Detention conditions raised with EU Commission

Green MEP Helene Flautre has put a parliamentary question to the EU Commission and Council on the conditions of detention of migrants and asylum seekers in Malta.

The question was tabled following the intervention of Prof. Arnold Cassola, Alternattiva Demokratika's spokesman for EU Affairs and Secretary General of the European Greens.

Ms Flautre informed the European Council that asylum seekers were being kept in very precarious conditions in Malta, even for as long as 18 months.

The Green MEP asked the European Council if it was aware of the situation, adding that this went against international law, especially the European Charter on Human Rights and the 1951 Geneva convention relative to the status of refugees.

Ms Flautre asked the European Council to specify how it would ensure that Malta adhered to its international obligations and to the EU acquis.

"AD is for the humane treatment of asylum seekers in Malta until their application is being examined.

"These people should not be confined to closed detention centres deprived of their freedom of movement, but should be lodged in open centres, where they can mingle with the local population, send their children to school and lead a normal life, as far as is humanly possible," Prof. Cassola said in a statement issued by AD.