| 24 juin 2006 |
At around 10:30am, more than 100 people from different European countries congregated in front of the doors of what will be the new migrant detention centre, currently in construction in Zona Franca (Barcelona). They entered peacefully in the site and placed placards denouncing the use that the centre will have.
The new detention centre, that will be the biggest in Spain, will substitute the current one (La Verneda) and will amplify its capacity in the number of places. The CIE La Verneda has been continuely denounced by international human rights institutions and by diverse social movements, as a result of which the opening of the new centre is being presented by the administration as an "improvement" in the migrants internment conditions.
During the action, the police arrived, and after having negotiated a peaceful exit for the participants, they began to act aggresively towards journalists, threataning the participants with dogs and even destroying a camera of TVE. The events have ended with multiple agressions and with the detention of all the participants concentrated within the centre, including the journalists, one from Europa Press and another from TVE.
The detainees are now in Verneda police station where right now there is a concentration of support, which will later be moved to the demonstration. The lawyers will present a Habeas Corpus for illegal detention. We denounce the unmeasured and aggresive police action against a completly peacefull and legitimate act in defence of all the rights of migrant people.
The arrangement of the peacefull demonstration at 18:00pm this afternoon in « Plaça Universitat », for the closing of migrant detention centres, freedom of movement, and the unconditional regularisation of migrants in Europe, remains in place. At the end of the demonstration a concentration of people has been arranged in front of the Verneda detention centre in solidarity with the detainees.
