CAMPAIGNERS hit out at the Home Office today after another dawn raid on a Glasgow family of asylum seekers.
Max and Onoya Waku and their three children face deportation to the Democratic Republic of Congo next Monday.
Glasgow asylum seeker support group The Unity Centre claims the parents could be in danger if they are sent back to the African country.
advertisementThe family fled the DRC in 2001 after its government accused Mr Waku’s company of helping a rebel insurgency.
It is claimed the family were taken from their Cardonald home after immigration officers broke into the house at 7am.
Cat Storrie, of The Unity Centre, said: “The children watched their dad being handcuffed and led to a van. The rest of the family were then put into vans.”
The family, who have been in the city six years, are now at Dungavel detention centre, Lanarkshire.
Publication date 20/03/07
http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/news/display.var.1271726.0.dawn_raid_on_family_slammed.php
3 responses so far ↓
Michael Woods // March 22, 2007 at 8:26 pm |
I think that the UN Declaration and the Convention on the Rights of the Child must be key to the way in which we approach such cases. For instance the Declaration states :
The General Assembly
Proclaims this Declaration of the Rights of the Child to the end that he may have a happy childhood and enjoy for his own good and for the good of society the rights and freedoms herein set forth, and calls upon parents, upon men and women as individuals, and upon voluntary organizations, local authorities and national Governments to recognize these rights and strive for their observance by legislative and other measures progressively taken in accordance with the following principles:
Principle 1
The child shall enjoy all the rights set forth in this Declaration. Every child, without any exception whatsoever, shall be entitled to these rights, without distinction or discrimination on account of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status, whether of himself or of his family.
Principle 2
The child shall enjoy special protection, and shall be given opportunities and facilities, by law and by other means, to enable him to develop physically, mentally, morally, spiritually and socially in a healthy and normal manner and in conditions of freedom and dignity. In the enactment of laws for this purpose, the best interests of the child shall be the paramount consideration.
It goes further. In Principle 6:
Society and the public authorities shall have the duty to extend particular care to children without a family and to those without adequate means of support.
Principle 10:
The child shall be protected from practices which may foster racial, religious and any other form of discrimination. He shall be brought up in a spirit of understanding, tolerance, friendship among peoples, peace and universal brotherhood, and in full consciousness that his energy and talents should be devoted to the service of his fellow men.
My understanding of this is that we must strive for the best interest of each and every child and particularly those who live in our society, however they may have come to be here. Their presence is an incontrovertible fact and tearing them from their friends and familiar surroundings is nothing less than a crime against the child.
The Convention of 1990:
Article 2
2. States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that the child is protected against all forms of discrimination or punishment on the basis of the status, activities, expressed opinions, or beliefs of the child’s parents, legal guardians, or family members.
Article 3
1. In all actions concerning children, whether undertaken by public or private social welfare institutions, courts of law, administrative authorities or legislative bodies, the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration.
It goes on and on. This legislation is very good and detailed and I cannot understand how our civil servants are able to deport families to places in which their and their children’s rights will likely be violated. Shame on those who do this and shame on us for allowing it to happen.
Perhaps the court to approach is that which deals with human rights issues and to challenge any of it’s rulings which appear to allow the contravention of those rights, rather than those which feel bound by our own parochial views.
I’m sure my anger counts for very little but it’s real and it’s here.
Michael Woods.
Rebecca MacGregor // April 25, 2007 at 6:06 pm |
This is NOT the way things are done in Scotland. Not the Scotland that I know and love anyway. This is an apalling way to treat people. What was their crime? Escaping torture and death.
To me, Scotland is the most tolerant and friendly country in the world. We must preserve this. We must have dungavel closed down.
I am Disgusted.
andreas04: close to attraction // June 14, 2007 at 6:08 am |
[...] line, didn’t have it so easy after all. They also witnessed at close hand the tactics of dawn raids, as police battered down the doors of asylum seekers and dragged children from their beds. This [...]