Switzerland Harraga: these children who "burn" the borders

May 17, 2008

Comment: An interesting article in the Swiss newspaper ‘Le Courrier’ points out the hardening treatment of unaccompanied minors in Melilla, Barcelona and Marseilles (see also the previous press review in ‘Le Monde’ of 13th May).

According to the International Convention on the Rights of the Child, unaccompanied minors have to be taken into care by the country where they are found until their majority and can not be return to their origin country if their best interest could not be ensure.

Based on testimonies, the author of the article, CÊcile Raimbeau, demonstrates that in Marseilles, Barcelona or Melilla, unaccompanied minors are not treated as children at risk by authorities as they should be. Instead, they are widely victims of violence inside the state institutions, fosters, at the police station and in the streets. Moreover, the States, when they have a doubt about the age of an adolescent, ask for a left wrist radiography to prove if they are effectively minors and so under their responsibility. This practice has not been proven as hundred percent sure and some minors are considered as adult and are repatriate to their origin country.

The term “harraga” is use in Maghreb to describe the adolescent in the ports waiting for an opportunity to cross the Mediterranean to find a better future. Instead, they find reject and violence from the State and the society but as a young adult said: “Here, there is public fountain, popular soups, and the dust bins are cleaner and more abundant.”

Link to the article here