On 28 March, the Portuguese government announced that all migrants living in the country are to be treated as permanent residents during the crisis. Persons must provide evidence of an on-going residency request before they can use the country’s health service, welfare system, bank accounts, and work and rental contracts. These rules would apply from […]
Detention Blog
Australia: Covid-19 and Detention
1,100 Australian healthcare professionals have co-signed a letter to the Home Affairs Minister, Peter Dutton, calling for all refugees and asylum seekers to immediately be released from immigration detention. “Failure to take action to release people seeking asylum and refugees from detention will not only put them at greater risk of infection and possibly death,” […]
Egypt: Covid-19 and Detention
The GDP has been unable to find any reports indicating that authorities have taken measures to assist migrants and asylum seekers, who are generally detained in prisons and police stations in Egypt. On 11 March 2020, the Egyptian government suspended visits to prisoners for 10 days due to the Covid-19 outbreak. Activists have urged the […]
Italy: Covid-19 and Detention
Campaign groups such as the “Campagna Nazionale contro la detenzione amministrativa di migranti” have highlighted the risks of the spread of Coronavirus within immigration detention centres in Italy, especially given the poor hygiene conditions and particular vulnerability of detainees. In addition, Italy’s national detainee rights guarantor, Mauro Palma, has urged the government to assess whether […]
Netherlands: Covid-19 and Detention
The Council of Europe, in a 26 March statement, mentioned Netherlands as being one of a handful of countries in Europe to have released some immigration detainees because of the Covid-19 pandemic. However, other reports indicate that as of the end of March, people continued to be placed in immigration detention and that insufficient steps […]
Bahrain: Covid-19 and Detention
In mid-March King Al Khalifa of Bahrain ordered, via decree, the liberation of 901 prisoners so as to control the spread of Covid-19. Prison sentences for 585 other prisoners will be changed to rehabilitation and reformation programmes. Bahrain is notorious for imprisoning large numbers of foreign workers, who at one time reportedly made up some […]
Germany: Covid-19 and Detention
On 16 March, Germany reintroduced border controls, stationing federal police at the borders with Austria, Switzerland, France, Luxembourg and Denmark. The Ministry of Interior said that in coordination with the neighboring countries and authorities in all German federal states with external borders, the border police are ordered to turn away all travelers without a valid […]
South Africa: Covid-19 and Detention
On 20 March 2020, the Justice Minister, Ronald Lamola, advised that criminal prisons in South Africa would undergo deep cleaning in a bid to prevent coronavirus infections. In addition, visits to offenders are suspended for 30 days and testing measures are being rolled out. A local NGO, Sonke Gender Justice, has urged the government to […]
Taiwan, Province of China: Covid-19 and Detention
Taiwan’s National Immigration Agency (NIA) announced the start of a three-month amnesty programme from 1 April until 30 June 2020. This programme is for foreign nationals who have overstayed their visas, allowing them to pay smaller fines and avoid detention should they report to immigration authorities during the grace period. The maximum penalty will be […]
Australia: Covid-19 and Detention
Numerous civil society organizations have issued calls for the release of immigration detainees in Australia, which took on new urgency after a private security guard at an ad hoc detention center in a hotel in Brisbane tested positive for Covid-19 in mid-March. On 23 March, asylum seekers in detention across Australia wrote an open letter […]
