LIBYA DEPORTED ERITREANS: AN OPEN CASE

“What will occur in three months when their stay permits expire?” asks Father Mussie Zerai, Rome director of the Habeshia Non-Governmental Organisation and an Eritrean national like the majority of the migrants released from the Braq centre in Libya. Over the weekend, after their liberation, Fr. Mussie spoke to several of them. He explained to MISNA that the stay permits conceded by Tripoli consent Libya and Italy to “lower the tension” a little on an uncomfortable episode, which had attracted the attention also of the national media. According to the Libyan Ambassador in Rome, Hafed Guddur, the over 200 Eritreans released from the centre in the Sabha region “can reintegrate in the society finding jobs and homes”. The Habeshia director however explained that when their stay permits expire in three months they risk returning to a situation of “illegality” in a country where they cannot even seek political asylum. “The only solution is their reintegration in Italy or however in Europe, where the 1951 Geneva Convention on refugee status is respected”, explained Fr. Mussie. After the release of the migrants on Saturday, various rights groups emphasised the importance that they not be deported back to Eritrea. Also according to Fr. Mussie this decision is very important, but warned that “Europe built a wall with no doors, which keeps out even migrants fleeing conflicts or regimes, from Somalia to Eritrea and Darfur”. [BO]