What are the centres of internment of foreigners in Europe? – The Trade

Is closed at night and it was raining in Madrid. A group of 39 people crying for “freedom” and “dignity” from the rooftop of the Center of Internment of Foreigners (CIE) in Aluche, a barrio in the southwest of the Spanish capital.

The riot took place last week and lasted 12 hours. After negotiating that I would not have reprisals against them, the migrants-internal to the centre – they returned to their rooms.

Just a month before, 70 inmates had escaped from a similar center in Murcia, in the southeast of Spain, in an action that also left five police officers wounded.

These last two cases, again called attention to these detention centers.

And on its use as a prelude to the expulsion of irregular immigrants from Europe to their countries of origin.

In Spain, these places are called the Centres of Internment of Foreigners (CIEs), in Italy, are the so-called Identification and Expulsion Centres and in the Uk, the Centers of Deportation of Immigrants.

In France, where in September, also came up with an escape of several inmates in the southern city of Nimes, known as holding Centers Administrative.

— Centers in the whole of Europe —

With one name or another, this type of facilities are used -according to the consulted experts – in all the countries of the European Union.

“What distinguishes Europe from other parts of the world is that they have facilities especially created to accommodate immigrants or asylum seekers.
Specific for that purpose,” says Michael Flynn, executive director of the Global Detention Project (GDP for its acronym in English), a center of monitoring of these institutions with headquarters in Geneva.

“Some countries do better than others, but legally they have to be site-specific installations that ensure the separation of this type of inmate population convicted of criminal offences,” he says in conversation with BBC World.

The amount of internal people in these places varies according to countries.

For the seven centers that exist in Spain spent 6.930 immigrants in 2015, according to data compiled by the GDP. Of them, nearly 40% were expelled from the country.

In France, the country with the highest number of boarding institutions of the EU, the number of detainees -according to the same source – was 47,000 in 2015. 44.000 were expelled.

A similar scenario is given in the Uk, with a domestic population of 32,000 and more than 40,000 were deported in 2015.

But, what are these Surfaces? And, why do they raise controversy?

“(In Spain) are public establishments non-prison of the Ministry of Interior and that are intended to guard the aliens to ensure their removal, his return or his return,” says Pepa Gutierrez, a member of the Subcommittee on Immigration of the General Council of the legal profession, which comprises the bar associations of this country.

In this way, persons entering these facilities do not have why to have committed any offence.

“There are cases of foreigners who have committed a crime and the judge agreed to the substitution of the sentence of imprisonment for his expulsion, but many inmates in the CIE is found in an administrative procedure,” adds the expert, in conversation with BBC World.

The european law that regulates these centers establishes “the possibility of detaining asylum seekers and irregular migrants, in particular if there is a risk of flight.” The detention, however, “must always be a last resort and must be proportionate”.

In the interpretation of this point is, perhaps, where he resides much of the controversy surrounding the CIEs.

“there Really is a preference for the sanctioning procedure, which should have a character more exceptional. That is to say, you should start more procedures that could invite or offer the alien the opportunity to leave a voluntary basis,” says Gutierrez.

— Stay —

In Spain, the maximum stay of an inmate in a ICD is 60 days, while the average stay is around 24 days.

But also in this, there is disparity between the different countries of the EU.

In France, for example, the maximum period of detention is 45 days, extendable to 20 more under certain circumstances. In Italy and Portugal are two months, while in Germany they are six or 18 in exceptional cases.

Within the EU, the Uk is the only country that does not have a maximum period of detention.

for decades, allegations of abuse and poor living conditions in these centers -that they began to spread in Europe in the 80′s – are numerous.

The last mutiny in the CIE of Aluche in Madrid turned to put them on the table in Spain.

“In the center with which we work, the living conditions are poor. Are small spaces and in the cells there are between four and six people, depending on the moments, in conditions of overcrowding”, tells BBC World, Betty Rock, a spokeswoman for the campaign for the closure of the CIEs in Valencia, in the east of Spain.

Chimbo Samb is from Senegal. 28 years old, and came to the Canary islands in 2006, in a wooden boat. At that time he remained 18 inpatient days in the CIE of Tenerife.

“The conditions were very bad. I was not given explanations of why he was there, or what was a CIE. The water was very cold, we barely showered. It was like a camp: the room had no walls and we were about 70 people”, he recalls in conversation with BBC World.

“a year Ago I visited a friend’s internal in the CIE in Valencia. By what told me, the conditions are more or less the same or worse. Have them locked up in rooms without a toilet and don’t let them go to the bathroom at night,” says Samb, who came to be expelled from Spain, and seven years after its passage by the CIE regularized their situation.

The Spanish government denies these allegations.

“There is a black legend about the CIEs,” said Thursday the minister of the Interior, Jorge Fernández Díaz, in a statement to the media at the exit of the Congress.

“to Talk of human rights is to offend the Spanish law and the regulation of the CIE is a of the most guarantees in Europe,” said the minister.

BBC World news requested interviews with the Ministry of the Interior and the National Police in Spanish but were not granted.

From the General Council of the bar, Pepa Gutiérrez insists that the figure of the internment must be seen as the “last option”. And suggests to find alternative ways to the CIEs for the control of immigrants who are in the process of removal.

“The immigration law, Spanish allows for the repatriation adopting other precautionary measures that are undoubtedly less restrictive of rights that the deprivation of freedom: from the regular submission to the competent authorities, withdrawal of passport, mandatory residence in a particular place… There is so much about what to work on”, he concludes.

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