Immigration news

The UK is making it harder for Syrians who wish to remain in the UK say lawyers. UK immigration authorities are quietly sending Syrian refugees to their first European country of entry, usually Italy.

Lawyers say that in the last four years, UK visa approvals for Syrians have dropped from 70% to 40%. Official UK statistics show that over 30 people were ejected from Britain in a 12-month period to mid-2014.

The UN is also making arrangements that will attempt to funnel more Syrians from overwhelmed southern European nations to more affluent northern countries.

The number of overseas nationals residing in Germany grew at the quickest rate in 20 years in 2014 according to figures released by the Statistics Office on March 16. Data shows that in 2014 a total of 519,340 people, equivalent to 6.8 percent of the population, arrived in Germany compared to 2013, which saw 437,000 people coming to the country.

The majority of foreigners arriving in Germany are Syrians, who are fleeing war, plus Romanians and Bulgarians coming in search of employment. The surge in immigrants represents a second year in a row of record immigration in Europe's biggest economy.

The Labour Party has vowed to bring in time limits and ban the indefinite detention of asylum seekers and immigrants in detention centres, if they come into power after the 7 May 2015 General Election. The move will bring the UK into line with other Western nations.

Yvette Cooper, the shadow home secretary, described the detention system as inefficient and "deeply scarring" for detainees. There have been increasing delays in visa applications being considered leading to more people in detention centres; in 2010 1,757 were detained for three to six months, that number rose to 2,385 last year.

Research regarding immigration has been conducted by the British Election Study (BES); an academic group that has analysed Britain's electoral behaviour since 1964. In the survey, the BES found that the more "financially literate" a person is, the more positive their views on immigration are likely to be.

The survey was taken by up to 30,000 people. BES discovered that the more people correctly understood inflation, interest rates and risk diversification the more likely they were to have a positive stance on immigration and its cultural and economic benefits.

Afzal Amin recently resigned as the Conservative Parliamentary Candidate for Dudley North, less than two months before the UK General Election on 7 May 2015. This is following recent allegations of an attempted plot between Amin and the anti-immigration and anti-muslim English Defence League (EDL). Apparently, the intention was that EDL would announce a fake march in Dudley North; The march would not actually go ahead and Amin would then take credit for preventing the march.

A US appeals court in Washington DC has set a date of May 4 to hear arguments concerning a challenge against President Barack Obama's immigration executive actions.

In December 2014, a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit brought by Joe Arpaio, an Arizona sheriff, who described Obama's sweeping changes as 'unconstitutional'. Apario lodged an appeal with the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

The lawsuit filed by Apario said the changes were effectively an amnesty and would encourage more people to enter the US illegally.