Update 29 September: In the end it was a FRONTEX flight that deported around 30 Guineans and Congolese from Brussels! They landed in Conakry in the evening of the 28th of September, where the Belgian ambassador and the Guinean Interior Minister were expecting them. They directly left with their families who were there waiting for them.
Then the plane left for Kinshasa with the Congolese.
One Congolese got one of his feet broken during the violent actions to embark him because he refused to leave.
Three Guineans and two Congolese were not driven to the airport because they were on a ‘reserve list’, hence they were driven back to Vottem and Merksplas
Update 26/09
ALERT AT THE 127 BIS At the 127bis, 10 persons from the DRC have been warned that they would be put on a collective flight to the DRC this 28th of September, most likely on the same flight that had been announced for Guinea! Among the Congolese people of the 127bis, six women got notified. Five of them introduced a marriage or cohabitation request or a family reunification request, one an asylum request! Several of them were arrested at their home during the past weeks!
Update 23/09:
A Guinean detainee from a centre got a phone call this morning from the social assistant. She warned him that he was on the list of the people who would be on the collective flight this Wednesday 28th September 2016 to Conakry and that he would be transferred to the 127bis centre near the airport this coming Monday!
Update 21/09 in Africaguinée
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CALL/ Once the expulsion machine is on, with a cohort of military and police men, it gets harder even impossible for the deported to resist during a collective expulsion, but other political or supporter initiatives from the outside may prevent the flight. In 2014, the landing of a charter with 34 Guineans on board was refused by the governement in Conakry and the plane was forced to fly back to Brussels! http://www.gettingthevoiceout.org/la-guinee-refuse-toute-expulsion-collective-de-ses-nationaux/
Théo Francken clumsily advertised a European collective expulsion to Conakry on Twitter, foreseen for this 28th of September. These flight projects are usually kept secret until the very last minute. Francken’s tweets mainly are propaganda or threats. Sometimes they may be true even though the date may be changed.
Several dozens of Guineans have been retained for months in our closed centres, but until here they could not be deported without let passes, which have to be delivered by the Guinean embassy to allow the expulsion. It seems that an agreement (secret, legal?) was reached between Francken and the ambassador to allow these expulsions.
This information has to be spread and the Guinean people concerned should be rapidly warned.
The people concerned:
The people who got a negative and definitive answer to their asylum request
The undocumented people living on the territory
The undocumented people who have a ‘criminal’ record currently are on the priority list for deportations and they run a heavier risk of arrest and expulsion
The people retained in closed centres
Risks of arrests
Arrests still can happen on the street, at home, at the police station or at the Foreigners’ Office
How to avoid an expulsion
Avoid finding yourselves in situations mentioned here above (do not stay at your official residence place, avoid places such as train stations, metro stations, do not answer calls of the Foreigners office, the commune or the police station)
Inform your lawyer who may reintroduce an asylum request or appeal a decision by the courts; which may delay the expulsion
Inform your friends and family and rapidly warn them if you have been arrested
Inform compatriots on the threat of expulsion, politicians (male/female) of our country and of the country of origin
If you are sick, consult your doctor so that he may give you a certificate that might prevent the expulsion
How does a collective explusion happen?
Here is what could be gathered on how a collective expulsion happens.
THE WEEKS BEFORE :
Arrests in public places of undocumented persons with a given nationality, retention in closed centres of these persons,
Maintenance in closed centres of people already retained and/or already having been subject to expulsion attempts
Retention in the Caricole closed centre of the people requesting asylum at the airport and quick analysis of their files
THE DAYS BEFORE :
Transfer from the Belgian closed centres to the closed centre 127bis in Steenokkerzeel of all the candidates selected by the Office.
THE HOURS BEFORE :
Isolation in confinement cells of the candidates to be deported, including an unknown number of ‘reservists’.
FROM 4 TO 5 HOURS BEFORE THE FLIGHT :
People to be deported are gathered in vans and buses, sometimes military. They are handcuffed and escorted by 2 or 3 policemen each, in uniform or plain clothes.
The recalcitrants and those who refused a previous expulsion are considered as dangereous and deserve a special treatment : isolated, undressed, having to bend in presence of the police, tied and accompanied by a special escort
http://www.gettingthevoiceout.org/cinq-mois-en-centre-ferme/
In general, this takes more than two hours and happens sometimes with violence.
Departure of the caravan to Melsbroek’s military airport in Chaussée de Haecht, boarding on a military plane.
The deported remain handcuffed during one part of the flight.
http://www.gettingthevoiceout.org/mode-demploi-vol-collectif/
