In the ruins of the Deportation Detention Centre of Trapani-Milo: voices from inhuman detention, while the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) condemns Italy
A joint statement from different associations tells what happened in the deportation detention centre [Centro di permanenza per i rimpatri, from now on CPR] of Milo, Trapani
7th February 2024
A joint text from ARCI, Arci Porco Rosso, Associazione per gli Studi Giuridici sull’Immigrazione (ASGI), borderline-europe, Campagna LasciateCIEntrare, Maldusa, Mem.MEd – Memoria Mediterranea
“The European Court of Human Rights requested the Italian Government to immediately transfer a person detained in degrading material conditions from the Trapani CPR. The decision concerns what happened in the Milo CPR during the last week of January. We think it is vital to retrace what happened and share it thanks to the voices of the people detained”.
A Tunisian asylum seeker, together with many other people, was detained in degrading and completely inadequate conditions, without any actual possibility to demand respect for his rights, after a fire on 22nd January. An urgent appeal was then filed at the European Court of Human Rights, that today, 7th February 2024, requested the transfer of the detained person to an adequate place and the change of the reception conditions in the Trapani CPR, so that the stay of other detainees complies with the parameters of Article 3 ECHR. The ECtHR’s decision is of fundamental importance because, for the first time, an assessment of the legitimacy of the treatment in a deportation detention centre was carried out, paving the way for the assessment of other situations concerning CPRs. The accounts of the material conditions inside the detention centre were fundamental to this decision, thanks to the voices of the people detained and the visits organized by a network of different groups and organizations.
This is just another proof of the violence and the inadequacy of the Italian system of detention of migrants and of the particularly dire conditions of the people still detained in the Trapani CPR.
Indeed, in the early afternoon of the 22nd of January 2024, a protest was started by the people detained in the CPR of Milo (TP), to expose the inhuman detention conditions and the injustice of forced deportations. From that moment, according to testimonies gathered also during a visit to the CPR with a Member of Parliament, the people detained are being made invisible, deprived of their personal freedom, and forced into inhuman material conditions.
After the fire, many people were transferred to other CPRs, among these the one in Rome – Ponte Galeria. Precisely in this one, Ousmane Sylla, a 22-year-old boy from Guinea, coming from the Milo CPR, took his life by hanging himself with a sheet.
Administrative detention: a system to abolish and condemn
Premising that administrative detention should not exist, that it is per se horrible and unjustifiable violence, what happened in the last days shines again a light on the structural inadequacy of the Italian administrative detention system. The systematic deprivation of personal freedom of people coming from countries that are politically redefined as 'safe', moreover in inhuman conditions, without any information on the reasons for the detention, and without any access to basic services and legal assistance whatsoever will inevitably keep on causing protests, acts of self-harm, and fires.
Given the increasingly clear will of the Government to cut the ties between the people detained and the outside world, and to hinder them from exercising their fundamental rights, it seems essential to keep on critically monitoring these places, that have always been 'black holes', and above all to bring to light the testimonies and amplify the voices of the people detained.
Fighting against the invisibility of the people detained, and continuously reporting on the detention regime’s violence and the infringement of rights that it causes is essential, today more than ever.
The rebellious acts that happened during the last days of the year in many administrative detention centres, lastly in Trapani, require more than ever a strong answer of support from the outside world too.
Tunisian activists, mothers, and sisters of the people missing or dead in the Mediterranean write: “We demand that the Italian authorities and the European governments take their responsibility for the verbal and physical abuse, for the deprivation of freedom against laws, people’s rights, religions and humanity” and “to sympathetic people, we ask to stay together, next to these young people who are fighting for their freedom!”
For this reason, numerous groups and organizations are coming together to create a network that can build a cohesive narrative, against the silence and the twisted retellings of institutions and mainstream media.
The people who risk their safety to claim their freedom shouldn’t receive water cannons, beatings, and criminal trials in return. It is the duty of people who are outside to answer to this havoc with anger and outrage, to amplify the claims and reiterate once again that all administrative detention centres are to be closed, immediately.
A reconstruction of the events
In the early afternoon of 22nd January 2024, a protest was started by the people detained in the CPR of Milo (TP), to expose the inhuman detention conditions and the injustice of forced deportations. After a first fire, that concerned around three adjoining sections, the people detained there were moved to other sections. This caused even worse overcrowding, new protests, and a new fire toward the evening. According to what was told, firefighters managed to tame it completely only by late evening/night, issuing a ban on access to the areas concerned.
Despite what the firefighters recommended, people were still detained in the CPR, protests went on and were shut down by the police with tear gas, water cannons, and truncheons. According to the testimonies gathered, the 154 people detained at the time of the fire were redivided after the fire in the sections, of which only two were still 'accessible'. Those who were assigned to the damaged sections were forced to stay in the small courtyards, with the possibility of staying indoors only by entering the burned-down premises. During the following days, more than 100 people were sleeping outdoors, on makeshift mattresses and trashbags.
Moreover, on 24th January, the police detained three people, accused of starting the fire based on the videos taken by the video cameras. On 25th January a group of people was transferred to the CPR of Pian del Lago (CL) – which was shaken by protests of the detained people in the previous days too. Others were brought to other CPRs in Italy. On 26th January, many people were deported to Tunisia. Others were released and left in the streets, after receiving a deportation order. Among these also citizens of countries with which Italy doesn’t have agreements on deportations, coming from Western Africa. On the evening of the 26th, a group of activists went to the CPR to express their solidarity with the detained.
