From a member of the Jesuit Refugee Service, Malta

Claude (not his real name) was a social worker with the Good Samaritan, a church aid agency in Democratic Republic of Congo. Helping young people, orphans, the destitute and sick people in the war-torn country kept 27-year-old Claude always on the go. But he also made time to manage his late father’s coffee plantation, and to be with his wife and seven-year-old daughter. This was Claude’s life until persecution forced him to escape nearly three years ago.

His search for safety led Claude across Africa into Libya, and eventually to Malta, where he was immediately detained. He was severely beaten by members of the Armed Forces while staging a peaceful protest with fellow detainees on 13 January.

Claude is at a loss to understand this reception. “I feel deceived,” he says. “I escaped torture and imprisonment at home and I had to leave Libya because I faced discrimination as a Christian. I thought I would find a place to live in peace in a Christian country until I can go back home. But again, I have been rejected.”

The protest and army crackdown is still making media headlines, and questions are being asked about what truly happened, and whether the asylum seekers had any reason to make a protest.

Claude’s straightforward account of what happened on that fateful day, and what led to the protest in the first place, is based on a few crucial points. First, detention of asylum seekers is evil because it breaks people in need of help. Second, the protest was held as a peaceful declaration of detainees’ fundamental human rights and third, they felt they had no other option.

“It was impossible to do anything else, we had no other means to express ourselves,” said Claude. “We asked to see the authorities and the Refugee Commissioner, but they did not come. I am sure they never even knew we wanted to see them. We decided to hold this protest to make our voices heard especially by the media, because the authorities knew all but did nothing. Nothing ever changed.” What did the detainees want to draw attention to? Replies Claude, “Life in detention is appalling”. A growing accumulation of literature bears out his words, regularly highlighting the potentially unlawful, unnecessarily harsh and harmful nature of immigration detention across the world.

What worries Claude most is the harmful impact on the detainees’ psychological health; time and again, he has seen sane people “going crazy” before his eyes. His fear is confirmed by research findings; one study remarked that if someone wanted to devise a system to deliberately drive people around the bend, this was it.

As we talk, Claude keeps returning to the question burning in his mind: “What is the future of a man who becomes incurably mentally ill after spending too much time here? A man comes in with a clear, intelligent mind and is broken here. I have seen people going crazy; they start talking to themselves and no longer recognise where they are.”

Detainees are completely powerless; all control of their future has been taken out of their hands. They have little or no news of their families. They wait to hear about their interview for refugee status, which will change their lives for better or worse, but there is no one to answer their questions about what is happening. Some, like Claude, have already been rejected. They have appealed, grimly aware that only one out of hundreds of rejected asylum seekers has been successful on appeal. Who can blame them for descending into despair?

The asylum seekers detained at Safi Barracks appealed for activities to fill in the time and “to liberate our minds”, like language classes, but their appeal fell on deaf ears. They have been condemned to spending day after day wasting away, sitting and staring in totally inadequate and dilapidated surroundings.

Finally, a group decided that they could no longer remain silent. They planned the protest, determined to “say nothing negative about anything here, not to force open doors or break things, only to declare our universal rights”.

Says Claude: “We assured the soldiers no one was going to escape, we just wanted to make a peaceful protest. We reached the football ground and started to sing ‘Give us freedom’. Some minutes later, officials came and asked us what we wanted. We said we wanted to see the Minister for Social Policy, other government officials, the Refugee Commissioner, and a representative from Amnesty International.”

According to the detainees, the army officials offered to try and get the Refugee Commissioner and asked all but five to go back in. But the detainees refused because “every time we had asked the Commissioner to come, he never did. Perhaps he never even knew we asked to see him”. However, they agreed to give up their protest if they saw the Commissioner in person. Negotiations went on at length and the protesters were threatened with forced removal, but nonetheless they stood their ground and talked to journalists gathered outside.

“We told them about our sufferings and our needs. We asked them to appeal to the international community to come and see how we live, and to ask why must we live like this? We asked them if it is because we are black,” recalled Claude.

“Then the official came and said we had two minutes to go in. We asked for 10 minutes to get together and discuss. As he turned away, the soldiers came and started to beat us. We sat on the floor, and five or six men attacked me.”

Claude was hit on the back of the head and he lost consciousness. He was hospitalised and released later on the same day. Apart from head and leg wounds, Claude was injured when soldiers started stamping on his back. “I coughed up blood and my leg was fractured. They hit here, here and here,” he said, indicating his bandaged and swollen leg.

This is not the first brutal beating Claude has suffered. The other time was in 2002, when he was imprisoned back home in Democratic Republic of Congo, where soldiers and fighters of armed groups routinely perpetrate severe violations of human rights.

Back then, Claude was rounded up together with other staff of the Good Samaritan agency. The arrests were ordered by the leader of the militant Movement for the Liberation of Congo (MLC), which controls part of the country. The alleged crime of the Good Samaritan agency: preventing youths from joining the MLC. “I was imprisoned for 19 days, beaten and tortured,” says Claude. “We escaped when renegade MLC fighters broke in to free their comrades who had been imprisoned by a rival MLC faction.”

Claude’s flight took him first to the Central African Republic and later to Chad. From there, he moved to Libya, where he was discriminated against because he was a Christian, and lost his job because he took Christmas holidays. So Claude left Libya in search of another refuge until he can return home.

He is adamant about this: “I want to return when peace and democratic institutions are a reality in my country. There is so much to be done.” Until such time comes, Claude needs asylum. So far, he has not found it here. Certainly he feels the authorities denied him welcome.

And what does he make of the reactions of the Maltese? Claude considers the question carefully before replying: “I would say not all Maltese are for long-term detention. People are ignorant about what happens here because information is suppressed. If the Maltese knew our plight, they would understand we only need help. They helped victims of the tsunami because they saw what happened to them. I thank the Maltese people who have finally understood and reacted immediately in our favour.

“And we will never be against the armed forces, who at times were moved to compassion for us. I, and the others too, will always love them. This is what is written in the Bible. God bless you.”

Some reactions do hurt Claude, like the woman in hospital who told one injured protester that no one had asked him to come to Malta. “Every time I read it, I cry. I say to myself, it is impossible someone could say this. But I do not condemn those who speak against us because they speak from lack of information. Otherwise they would be too inhuman.

“People ask us why we came here. We did not choose Malta as a destination; we were rescued at sea and brought here. But if we had known it would be like this, we would have preferred to die out there.”

A harsh indictment of the “welcome” we give those who seek refuge. Claude and his friends persevere in the hope that things will improve if we bother to learn about the reality of their desperate and traumatic situation. Until then, they are left wondering along with Bob Dylan, “How many tears must one man shed before he can hear people cry?”