OPU Press release: The European Court of Human Rights is asking the Czech Republic to explain the situation of two families with children detained in the Bělá-Jezová Detention Centre for Foreigners.
On Thursday, 7 November 2024, the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg called on the Czech authorities to comment on the situation of two families with young children who have been detained for 49 days in the Bělá-Jezová facility for the detention of foreigners. The families applied to the court with the help of the Organisation for Refugee Assistance (OPU) after their claims were rejected by the Czech courts. The Czech authorities have been given until 12 November to respond, after which the court will decide on the families’ request for their release.
The families have applied to the court for an interim measure under Article 39 of the court’s Rules of Procedure. They drew the court’s attention to the considerable length of their detention and the very young age of their children. In the first case, police officers detained the parents with a total of six children aged 2, 4, 8, 11, 12 and 14. In the second case, three children aged 5, 11 and 17 are seized with their parents.
The families were placed in the facility after arriving in the Czech Republic without travel documents and visas. The police detained the families for transfer to Croatia, which is competent under European law to examine their asylum claims. However, the families were unaware that they had filed an asylum application in Croatia. Some of the families complained about the conditions in the camps for foreigners in Croatia, mentioning broken windows, dirt and cockroaches. Croatian police officers merely took their fingerprints. They were then told that they could go wherever they wanted.
According to Czech law, families with children can be detained in a detention facility for foreigners for up to three months. They are not allowed to leave the facility, their phones and finances are temporarily taken away, and they have limited opportunities to communicate with the outside world. At the same time, foreign research shows that the restriction of personal freedom in immigration detention has a negative impact on children, causing them anxiety and can deepen the trauma they have suffered in their country of origin.
The European Court of Human Rights is now interested in the situation of the families, the conditions in the Bela-Jezova facility and what steps the Czech authorities are taking to implement the return of the families to Croatia. According to the Court’s case law, detention of children is a measure of last resort, which can be resorted to only in exceptional cases and for the shortest necessary period of time. If the court is not satisfied with the response of the Czech authorities, it may issue an interim measure – i.e. order the families to be released immediately. It last did so in two cases in 2016.
“An interim measure of the European Court of Human Rights is an extraordinary remedy; the court will grant it only exceptionally and only if there is an imminent risk of irreparable harm in a particular case. We are encouraged by the fact that the court is taking an active interest in the cases of families with children in Bělá-Jezová. It confirms what we have been pointing out for a long time – immigration detention of children is an inappropriate and harmful practice,” says Zuzana Pavelková of the OPU.
Contact: Zuzana Pavelková, zuzana.pavelkova@opu.cz, +420 730 158 779; +420 730 158 781