In West and Central Africa, Legal Experts Push to Turn Migrants’ Rights Into Reality

In West and Central Africa, Legal Experts Push to Turn Migrants’ Rights Into Reality

Participants at the third annual meeting of the Network of Legal Experts on Migration in West and Central Africa (NoLEM), working to strengthen migration law and access to justice across the region. Photo: IOM / Moustapha Kalil Ouattara, 2026

Dakar, Senegal – The third annual meeting of the Network of Legal Experts on Migration for West and Central Africa (NoLEM) took place in Dakar from 21 to 25 September 2026, bringing together legal experts and partners to strengthen regional cooperation on migration law, build on the Network’s achievements and shape its priorities for the years ahead.

More than 30 participants attended the meeting, including NoLEM members, representatives of the Government of Senegal, United Nations agencies, the International Detention Coalition (IDC), law students and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC). The five-day meeting provided an opportunity to take stock of the Network’s progress, strengthen partnerships and agree on the strategic directions that will guide its continued development and work in the coming years.

Established in November 2022, NoLEM brings together legal experts around the shared objective of upholding migrants’ rights in West and Central Africa. The Network has since developed expertise in key areas of migration law, including through research on migrant detention and access to justice. In doing so, it has helped identify and address the legal and institutional barriers that people on the move may face across West and Central Africa.

Opening the annual meeting, Professor Abdou Khadre Diop, Chair of NoLEM, underscored why this practical focus matters: legal expertise must remain connected to the realities experienced by people on the move.

“Behind every recommendation we make is a worker detained at a border, a woman denied access to legal protection, a family displaced by land that has become barren. Our work will not be measured by the number of publications we produce, but by how much we succeed in narrowing the gap between rights proclaimed and rights experienced.”

This ambition is particularly relevant in a region where migration pathways are diverse and closely intertwined with economic, social, environmental and security realities. An estimated 11.3 million migrants live across the region, 77 per cent of whom originate from another country in West and Central Africa. Yet these journeys can also expose people to significant risks, particularly along some international migration routes. In 2025, over 3,800 deaths or missing migrants were recorded along routes crossing the Western and Central Mediterranean, the Atlantic Ocean and the Sahara Desert. For others, migration journeys end in assisted return: between 2021 and 2025, 191,050 migrants received assistance from the IOM for voluntary return, including 55,525 in 2025.

The third annual meeting marked another step forward in the development of NoLEM. Members made progress towards institutionalizing the Network and expanding its membership to include new areas of expertise and additional countries, further strengthening its regional reach. Participants also laid the foundations for a regional network of legal clinics and set the direction for NoLEM’s next publication, with a view to translating the Network’s knowledge and experience into practical contributions to access to justice and migration policy across the region.

“The question is no longer only what NoLEM has achieved, but how the knowledge, exchanges and partnerships it has fostered can be further leveraged and made available to professionals, institutions and researchers working in the field of migration,” said Anna Eva Radicetti, IOM Deputy Regional Director for West and Central Africa.

At the end of five days of consultations, NoLEM members adopted a 2026–2027 roadmap to guide the Network’s next steps and provide a common framework for its priorities. These directions will support NoLEM in consolidating its role as a regional platform for expertise and dialogue on migration law.

NoLEM was established with the support of the International Organization for Migration’s Migration Resource Allocation Committee (MIRAC) Fund and benefits from the support of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC).

***

For more information, please contact Karen Lohse: kalohse@iom.int.