Imogen CalderwoodSPAIN has been refused permission to deport 30 Saharaui asylum-seekers by the European Court of Human Rights.
The court ruled that Spanish authorities failed to properly hear the refugees’ claims.
The immigrants arrived on the coast of Spain’s Canary Islands in 2011, in makeshift boats, and lodged an appeal for international protection.
They fled after Moroccan authorities forcibly dismantled their refugee camp Gdeim Izik in Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony annexed by Morocco in 1975.
After the Spanish Minister of the Interior rejected their application for asylum and ordered their deportation, they appealed the decision at the ECHR.
The migrants claimed that they had been persecuted by the Moroccan authorities for their Saharaui origin, and would feel threatened if they were forced to return.
They alleged that they had been physically assaulted by police officers, and some family members had suffered sexual abuse and torture.
It was unanimously ruled that there had been violations of Articles 13, 2 and 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights – the right to an effective remedy, the right to life, and the right to prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment, respectively.
Spain has been ordered by the court to ‘ensure that the applicants remained within its territory while their cases were being examined, pending a final decision by the domestic authorities on their applications for international protection’.
send them to the UK
The more the merrier
Such desperate people are refugees, not “the enemy within”.
What happened to pity and compassion ? When and why did it morph into cynicism and hatred ?
Most refugees are running scared for their lives. Think yourself lucky you live in a free civilised society.
>>>Especially MOANING ex pats here<<<
Makes me sick they don't realise how lucky they are and how others live. Living in what a lot of the world would consider PARADISE!
Derek, just to bring you back on topic. If you didn’t notice, the article was actually about how Spain was not civilised in its treatment of the Saharaui refugees, and that Spain breached their human rights. Spain is doing a lot of breaching of peoples’ human rights recently, and not just to refugees.
Fred, I don’t think you understand who’s got problems in the world and who hasn’t.
You most certainly HAVE got a lot of personal problems though!
What are you doing today, off to tell people how bad Spain & the Spanish are as usual?