Latvia, the brutal treatment of migrants and refugees, including children, held in secret places and subjected to electric shocks

ROME – The organization in defense of human rights, Amnesty International published a report on Latvia denouncing violent push-backs of migrants and refugees at the border with Belarus and serious human rights violations committed against them, including secret detentions and even torture. The report, entitled “You will either go back to your home or you will never leave the forest”, Reveals the brutal treatment of migrants and refugees, including children, arbitrarily detained in secret structures inside the forest and illegally and violently forced to return to Belarus. Many of them were beaten and subjected to electric shocks with taser guns, including on the genitals. Some were forced to “voluntarily” return to their countries of origin.

The cruel ultimatum. “Latvia has given migrants and refugees a cruel ultimatum: agree to return ‘voluntarily’ to their countries or remain left to fend for themselves along the border, risking detention, illegal repatriation and torture. Some have been subjected to arbitrary detention in a manner comparable to enforced disappearance, ”said Eve Geddie, director of Amnesty International’s office at European institutions. “The Latvian authorities have left men, women and children alone to defend themselves from the cold, often abandoned in the forest or stuck in tents at the border. They were violently pushed back to Belarus, where they now have no chance to seek protection. These actions have nothing to do with border protection and blatantly violate EU and international law, ”Geddie added.

The state of emergency since August 2021. On 10 August 2021, following the increase in the number of migrants and refugees encouraged by Belarus to arrive at the border, a state of emergency entered into force in Latvia, which suspended the right to seek asylum in four border areas. This rule deprived refugees of their rights, enshrined in international law and that of the European Union, allowing the authorities to summarily and forcibly return them to Belarus, in violation of the principle of non-refoulement. Latvian authorities have repeatedly extended the state of emergency, currently in force until November 2022, despite the decrease in border arrivals and their own admission that the number of entry attempts resulted from multiple crossings by the same people .

Other reports-complaint for Poland, Belarus, Lithuania. Thus, dozens and dozens of migrants and refugees were arbitrarily arrested and held in unsanitary conditions. A small percentage of them were allowed to enter Latvia, while the majority were placed in detention centers with little or no access to the asylum procedure, legal assistance and independent supervision. The report of Amnesty International on Latvia is the most recent in a series of similar reports on the same subject, which involved Belarus, Poland and Lithuania.

Push-backs, arbitrary detentions and enforced disappearances. On the basis of the state of emergency, border guards, assisted by unidentified “commandos”, the army and police forces, have repeatedly carried out forced returns in a summary, illegal and arbitrary manner. On the other side of the border, the Belarusian authorities systematically sent these people back to Latvia.

The stories of Zaki, Hassan, Adil and Omar. Zaki, an Iraqi who remained in the border area between Belarus and Latvia for three months, told Amnesty International that he was rejected over 150 times, sometimes eight times in a single day. Hassan, himself from Iraq, spent five months near the border: “They forced us to remain naked, sometimes they beat us and then forced us to go back to Belarus, in some cases even crossing a river whose water it was very cold. They told us they would shoot us if we didn’t cross the border ”. Hassan then said he tried to explain that, in the event of repatriation, his life would be in danger. He was replied: “But even here you can die”. Adil, another Iraqi who spent months in the forest, said: “We slept in the forest, under the snow. We lit fires to warm ourselves. There were wolves and bears ”. Another Iraqi, Omar, recounted how he accepted the “voluntary” return: “An agent took my hand, forced me to sign and forced me to sign”.

Under tents in an area in the middle of the forest. Between push-backs, migrants and refugees were abandoned in the border area or held in tents set up by the authorities in isolated areas of the forest. The Latvian authorities have so far denied having set up tents except to provide “humanitarian assistance”, but Amnesty International has verified that those heavily guarded tents were used to arbitrarily detain migrants and refugees and then illegally send them back. Those who did not stay in tents were forced to remain in the open, with temperatures as low as -20 ° C.

Mobile phones are confiscated. At border points as well as in tents, Latvian authorities confiscated mobile phones to prevent any contact with the outside world. Some families searched for their relatives, having last heard from them when they were in Latvia, but to no avail.A Latvian NGO said it was contacted, between August and November 2021, by family members over 30 migrants and refugees with whom there were no more contacts. Keeping migrants and refugees in secret locations or leaving them alone along the border, unable to communicate with others and without being able to take advantage of safe alternative routes to being continually sent back and forth between Latvia and Belarus constitutes a form of secret detention and can represent a forced disappearance.

Forced returns, violence and torture. Unable to access asylum procedures, people arbitrarily arrested along the border were forced by the Latvian authorities to accept, by violence or deception, to return “voluntarily” to their places of origin: it was the only way to being carried away from the forest. Others were forced, by force or deception, to do the same while in detention centers or police stations.

All that is ignored. In some cases, representatives of the International Migration Organization for Latvia ignored evidence that the “voluntarily” displaced persons did not give their genuine consent. “Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, under the pretext of being under a ‘hybrid attack’ by Belarus, are committing serious human rights violations. Winter is approaching and movements along the border are resuming, while the state of emergency continues to allow Latvian authorities to illegally return people to Belarus. Thus, many more people will be subjected to violence, arbitrary detention and further human rights violations without any independent monitoring, ”Geddie stressed.

A fundamental test for the European institutions. “Latvia’s shameful treatment of people arriving at its border represents a fundamental test for the European institutions, which we ask to take urgent measures to ensure that the Latvian authorities repeal the state of emergency and restore the right of asylum for anyone looking for shelter, regardless of where they came from and how they crossed the border, ”concluded Geddie.

The screen of “exploitation”. At a time when push-backs at the Belarusian border with Latvia, Lithuania and Poland are intensifying again, the Council of the European Union is giving priority to the adoption of a Regulation on the “exploitation” of migrants and asylum seekers. This legislation would allow member states that are facing situations of “exploitation”, such as Latvia, to derogate from their obligations under European standards and international immigration law. Such a proposal would have a disproportionate impact on the rights of migrants and asylum seekers and would risk undermining the uniform application of European rules on the right to asylum.

The choices of the EU Court of Justice are incompatible with the current rules. In June the Court of Justice of the European Union established that Lithuania’s immigration and asylum legislation, which limited the possibilities to seek asylum during a state of emergency and provided for the automatic detention of asylum seekers, was incompatible with EU law. The Court’s analyzes and conclusions should be directly applied to the situation in Latvia where, since August 2021, the state of emergency has prevented most people entering or trying to enter the country “irregularly” from accessing security procedures. asylum. Previous reports of Amnesty International on Belarus, Poland and Latvia are available at the following links:

https://www.amnesty.it/senza-cibo-ne-acqua-le-terribili-condizioni-dei-migranti-e-richiedenti-asilo-in-bielorussia/

https://www.amnesty.it/la-polonia-ha-violato-i-diritti-dei-richiedenti-asilo-lungo-il-confine-con-la-bielorussia/

https://www.amnesty.it/lituania-respingimenti-detenzioni-illegali-inganni-e-violenze-contro-rifugiati-e-migranti/