The 'express' deportations of immigrants without passing through the CIE increase

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The state campaign to stop deportation flights and close the CIE will continue to intensify this year.
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A group of immigrants entering the CIE of the Zona Franca of Barcelona.
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Organizations report an urgent review of the current mechanisms for reception and detention of immigrants

The NGO Platform 'Stop Deportaciones' also denounces that the Spanish authorities execute expulsions in the initial phase and without guaranteeing to the affected people their right of defense.

"Express" deportation flights without going through the Foreign Internship Center (CIE) have increased this year, according to Ainhoa Nadia Douhaibi, member and spokesman of the 'Stop Deportaciones' Platform.

This fact is relevant if one takes into account that the reason for being from the CIE is precisely this: a place of departure, prior to the expulsion of immigrants. Instead, the competent authorities use these centers as input devices.

"The expulsions take place in the execution phase of the process violating the rights of people to be able to defend themselves because they do not leave time to show that they have family or work or to guarantee minimum conditions to stay ...", explains Douhaibi.

The Platform, made up of activists and state NGOs working on immigration policy and monitoring and controlling deportation flights, has found that Spain executes about 10,000 annual expulsions on flights chartered by different airlines.

According to Douhaibi, to fill these 'express' flights, the police take people out of the street or go find them at their own address or cheat them to go to police with any excuse.

The Platform is not the only organization that denounces these practices. The latest report of the 'National Mechanism of Prevention of Torture' dating from 2017 shows that Spain uses CIE as a tool for "profound detention without developing other alternatives that guarantee a more humanitarian response to these people, then of being rescued from the sea in very precarious conditions. "

The report also recommends an "urgent review of the current mechanisms for reception and detention of immigrants".

More threats than expulsions

Although there has been an increase in 'express' flights, the platform also stresses that the number of people threatened is six times higher than the number of people expelled.

These data show the extent of migration policy: "We live in a system that is interested in maintaining job insecurity in order to continue feeding and meeting the demands of capital," Douhaibi said. Add: "The capture, closure and expulsion responds to a racial mechanism. Deportation must be the last resort. "

For this reason, the organization, in which there is the platform 'Tanquem el CIE', will continue intensifying its "Stop Deportaciones" campaign throughout this year.