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Partnerships and Networks

CMRS actively initiated a number of joint initiatives and partnerships with international, regional, and local entities that are concerned with migration issues. 

In Spring 2021 CMRS created the first network among scholars of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) on mixed migration issues to enhance the production and dissemination of knowledge in the area of mixed migration. More about the Mixed Migration Network

CMRS joined the International Migration, Integration, and Social Cohesion in Europe (IMISCOE) network on March 17, 2022. IMISCOE is Europe's largest interdisciplinary research network in the field of migration, integration and diversity studies. The IMISCOE research network consists of 61 research institutes from almost all European countries and from various disciplines, including sociology, political science, economics, law, demography, public administration, social geography and history.The Center for Migration and Refugee Studies (CMRS) at the American University in Cairo (AUC) is the first non-European research center to join the IMISCOE network.

In 2022 and through funds from the European delegation to Egypt, CMRS launched the Egyptian Migration Hub (EHUB) to bring together academics, practitioners, and government officials to discuss important topics of migration governance in Egypt. More about the EHUB

In September 2023, CMRS partnered with the University of Cologne in Germany in the project “Dialogue on Migration Governance in the Euro-Mediterranean (DiaMiGo)” funded by the German Academic Exchange Services (DAAD). More about the DiaMiGo

In the summer of 2024, CMRS will host a summer academy where students and faculty members from Cologne University will visit CMRS/AUC. Moreover, during the life of the project, each year CMRS will send a researcher for a short teaching and research stay (3-5 days as a workshop/intensive seminar) at the University of Cologne. 

CMRS is a member in the MENA Statelessness platform the first hub for organizations and individual expert in MENA working together in the hope of reducing statelessness in the region through research and advocacy. 

CMRS involvement in research around the problem of statelessness in MENA started in fall 2017 when CMRS partnered with the Middle East Centre of the London School of Economics to research access to birth registration and consular assistance for migrants and refugees in Egypt. The research was conducted in fall 2017 and spring 2018 with migrants and refugees from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Sudan, South Sudan, Nigeria, and Syria. The research investigated migrant, and refugee identification needs focusing primarily on access to birth registration for children born to these migrants in Egypt. The findings of the research are published in a sixty-two pages report entitled “Preventing Statelessness among Migrant and Refugee Children in Egypt”, the results of which were disseminated at a conference organized in Cairo on October 7, 2019. The report and the policy brief based on it were translated into the Arabic language. Both the report and policy brief were disseminated widely to the concerned government agencies, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) as well as other international and local organizations concerned with the issue of statelessness.

Within the framework of the collaboration with the Middle East Centre of the London School of Economics, CMRS organized a five-day intensive short course from January 12-16, 2020 entitled ‘Statelessness: Theories and Practices”. The course was co-taught by Bronwen Manby, Senior Policy Fellow at the Middle East Center of LSE and Zahra Albarazi, Senior Researcher at the Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion. The course examined relevant legislation and policy (international, regional, and domestic), the causes of statelessness and the links between statelessness and other issues including human rights, displacement and migration. Moreover, during the year 2020, CMRS carried out twenty awareness-raising sessions for the main five refugee communities in Egypt to help them understand the procedure of birth registration and related matters in Egypt. Twenty-awareness raising sessions were carried out during the period May 2020-January 2021. In addition, CMRS produced brochures in different languages highlighting the main important points discussed in the sessions. Last but not least, CMRS initiated a media awareness campaign by producing promotional videos. The different videos provided a brief background on the refugee definition, the conditions that could lead to statelessness, and the process of obtaining different identification papers in Egypt. The videos are in Arabic with subtitles in English. In a period of six weeks, CMRS released one video per week on CMRS Facebook page.

In 2021, CMRS partnered with the Boston University’s International Human Rights Clinic (IHRC) in IHRC’ project on Statelessness in MENA. In the framework of IHRC’s project on statelessness, country-specific reports were produced for each country in MENA detailing the relevant laws and policies, gaps in laws and policies, and stakeholder strategies regarding statelessness. CMRS was commissioned with the task of reviewing and commenting on the report on Egypt. Moreover, CMRS hosted a conference on statelessness in December 2021 where the findings of each country report were presented.