Some detainees have told us that SN Airlines Agents ‘paid a visit’ to a few detainees in a closed centre on September 3rd 2013.
They asked to see the file of several Africans to be deported soon and who had already been submitted to one or several deportation attempts. To their request, the social assistant of the centre gave them the files of the people they wanted to meet.
Hence, employees of SN Brussels Airlines could have an interview with these people: they told them that the airline proposed that the person to be deported collaborates and lets him/herself be deported without escort, and in return the airline would give him/her 250 euros upon arrival in the country of destination.
According to our interlocutor, this kind of deal had already been previously proposed to other people by the airline at the airport at the time of the deportation. When arriving in the country of destination, still according to testimonies, they never got the sum proposed.
As a reminder, a polemic had sparked off following a press release by Belga:
‘The police’s annual budget for forced repatriations has already been almost entirely used’
‘Reacting to the information published this Monday morning by De Standaard and Het Nieuwsblad, the Secretary of State for Asylum and Migration, ‘Maggie De Block asserts that ‘the budget of the Foreigners Office allocated to repatriations in case of forced returns is still sufficient. The issue of escorts by the police for these repatriations will be dealt with in the coming days with the political wing concerned’.
http://www.standaard.be/cnt/dmf20130826_00707983
http://www.rtbf.be/info/belgique/detail_le-budget-2013-pour-les-rapatriements-des-illegaux-toujours-suffisant?id=8074565
Is this rather dishonest collaboration with SN Brussels that they’ve taken out of a hat to sort out the issue of police escorts for these repatriations?
How can employees of a private company have access to closed centres that are so hermetical? The centre of Bruges even refused the access of journalists during the ‘Open Access’ campaign.
How does the social assistants’ ethics enable the handing over of personal files to these employees?
Besides, wouldn’t this way of functioning indicate that one is going towards the privatisation of deportations by expert companies? It is to be noted that in the United Kingdom repatriations are already managed by a private company, G4S not to cite it, and this with serious collateral damage.
http://www.corporatewatch.org/
SNAIRLINESCOLLABOS
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