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Netherlands: "Asylum seekers suffer in refugee countries"

01 November 1996

The care of asylum seekers in Holland does not meet the minimum standards for security, dignity and independence. This is the message which the Refugee Work Netherlands foundation, the main Dutch organization dealing with refugee affairs, put to the cabinet and parliament in an attempt to end what it calls "the human dramas in the asylum seekers centres". Asylum seekers still have to spend prolonged periods in large refugee centres before learning whether they will be given a formal refugee status. Frustration, enforced passivity and anxiety have resulted in eleven suicides in the last two years. Tension is rising: following a suicide by an Iranian at the Middelburg refugee centre in early December, the director was chased of the premises by an angry crowd. Refugee organizations have repeatedly sounded the alarm bell over extremely long waiting periods in the past years. While the government has announced earlier this year that soon most of the problems will be over, there are few indications that this will actually be the case. This summer, over 10,000 people in the centres had spent over 18 months there. In total, about 28,000 asylum seekers are currently held.