UN Chief Urges Commitment to Well-managed Migration at Marrakech Conference

The UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the migration meeting in Marrakech to adopt the Global Compact on Migration is an opportunity to make progress towards a well-managed migration.

“I urge Governments, businesses, civil society, but also local and regional authorities to come to the table ready to make commitments that will maximize the benefits of well-managed migration, and reduce the negative impact of ill-advised policies and a lack of cooperation,” said Guterres at an event dubbed the Road to Marrakech.

“I want to thank the Kingdom of Morocco for its generosity in hosting and helping to prepare this landmark conference,” he said.

The global compact provides a chance to come together and to manage one of the many facets of globalization.

As a historic and multi-faceted phenomenon involving humanitarian, human rights, and demographic issues, migration has deep economic, environmental and political implications, he said.

Migration “generates many different, legitimate and strongly held opinions. Not always the strongly held are legitimate; not always the legitimate are strongly held,” he explained.

Unfortunately, it is also an issue that has often been misrepresented and exploited for political gain.

Unregulated, unmanaged migration has created false and negative perceptions of migrants that feed into a narrative of xenophobia, intolerance and racism, Guterres said calling for promoting legal migration.

The Marrakech conference is set to be held in December this year.