Intervención policial en el campamento levantado en los alrededores CETI de las Raíces en Tenerife
The large-scale arrival of migrants to the Canary Islands (Spain), from the African continent, has generated a situation of overcrowding in the centers set up by the Government (CETI), which has caused tented camps to be set up around them. The terrible conditions in which they have been living for months have caused the situation to explode in the Las Raíces camp. The government response has been repression instead of rapprochement and dialogue.
Organizations such as the Assembly of Support for the Immigrants of Tenerife are calling attention to the criminalization and violation of rights that the “migrant brothers and sisters” are continuously suffering.
The incidents that took place last March 13 in the migrant camp of Las Raíces, in Tenerife, were the subject of the opening news. A viral message saying that “six security guards were injured with acid and calcium oxide” was spreading on social media, It was verified to be a lie that has been refuted by the Canarias authorities themselves.
The Subdelegation of the Government itself points out that the incident took place in the queue to enter the canteen shift, due to the long lines they have to stand in to be able to eat every day. On the other hand, statistics deny the existence of an increase in insecurity in the Canary Islands due to the arrival of undocumented migrants.
In the course of the brawl, several people were injured among the guards and the migrants, but it is a complete lie that there was an attack with “acid and calcium oxide”, as was spread in the viral messages. Neither Accem (the non-governmental organization that manages the camp) nor the Municipal Police has any proof of any aggression or injuries due to such materials.
The intervention of the National Police in the camp has resulted in the arrest of eight migrants, as reported to Efe by sources of the Government Delegation in the Canary Islands.
The conditions endured by migrants in the Canary Islands are increasingly brutal after months of blockade, cold and rain, hunger or lack of food; they live in inhuman conditions. At the same time, the media and politicians dehumanize the thousands of people and distort the realities, criminalizing and blaming them for what is happening.
The Tenerife Migrant Support Assembly has denounced on social networks the “repressive response” of the Government in the form of “police interventions in the face of what should be mediation and dialogue”, and have made “a call for help to the entire anti-racist community not to normalize or forget what is happening there with our migrant brothers and sisters, whose rights and dignity are being violated and humiliated every day. The only solution given by the institutions is to send dozens of police every night. We have been denouncing for two months that the situation is unsustainable, and the complaints are piling up while they look the other way. We demand less repression and police presence and more medical and psychological assistance for migrants. But above all, FREEDOM of transit once and for all”.
To demand for this freedom of movement, a call was made last April 10, at 12 noon, in front of the PSOE headquarters in La Laguna (Tenerife).
“Las Raíces” is one of the CETIs (Center for Temporary Stay of Immigrants) that the Ministry of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration has opened in La Laguna (Tenerife). These CETIs are, in fact, detention centers for migrants, whose closure has been requested by organizations from all over Spain for years.
Translation by Mireia Navarro Lopez, from the voluntary Pressenza translation team. We are looking for volunteers!
