Justice will never die and rights will never get lost as long as there are fair people like you… I owe you my life, nothing more to say.
A Sudanese Refugee in Cairo
       


Africa and Middle East
Refugee Assistance
(AMERA)

1 Tawfik Diab Street
3rd Floor, Apt 15
Garden City, Cairo
Arab Republic of Egypt

Tel: +20 22795 3202
Fax: +20 22792 6424

E-mail:
info@amera-uk.org
 
Jobs
 
Egypt hosts the fifth largest urban refugee population in the world. Although officially there are only 30,000 refugees in Egypt, unofficial estimates range from 500,000 asylum seekers and refugees upwards from 35 different nationalities. Most refugees are from Africa, the majority being from Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea. There is also a large refugee population from Palestine. No one in Egypt was providing legal aid until AMERA (formerly known as refugee legal aid) began in 2000. As the sole provider of pro bono legal aid as a professional service in Egypt, AMERA has established working relationships with UNHCR and other refugee service providers. These connections enable it to effectively advocate for refugee rights. Egypt is generally tolerant of refugees and asylum seekers on its territory. A party to both the 1951 UN and 1969 OAU refugee conventions, long before ratification in 1981, Egypt alerted UNHCR Geneva of its reservations to several of the articles regarding elementary education, public relief, the right to work, social security and personal status. This is especially significant as regards the right to work, leaving refugees dependent on the informal economy.

Despite the reservations, Egypt’s ratification of the Convention on the Rights to the Child gives all children the right to free primary education and Egypt. Consequently, refugee children can, in theory, exercise this right. However, in practice, because of the extreme pressure on Egyptian schools and the paperwork required by a refugee child to be accepted, it is difficult to fulfill that right. Concerning employment, refugees are still assumed to require work permit as any foreigner, but the Government of Egypt has stopped stamping refugee cards with the prohibition on work. Refugees can access health services at government hospitals.

Due to lack of resources, UNHCR’s budget for assistance has been shrinking, limiting their already scarce monetary assistance to the neediest and providing only emergency medical care to thousands of asylum seekers. AMERA is unable to provide material help itself, but refers refugees to the few agencies that do.
AMERA-Egypt operates as a
foreign branch of AMERA-UK under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In 2000 there were no Egyptian lawyers trained in refugee/human rights law. Today, through the training that has been ongoing since 2000, AMERA’s permanent staff are all Egyptian. In addition, three times a year, AMERA trains ten volunteer lawyers and psychologists/social workers from Egypt and the rest of the world. These volunteers are self-funded and remain with AMERA for at least six months. The work of AMERA-Egypt is overseen by an Advisory Committee, chaired by Dr. Harrell-Bond and appointed by the AMERA-UK Board.

AMERA-Egypt meets its goals and objectives through teams, each headed by a legal officer or psychosocial worker. The volunteer legal advisors and psychosocial workers are assigned to work with a team and are also responsible for representing individual refugee status determination cases.