Eighteen Guineans have been on hunger strike for two days at the dentention centre 127bis. They have been joined by an unknown number of other prisonners as a mark of solidarity.
For several months, tens of Guineans have been arrested and detained in preparation for expulsion from Belgian detention centres. This is in light of an agreement between Guinea and Belgium made on the occasion of a visit to Guinea in 2012 by Mr Roosemont, Director of the Immigration Office, who declared that the 10,000 Guineans residing in Belgium would be expelled.
The current situation in Guinea is very unstable. The latest protest by the oppostion on the 18th of April was harshly repressed, resulting in tens of arrests and injuries.
Here, the detained Guineans, of whom a majority are opposed to the Alpha Conde regime, are protesting by means of a hunger strike against the measures of arrest, detention and expulsion to a country where they risk prison, torture or disappearance. Several Guineans have already been expelled in the past few days. Their compatriots have no more news of them and are imagining the worst.
The hunger strikers from the detention centre in Steenokkerzeel (127bis) say that this is their only means of protesting and that they have no other choice.
They are asking for a show of external solidarity to support them in their action.
