community, other people with disabilities, anti-deportation activists and the community in general, are getting together to support you and to defend our collective rights. Sameeha and Kristine, you rightly make the case that you will be financially self-supporting after you finish college. That is not true of all of us, yet we all work hard, whether or not we have a waged job. As you know, living in an inaccessible world - getting around, communicating - is such hard work! and as women with disabilities we have to work even harder, because we usually have less resources than men, are often caring for other people too and have to deal with sexism. People of colour have made an enormous, unrecognised contribution to the economies of the UK, Europe and the US, and we have every right to come and live safely here. How many immigrant women and men have disabilities, is often hidden. It is also hidden how often our disabilities and our having to emigrate are the result of wars promoted by British arms manufacturers. People are refused the right to come to a new country because the UK and other Western governments say we will be a drain on health services and social services, while the UK alone has squandered at least £3.5 billion this year to kill and disable women, children and men in Iraq, and more on a brutal occupation with no end in sight - it seems there is always money for war but not for what we need. We remember Shahraz Kayani, a Pakistani father who set himself alight in protest, and died, after the authorities refused to allow his disabled daughter to come to Australia. Some of us in WinVisible are women seeking asylum, including from rape, other torture and persecution. We have fled war zones, and have disabilities and ill-health following the violence we suffered, but instead of compassion, we are denied basic human rights: money for food for ourselves and our children, housing, education in state schools and colleges, and we are left destitute or detained with our children and deported. We are denied the disability benefits and services which every person in need is entitled to. No School Apartheid is a network of mothers, fathers, teachers and other carers who oppose the denial of school education to asylum-seeking children. The Crossroads Coalition for Justice for Asylum Seekers includes an Eritrean women's group, and women from other countries, many of whom have been fighting destitution and deportation as a result of the same immigration laws which are being used against you. The Coalition demands: housing and support for all destitute asylum seekers; the right to access to the NHS, benefits and other resources; and the right to work so no asylum seekers are impoverished; for the Refugee Council and other NGOs to withdraw from administering inhuman policies; and for the government to recognise rape and persecution as torture and therefore grounds for asylum. We demand: We would like to be directly in touch with you - please get back to us by email and let us know how else we may be able to help. We would be glad to offer suggestions. WinVisible (women with visible and invisible disabilities) winvisible@allwomencount.net Crossroads Coalition for Justice for Asylum Seekers c/o law@crossroadswomen.net |