The Convergence of Cultures calls for urgent action by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the Council of Europe and international organizations for Human Rights on the situation of some 350 refugees, who fled the humanitarian crisis in the Horn of Africa. They have been held since June 30th in the Braq internment centre, 80 kms. from Sebah, in southern Libya.
On June 30th the Habeshia Agency and the group EveryOne communicated by phone with some of the detainees, and began sounding an international alarm: “We received an urgent appeal by the 350 refugees detained in Libya where they have been moved from the Mishratah prison to Al Braq Internment camp. There are about 80 children among them. They have suffered serious violence: beatings, inhuman and degrading treatment and torture. The refugees threaten to commit suicide by ingesting toxic substances.
Two days later, they sent a new warning: some of the refugees telling that they are at risk of deportation to their countries of origin, where their lives are in extreme risk.
The group EveryOne added in a message to EU institutions and the UN, that “many of the tortured refugees at risk of immediate deportation to countries in humanitarian crisis, including Sudan and Eritrea, are “rejects” from asylum requests in Italy and Malta.
The Convergence of Cultures joins the group EveryOne in calling for rapid action to prevent a humanitarian tragedy in the coming hours and finally to put a stop, using interim measures if necessary, to the rejections from Italy and Malta, which take place according to xenophobic policies and unfair agreements with Libya, and which violate the Geneva Convention in its entirety.
