Army foils mass escape attempt by immigrants

Chaos reigned at Safi barracks yesterday after an estimated 120 illegal immigrants attempted to escape and proceeded to hold an impromptu protest.

The situation was resolved only after five hours of negotiations between the immigrants, the police, the Refugees' Commissioner and the Emigrants' Commission.

The unrest started brewing on Thursday evening when several detainees began demanding freedom and protesting at the quality of food and toilet facilities at the barracks, according to AFM sources.

Realising that the situation might spiral out of control, the AFM took the necessary precautions and cordoned off the area during the night. Their fears were proven correct as about 120 illegal immigrants broke through a gate and charged out at 8 a.m. yesterday, holding a banner reading We Want Freedom, hoisted up by poles.

The AFM personnel on duty raised the alarm, scores of reinforcements were brought in and the illegal immigrants were rounded up before any could flee.

The detainees, mainly from the war-torn Congo, however, decided to stage a sit-in strike and demanded to speak to Refugees Commissioner Charles Buttigieg and Emigrants' Commission director Mgr Philip Calleja.

In the meantime, one woman was given treatment in an ambulance close by.

The AFM sources said that several illegal immigrants were coerced and threatened by their counterparts to take part in the protest.

The situation was resolved at about 1.30 p.m. when the detainees returned to their tents.

AFM commander Brigadier Carmel Vassallo told reporters the authorities had agreed to take into consideration the protestors' claims to reconsider their freedom and improve their conditions at Safi.

An Eritrean detainee expressed his dismay at the situation and claimed the Congolese were mainly responsible for yesterday's incident. "I arrived in Malta about 12 weeks ago and I've been locked in here since. Hardly anybody's spoken to me," Tesfahiwet Akale, 28, told The Times from a police car where he was temporarily held.

The Eritrean tried to escape from Safi but was restrained by the police. He said he tried to escape because he feared for his life inside the detention camp. The Eritrean detainees, he alleged, were at loggerheads with the Congolese. "I tried to escape today because I fear they will kill me. A lot of Eritreans in there are scared," he said.

Mr Akale claimed that the Eritreans wanted to opt out of yesterday's protest which, he said, was planned on Thursday evening, when a number of detainees refused food.

He said he was among those who were threatened if he failed to take part in yesterday's action.

The Eritrean, a father of two, said he escaped from his country in search of a decent life, away from trouble. He claimed he was imprisoned for 11 months because the government believed he had collaborated with a traitor.

"There are big political problems in my country. I earn $10 a month and my rent alone is $20 a month. How can I survive?" he asked.

The Jesuit Refugee Service said it believed that the physical conditions of immigrants detained at Safi fall "way below" internationally recognised standards on detention.

The facilities there currently house over 400 people, including women and until recently young children, in spite of the fact that the Council of Europe's Commissioner for Human Rights, Alvaro Gil-Robles, said they are unsuitable for the detention of more than 200 people.

Some of the places where the immigrants are forced to live, such as tents and Nissen huts, were never even intended to be used for long-term accommodation, Fr Pierre Grech Marguerat said, when contacted. "There is over-crowding, insufficient sanitary facilities and lack of access to basic services including healthcare."

Fr Grech Marguerat said the soldiers who run the centre do their best to provide for the basic needs of the immigrants entrusted to their care, sometimes even going beyond the call of duty to help them. "However they do not have sufficient resources to do this properly and, from what we can see, they get little or no support from other state authorities to do this very difficult job.

They simply have to make do with what they have, which is very little, and must use their own facilities and resources to accommodate the immigrants."

Only last Thursday, the JRS urged the government to map out a national strategy for irregular immigrants to replace what it described as a "flawed" system of detention.