A judge in Catania has scrapped the
detention of an Egyptian asylum seeker at a processing facility
in Pozzallo, Sicily, even though he hails from a country listed
as safe for repatriation by a new government decree, judicial
sources said on Monday.
In the decision, the judge did not validate the detention for
the asylum seeker during the examination of his request for
international protection ordered by the central police
department of Ragusa based on the fact that the list of 'safe
countries' defined by the decree "does not exempt the judge from
the obligation to verify the compatibility" of such "designation
with European Union law" and "in Egypt grave violation of human
rights have been reported", the judge wrote.
The migrant's attorney, Rosa Emanuela Lo Faro, said the decision
"is the first of its kind since the decree on safe countries".
The new measure approved on October 21, aimed at solving the
legal issue that led a Rome court to refuse to validate the
detention of 12 migrants at a newly opened Italian-run centre in
Gjader, Albania, includes a list of safe countries as part of
primary legislation rather than as an inter-ministerial decree.
The list aimed at accelerating procedures of expulsion was
drafted after a Rome court on October 18 gave the thumbs down to
the first group of migrants being held at one of the centres
Italy has set up on Albanian territory, based on a controversial
agreement with Tirana, on the grounds that their countries of
provenance, Bangladesh and Egypt, could not be considered wholly
safe.
The court's decision was based on an October 4 sentence of the
European Court of Justice that not all the territory of several
countries including Egypt could be considered safe .
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