The French Council of State has rejected a request by an NGO to remove the waiting area set up for migrants disembarked from the ‘Ocean Viking’ and which, according to the National Association for Border Assistance to Foreigners (Anafé), acted as a place of illegal detention.
Several minors of the 234 migrants who disembarked from the ‘Ocean Viking’ on November 11 at the French port of Toulon have already left that area, «a waiting room in an empty tourist village», according to the organization.
In its decision, published on its website, the Council of State notes «the exceptional circumstances in which the reception of these people had to be organized» and has observed «that the rights of these foreigners have not been seriously and manifestly hindered in an illegal manner».
Finally, the Council of State notes that «associations and lawyers can access this waiting place and carry out their missions there in conditions that do not warrant, in the state of the investigation, the adoption of urgent measures».
It should be recalled that the French authorities have rejected the asylum requests of 123 of the 234 migrants who arrived on board the rescue boat after Malta and Italy refused to allow them entry.
The Minister of the Interior, Geráld Darmanin, has confirmed the figures to the Council of State, days after he anticipated the expulsion of at least 44 of the migrants and even advocated to do it as soon as possible, with transfers towards the countries of origin.
The case led to a political struggle with Italy and, once on the ground, has caused legal chaos for France. A court in Aix-en-Provence ruled this week that many of the migrants waiting in a courtroom for their cases to be resolved could remain in detention, which resulted in the abandonment of dozens of people as early as Thursday, according to Le Monde.
The confusion is replicated in the case of unaccompanied minors, as initially 44 were initially cared for in Toulon but at least 26 have already «absconded» from the hotel to which they had been transferred, according to the president of the Var departmental council, Jean-Louis Masson. «We have no power to hold them,» he explained to ‘Le Figaro’.
France had authorized the docking of the ‘Ocean Viking’ on the premise of a subsequent distribution of the migrants on board, so that the country would only take charge of one third. The rest would be distributed among eleven other countries, including Germany, which undertook to take on another third.
