A number of immigrant families were yesterday transferred out of the Naxxar Counting Hall and were moved to the Hal Far Open Centre. The government said that in line with its policy to not separate families and detain children, the families were moved to Naxxar pending medical screening.
Initially they were sent to the Safi Detention Centre so that the authorities could establish who had arrived by himself or with his or her family since they refused to cooperate with the authorities. After making the necessary verifications, the migrants were sent to Naxxar.
They had been rescued by the Armed Forces of Malta at sea last Thursday. Normally, immigrants are medically screened within 72 hours – as established by policy – however, on this occasion, the timeframe elapsed. A government spokesman said that the screening took longer than the 72 hours because the families had to be transported to Naxxar, and the fact that they refused to cooperate with immigration officials.
Ramona Attard, spokesman for the Interior Ministry said that on their arrival, unaccompanied minors were immediately transferred to Dar il-Liedna in Fgura, an open centre dedicated to housing minors.
Ms Attard said that had the migrants cooperated with police, they would have been transferred to an open centre immediately and not to Safi detention centre and then Naxxar. The migrants, some 100, were moved to Naxxar from Safi after they failed to cooperate with the authorities for the necessary medical clearance and interviews.
“It is government policy to place family units in open centres and not detain them,” Ms Attard emphasised.
This newsroom is informed that on their arrival, some migrants were warned by immigration officers that they would be sent back if they refused to cooperate. Some migrants surprisingly replied that they would be happy to do so.
This newsroom is also informed that some migrants even refused to go through normal procedure, that is Eurodac, for fingerprints. It is a known fact that migrants land on our islands without any relevant documentation in hand.
The Eurodac system enables EU countries to help identify asylum applicants and persons who have been apprehended in connection with an irregular crossing of an external border of the Union.
By comparing fingerprints, EU countries can determine whether an asylum applicant or a foreign national found illegally present within an EU country has previously claimed asylum in another EU country or whether an asylum applicant entered the Union territory unlawfully.