Refugees crammed in Libyan detention centres to keep them from entering EU
The Mediterranean has turned into an invisible graveyard as thousands have drowned trying to reach Europe. Libya is a major transit point in this quest and has come under question for shooting at rescue ships and detaining refugees.
Migrants in a boat arrive at a naval base after they were rescued by Libyan coastguard, in Tripoli, Libya, August 28, 2017.
War and poverty in African countries have turned human smuggling networks into a multimillion dollar business in Libya. Libya has also promised Europe to curtail refugee and migrant crossings.
In doing so, the country has adopted questionable tactics. Libyan authorities have been accused of firing at rescue boats and detaining migrants in makeshift camps under deplorable conditions.
TRT World's Zeina Awad visits one such detention centre in Libya where at least 40 women and children are forced to live in one room.
The Paris deal
France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Chad, Niger and Libya agreed on August 28 on a plan to tackle illegal human trafficking and support nations struggling to contain the flow of people across the desert and Mediterranean sea.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra‘ad al-Hussein said the deal "is very thin on the protection of the human rights of migrants inside Libya and on the boats, and silent on the urgent need for alternatives to the arbitrary detention of vulnerable people.
Zeid’s office published a report last December on abuses faced by migrants in detention centres in Libya, “but memories are short when facts are inconvenient”, he wrote.
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