One year on, African migrants still face persecution in Libya

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It’s been exactly one year since Libya’s nine-month civil war came to an end on 23 October and the National Transition Council (NTC) announced the “liberation” of Libya, but for many the hostilities continue.

Least of all for the sub-Saharan migrant workers who are still subjected to degrading, xenophobic and often life-endangering treatment at the hands of militia groups.

A recent report issued by the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), Migreurop and Justice Without Borders for Migrants (JWBM) reveals the true extent of the situation.

Titled “Libya: Stop the Hounding of Migrants”, the report is based on the testimony of hundreds of migrant detainees in eight detention centres in Tripoli, Benghazi and the Nafusa Mountain.

It reveals that thousands of migrants are arrested at checkpoints and even in their homes.

Their only crime is being black, for which they are still suspected of being Gaddafi loyalists. Arrested, they are then locked up indefinitely in improvised camps with no legal representation and little prospect of release.

“The conditions in these camps are inhuman and degrading,” says Sara Prestianni of Migreurop and JWMB, who visited some of the camps in June.

“The cells are overcrowded, lack basic hygiene and detainees are rarely allowed out. They suffer physical and psychological abuse from camp guards.”

 

Gaddafi’s policies

During the Libyan Revolution, which lasted from February until October 2011, many black Africans were a visible target for both pro-Gaddafi loyalists and opposition rebels, who accused them of being mercenaries.

While this was true for a small number of fighters from Chad, Sudan and northern Niger, the majority of sub-Saharan Africans in Libya are economic migrants who were encouraged to come to Libya by Gaddafi’s “open door” policy towards migrant workers.

There are also a number of asylum seekers from the Horn of Africa, specifically Somalia and Eritrea.

But as Libya has not ratified the 1951 Geneva Convention and has no official asylum policy, these refugees pass through Libya as they try to reach Europe were they can access “the international protection to which they are legally entitled as refugees and which Libya cannot guarantee, according to Messaoud Romdhani, vice president of a Tunisian human rights organisation which also took part in the investigation.

Before the war, estimates put the figure of foreign workers in Libya at anywhere between 1.5 and 2.5 million people out of a total population of 6.4 million. A month after the war, the International Organisation on Migration registered the departure of 778,981 migrants since February 2011.

 

Anti-migrant aggression

But those who remain today face open discrimination.

A rebel leader of the Free Libya faction told the FIDH, Migreurop and JWBM delegation that “the priority today is to clean the country of foreigners and to end the practices of Gaddafi who let lots of Africans into this country.

“We don’t want these people here anymore bringing crime and disease.”

Hostility towards black African migrants did not begin with the fall of Muammar Gaddafi.

In one episode of xenophobic rioting in autumn 2000, some 130 migrants were killed.

However, Gaddafi initially welcomed sub-Saharan labour migration to Libya under the guise of economic expansion and pan-African brotherhood.

But once Libya began to forge closer ties with the EU and particularly with Italy, which remains a popular point of entry into Europe for migrants and asylum seekers, Libya began a crackdown.

 

After the revolution

The Libyan revolution was one of the most violent episodes of the Arab Spring.

But one year after the fall of a 42-year dictatorship, Libyans are still faced with the daunting challenge of having to rebuild their country.

There are very few civil society institutions in Libya and the NTC is still struggling to create a viable, central government.

As a result, the various groups and rebel factions that helped to overthrow Gaddafi are now taking responsibility for maintaining law and order in the country.

Last month’s attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, which resulted in the death of the US ambassador Chris Stevens and three other embassy officials, was a stark reminder of the difficulties Libya is facing on the road to stability and democracy.