Fortress Europe Policy and Detention of Migrants in Libya under Gaddafy Regime

Detention conditions. In 2005, the former director of the Italian secret service, Prefect Mario Mori, told the Italian Parliament that “undocumented migrants in Libya are caught like dogs” and placed in overcrowded facilities that are so degraded in condition that “policemen must wear a dust mask on the mouth because of the nauseating odours” (Fortress Europe 2009). Many observers agree that detention conditions in Libya are abhorrent, including Human Rights Watch, which provides a detailed overview of detention conditions in its 2009 report Pushed Back, Pushed Around: Italy’s Forced Return of Boat Migrants and Asylum Seekers, Libya’s Mistreatment of Migrants and Asylum Seekers.

Access to the facilities has been frequently denied to organizations, however both NGOs and international organisations have gained increased access to some of the centres, including the Organization for Human Rights, a Libyan NGO funded by the Foundation of Saif al Islam Qaddafi (Fortress Europe 2009); IOPCR; and the UNHCR (UNHCR 2009).

Among the facilities that have been frequently criticized are the ones in Kufra and Sabha.

Kufra. The official immigration detention centre in Kufra—which is an isolated city in the Sahara desert in south-eastern Libya that serves as key transit route for irregular migration—has been described by Frontex as “rudimentary and lacking in basic amenities” (Frontex 2007, p.7). As of May 2007, the facility was holding 130 people from sub-Saharan Africa (Frontex 2007, p.7). According to a 2009 HRW report, the centre has a central courtyard and six large detention rooms, which can each hold more than 100 people, with frequent overcrowding (HRW 2009, p.76).

Multiple observers have reported that conditions at this centre are among the worst in the country. It reportedly is comprised of old facilities, is grossly overcrowded, has  poor lighting and ventilation, provides no access to health care, has inadequate bedding and bathrooms, and offers limited outdoor access and insufficient food (Fortress Europe 2009; HRW 2009, p. 76-78; Asinitas Onlus 2008). Beatings are apparently a frequent occurrence (Fortress Europe 2007; HRW 2009; Asinitas Onlus 2008), and there have been reports of religious intolerance (Fortress Europe 2007) and the use of torture, including electric shocks and upside down suspension (HRW 2009, p.77). Many of those held in this facility are migrants from Eritrea and Ethiopia who enter Libya from Sudan (Fortress Europe 2009).

Libyan authorities carry out a “circular network of checkpoints” for monitoring illegal immigration around Kufra in an effort to intercept and detain undocumented migrants. An outer ring, controlled by the army, is located 300 kilometres from Kufra, near the eastern and southern borders; a middle ring encircles Kufra from 100km distance, and is jointly controlled by the army and the police; and the inner ring, controlled by the local police, is just on the outskirts of Kufra (Frontex 2007, p. 7).

Sabha. In 2008, the government opened a new immigration detention centre in Sabha, at the edge of the Sahara, which is a key entry point for undocumented migrants entering Libya (Fortress Europe 2009). According to Fortress Europe, the compound is made up of three buildings, where a total of 1,000 people can be detained. Between 60 and 70 people are held in each of the facilities eight-by-eight meter rooms. Detainees reportedly sleep on the ground. Light, ventilation, and time spent outside the rooms are reportedly grossly insufficient (Fortress Europe 2009). Many migrants detained in this facility are caught in the desert and detained in immigration detention facilities close to the border before being transported in truck-loads of 100 or 200 people to the Sabha facility (Fortress Europe 2009).

According to Fortress Europe, 9,000 migrants were deported from the Sabha immigration detention facility in the first 11 months of 2008, mainly to Nigeria, Mali, Niger, Ghana, Senegal, and Burikna Faso. The embassies of the countries generally cooperate with the Libyan officials in the repatriation of their nationals, though detainees are denied the opportunity to see a judge or lawyer, and their detention is not validated by a court. Appeals and asylum are generally not granted, and detainees are often denied contact with anyone outside the facility (Fortress Europe 2009).

Corruption and ill treatment. HRW reports that corruption is endemic in Libya’s detention facilities and that smugglers run their own facilities. Former detainees have said that they were forced to pay bribes of around USD $500 to officials to be released. One ex-detainee told HRW, “The police said they would deport us, but then they took us to pay money to smugglers to take us to Tripoli. Those without money stayed in Kufra. … Everything depends on money” (HRW 2009).

A 2008 documentary by a former detainee recounts that migrants are sometimes arrested by the police, detained, and then sold by the police to people smugglers, only to be caught, detained, and re-sold again and again. At each point in the chain, migrants are forced to pay people smugglers, and ex-detainees claim that this can occur up to three or four times before they eventually make it abroad, or are deported to their country of origin. Those who cannot pay the people smugglers can be held in detention for years (Asinitas Onlus 2008).

Observers have criticised Libyan officials for mistreating deported immigrants, and there are multiple accounts of migrants being dropped off in the desert and left to die (HRW 2009). One observer reported that in 2004, more than 18,000 migrants were loaded into trucks and left in the desert to die. As a result of escalating deaths in the desert, repatriations are supposed to be undertaken by the Libyan air companies Ifrqiya and Buraq Air (Fortress Europe 2009). While the Libyan government claims to pay for deportations (Fortress Europe 2009), it is widely reported that Italy pays for charter flights to send migrants it has expelled to Libya back to their original countries (HRW 2006a, p. 112; Fortress Europe 2009).

Many migrants repatriated to Nigeria from the Sabha facility claim that they were forced into hard labour to transform old facilities into the Sabha immigration detention facility (Fortress Europe 2009).

Source:
http://www.globaldetentionproject.org/countries/africa/libya/introduction.html