BELGIUM: Migrants without legal documents start hunger strike in Brussels and call for legalisation

Record ID: 340143

  • Title: BELGIUM: Migrants without legal documents start hunger strike in Brussels and call for legalisation
  • Date: 10th May 2008
  • Summary: GENERAL VIEW OF CHURCH WITH HUNGER STRIKERS EXTERIOR: PEOPLE WALKING, CHANTING "IT'S NOT IMMIGRANTS, IT'S NOT IRREGULAR MIGRANTS 'WITHOUT PAPERS', IT'S THE LAW THAT WE MUST CHANGE!
  • Embargoed: 25th May 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Belgium
  • Country: Belgium
  • Topics: International Relations
  • Reuters ID: LVA2VCNUR6HIUG642DCU53TND3GV
  • Story Text: Almost 200 migrants in Belgium have gone on hunger strike at a church they occupied in the heart of Brussels saying their calls for regularisation have fallen on deaf ears as the government struggles with a political crisis.
    About 170 migrants to Belgium including 20 women completed the first day of what they say is an indefinite hunger strike in Brussels on Friday (May 9) after occupying a church and calling on the government to legalise their status and stop arresting them.
    The migrants, known as 'sans-papiers' or 'without papers', have battled with the government for years to regularise their status so they can access the country's benefits including schooling for their children.
    But the Belgian government, which was sworn in only last March after nine months of political wrangling, has not addressed the issue head-on.
    The 'sans-papiers' say the failure to get any response from the government is the reason why they have resorted to what they describe as violent action against themselves.
    There are 40 nationalities represented at the church.
    One of the hunger strikers, a Nepalese called Kudankc who has lived in Belgium for eight years, says he can't hold down a job because of his semi-legal status. He is angry because he has the right to stay in Belgium but says he is not treated as a citizen with equal rights to Belgian nationals just because of the delay in processing his papers.

    "Until this moment it feels that like we are just breathing, we are not living. We are living under inhuman circumstances. We don't, we cannot support ourselves, we are ready to work, we we are I think ready to work and we can do ourselves, we are ready for labours, even everything. We do have certain qualifications and certain experiences everybody most of the people, so we are ready to work but we cannot work and we cannot support ourselves, so for us it will be that, be, in a way it will be like living our life, not just breathing, but living under normal human circumstances," said Kudankc.
    North African hunger striker Ali Sayahi is the spokesman for the 170 people who occupy the church. He said they are willing and ready to keep going until they get some movement on the part of the authorities.

    "We, illegal migrants, when we were here or there, living in fear, we were more suffering than we are now with our hunger strike. We started it yesterday because we were ready to do this hunger strike until the end. For now we are really fine, it is true it is very hard, but we are ready to do everything to change our current situation," says Sayahi.
    The government on Friday was still trying to recover from a vote the previous night which could eventually bring down the barely-formed coalition.
    Politicians themselves are complaining that the ongoing political crisis, relating to long-standing linguistic divisions and demands by the Flemish parties to reform the state, is hampering them from governing effectively.
    But the migrant problem is Europe-wide and on Wednesday (May 7) hundreds demonstrated against an EU directive which would allow illegal migrants to be detained for up to 18 months and face a five-year re-entry ban.
    The move has been lambasted by rights group who say it criminalises immigration.
    Member states were due to agree to the directive on Wednesday, but failed to reach agreement.
    Officials say the European parliament is also divided on the controversial issue and the outcome of a vote set for June is hard to predict.
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