The World’s Largest Migration Conference Gathered inSydney
The International Metropolis Conference 2018 was held between 29 October-2 November 2018 in Sydney, Australia. The Conference brought together leaders and experts to discuss migration, diversity and integration.
International Metropolis Conferences are the largest annual gathering of experts (from academia, governments, and civil society) in the fields of migration, integration and diversity. The plenary sessions offer access to the insights, challenges, and prescriptions of some of the world’s key experts. In addition, Metropolis Conferences offer comprehensive study tour programs, and around 100 workshops.
The theme for this year’s Conference was Global Migration in Turbulent Times; with a focus on the following eight sub-themes: Enterprise, Innovation and Employment, Migration and Mobility, Displacement and Asylum, Migrant Voices in a Connected World, Conflicting Agendas, Religious Diversity, Migration and Inequality and Australia a multicultural paradise.
In the frame of the Metropolis 2018, a session on “Global Compact on Refugees and Local Governments” was organized by Marmara Municipalities Union in cooperation with Turkish-German University Migration and Integration Research Center-TAGU. Director of TAGU, Prof. Dr. M. Murat Erdogan analyzed the current situation in Turkey. Then, MMU International Cooperation Coordinator and Director of Migration Policy Center (MPC) Ms. Burcuhan Sener conveyed Turkish municipalities’ experiences, their role on management of migration process and MMU’s activities carried out within the scope of MPC.
“Municipalities shoulder a great level of responsibility, together with other stakeholders. They provide a wide range of services to refugees alongside the host communities, ranging from trainings to guidance to relevant authorities, from healthcare to social assistance, from legal counselling to employment support. Local integration emerges as one of the leading challenges for both refugees and the host communities and municipalities are one of the closest institutions to them.” said Ms. Sener.
At the conference, MMU Secretary General Mr. M. Cemil Arslan and Director of MMU Migration Policy Center Ms. Burcuhan Sener made a statement to the Australian press and replied their questions on Turkey’s experience on migration.
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