The conditions in the detention centre during the visit of a delegation: voices of the people detained
After the fire, some of the detained people managed, with many difficulties, to communicate with the outside, breaking the mediatic silence on what had happened. Urged by civil society, MP Giovanna Iacono entered the centre on 28th January, together with a local representative of PD [Partito Democratico, the Democratic Party], Valentina Villabuona. At the same time, access was refused to the legal representatives of the people detained – members of civil society organizations who requested the visit. After some negotiations, an interpreter was allowed in.
Even if some days had already passed after the fire, during the visit an extremely critical situation was observed. “We are exasperated” – said a detained person – “we can’t sleep. We don’t have beds, we can’t shower, there is only one sink from which the water comes out dirty and cold. We haven’t had clean clothes for days.” In these conditions, the people detained kept protesting and, according to what was reported, “every attempt was crushed by police with water cannons, truncheons, and tear gas”.
Many of the people with whom it was possible to talk through the bars were still covered by soot because of the fire. Some bore signs of violence: bruises and marks of recent beatings. Some showed, behind bars, scars dating back to violence suffered in their country of origin.
There were also people with serious health problems among the migrants: One person had to wear a corset due to back problems, and another person was missing an eye, which is why he needed daily medication.
“I would only be able to meet a doctor if I cut off my arm.”, told a boy, “To cure one part of my body I am forced to damage another”. Even if the delegation didn’t examine the register of 'critical events', where escape and suicide attempts, acts of self-harm, hunger strikes and other forms of protest, and events that caused injuries to the detained people, should be written down, many reported that detention has a damaging effect on mental health, and that self-harm is common.
The suicide of Ousmane Sylla, in the CPR of Ponte Galeria after being transferred from the Trapani CPR, shines a light on how the administrative detention system can have lethal consequences on the mental and physical health of the detained people. In Ousmane’s case, despite relevant problems highlighted during the psychological examination, the Trapani ASP [Azienda Sanitaria Provinciale, Provincial Health Agency] had declared him suitable for detention; this 'suitability' will be tragically refuted by the events.
“Around me, there were a lot of people who weren’t feeling good. But nobody cared about us. They put us in that place, threw us in, and threw the keys away, what were they expecting us to do if not protest?” told us a man, and went on “I have never been treated so poorly. I don’t know if I’ll ever recover from how I was treated, and from the fear I felt. I didn’t expect Italy to be like this. I was told a lot of things, but I didn’t expect this”.
Even if it was her right, MP Iacono was refused access to the two sections used for detention for 'security reasons'. Even through the gates, it was clear that the over 50 people detained – the majority of them asylum seekers – were confined in completely inadequate and overcrowded places, with extremely critical hygienic and medical conditions. They recounted the rushed cleaning, moments before the delegation entered the CPR. According to the accounts of the detainees, the heavy presence of police forces in anti-riot gear had been reduced only shortly before the visit.
In one of the sections around 36 people were housed. Most of them were sleeping on the ground, without covers or mattresses, with only one toilet. Some of the mattresses were half burned and had been replaced by blankets or trash bags. Everyone was wearing the same clothes from the day of the fire. As usual, the detainees were deploring the bad quality and the insufficiency of the food.
The conditions were a clear violation of the detained people’s fundamental rights. On top of the inhuman detention conditions, the people told us about the difficulties in accessing medical, social, and psychological care. Even the satisfaction of basic needs was extremely compromised, because of the conditions of the toilets without doors.
“I couldn’t even use the toilet, they were all disgusting and all open; I couldn’t go to the toilet in front of everyone, it was embarrassing for me; maybe they thought we were dogs… they closed all the doors to prevent us from going out, but they didn’t let us close the bathroom door. But no, we are not dogs” told a man.
Despite the presence of a doctor during the visit, many of the people detained said they had never seen one during their detention, severely jeopardising the inalienable right to health and access to medical assistance. Moreover, many people complained about the complete lack of information on their legal situation and the reasons for detention, which should be guaranteed according to international regulations.
“I don’t care if I’m sleeping on the ground, if it’s cold, if there is no water. I can take it”, said a boy “The thing I can’t bear is being locked in here without knowing why”.
The detained people’s right to communicate with the outside was completely violated, because of the inaccessibility of phone booths, and the unlawful prohibition to use cell phones or other forms of communication. This completely undermined the access to legal assistance, already compromised when the CPR was fully functioning, and the exercise of the non-derogable right to legal defence – already recognized as critically compromised on numerous occasions.
All the people with whom it was possible to talk were terrorized by the possibility of deportation, which – for many of them – was actually possible.
“I was here and the only thing I didn’t want was to go back to my country, where I would be killed if I went back So every night I was terrorized, I had a constant fear of being deported” said a man held in Milo during the fire.
On Monday, the people still in the CPR reported the deportation to Tunisia of many people seeking asylum, and for this formally non-deportable. It also seems that some people had already been forced to sign a waiver of their request for international protection, thus making their deportation possible. Again according to what was told, one of the repatriated people is now in jail in Tunisia for crimes of opinion: at the time of the deportation, he was waiting for the moratorium from the court of Palermo.
According to the statements of MP Iacono after the visit, the CPR will be closed for restoration after all the people, who are still – in any case unduly – detained there will have been moved. Despite this, the CPR is still open today, and the people are still held in the same conditions as in the past days.
Translation from Italian: Rossella Ferrara
