mercoledì 13 agosto 2014

Libya, hundreds of refugees enslaved by the militia for war

Appeals to the international community



Libya is rampant in the tragedy of the refugees abducted by militants of various factions in the fight as slaves and forced to carry into battle weapons, ammunition and supplies since the line of fire. Potential victims of this horror are all Africans "blacks" were trapped in the war that is sweeping the country: Eritreans, Somalis, Ethiopians, Sudanese, Malians ... Anyone, in fact, come from countries in the Horn of Africa or sub-Saharan Africa . News from various parts of the territory of Libya report that there have been numerous injuries and certainly of the dead, as evidenced by some direct testimony and that of other immigrants caught has lost all track, probably "disappeared" in the furnace of a war they did not choose and does not concern them.
The agency Habeshia has already denounced this horror to the international community in late July and early August, signaling that in the course of the fighting going on in Tripoli, dozens of young people were picked up in their homes or stuck on the road, while trying to escape from the evacuated areas, to be used as "auxiliary forced" militias. Impossible to escape: anyone who tried to resist were beaten up and threatened with death.
In many ways, a situation for migrants, even more serious than that after the 2011 revolution against Gaddafi, when every African "black" was considered a mercenary in the service of the regime, persecuted and imprisoned. It's been two weeks, but had no answers whatsoever to the request for an urgent intervention of the UN High Commission, the European Union and the United States. In the meantime, the use of refugee slaves in battle has become the norm.
The most serious case happens in Misrata, where the great school of Kalelarim, in an area called Bilkaria, are detained hundreds of men, women and children, most of them Eritreans, surprised at various stages in the desert while trying to reach Tripoli and often caught in dramatic circumstances: to lock the militiamen did not hesitate to shoot, so much so that there were two dead and several injured. The first prisoners began arriving about two and a half months ago, and the flow was never interrupted. It is thus formed a large initial group of 405 men, 103 women and 18 children, gradually grew with new arrests last month. Today, about 700 prisoners are forced to live in extreme conditions, ill-treatment, abuse, degradation, little food and poor quality, very low even water to drink. And any kind of assistance, even for the sick and wounded, entrusted solely to the care of a paramedic who shows up once a week, usually on Sundays.
It is a true lager under the total control of the militia, who made an inexhaustible reserve of slave-bearers of weapons and ammunition in the gun battles that disrupt the region. They started with a group of well 225 young people, all men. They were picked up by claiming that they would be put to work: they are finite, however, in the midst of war. For weeks if they have not heard from again until a few days ago, they returned to the camp seven young wounded, who recounted the horror lived, reporting that several of their comrades were killed. But there's more: the militias have replaced the seven young people with 61 others wounded prisoners, forcing them to follow them in battle. Of them it is no longer news since they left the camp.
And 'yet another crime that is being committed on the skin of refugees and asylum seekers abandoned by all. Nobody cares to enforce their right to be protected from war, persecution and abuse. It must certainly meet the militiamen who are enslaving them, but heavy responsibility for these atrocities suffered by refugees from the Horn of Africa and sub-Saharan Africa, are also faced with the countries that have thousands and thousands of young people trapped in a situation like that Libya, with its policy of "externalizing" and move the borders of Europe on the southern shores of the Mediterranean and, more recently, also to the south. Those governments that have made various African countries, starting with Libya, the gendarmes to control emigration, leaving them to decide the life and death of those forced to flee their country to escape wars, dictatorships, jail, persecution , famine and hunger.
For this launch another appeal to the community and internationally. For the umpteenth time, and even more strongly ask the UN, the European Union and the United States to intervene as soon as possible to arrange one or more escape routes for migrants stranded in Libya. And we turn to Italy in particular, by virtue of its direct relations with Tripoli, and because it is the only European country to have kept open their anguish, both signed several bilateral agreements with the Libyan government since the days of Gaddafi until today. The Government, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Italian ambassador to ask, as the first immediate action to block groped by all means possible seizures and the use of refugees as "auxiliary-slaves" in the fighting is the only way to stop the massacre of thousands of innocent lives. It should be remembered, moreover, that Libya, despite having never signed the Geneva Convention of 1951 on the protection of migrants' rights, has joined the analogous wanted the African Union. So far, no one has ever applied: the tragic events of recent days say that the time has come for the international community from requesting implementation, involving African states. Italy, in this phase of the EU presidency, can not escape the obligation to groped this way, involving the whole of Europe and at the same time opening a humanitarian corridor for the most vulnerable groups of refugees in need of protection.

Fr. Mussie Zerai

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