from AHMED ZAYED in Tripoli, Libya
TRIPOLI, (CAJ News) – SOME medical doctors have resumed treating migrants and refugees in Libya detention centres three months after halting services because of hostility in the facilities.
The resumption of services at two detention centres in the capital, Tripoli, by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), or Doctors Without Borders) follows some assurances by authorities.
MSF has also started activities in a third detention centre, which it had lost access to during the period that led to the suspension.
Libya’s Directorate for Combating Illegal Migration (DCIM), after recent talks with MSF, assured that certain basic conditions would be met in the detention centres, enabling MSF to resume activities in line with medical ethics and humanitarian principles.
These conditions include preventing the use of violence against detained people and ensuring the safety of MSF teams.
Medical staff would be unhindered and have sustained access to the detention centres.
Also, detained people would be allowed unfettered access to medical services while full respect for the medical confidentiality of people held in the detention centres would be assured.
Since resumption, doctors have examined and treated more than 400 patients.
These include more than 30 children under the age of 15, who are detained with their parents.
Patients mainly suffering from skin diseases, gastrointestinal disorders and upper respiratory tract infections were treated.
“The conditions are attributable to the poor conditions in which they are held,” an MSF spokesperson stated.
MSF has reiterated calls for the closure of the detention centres, the release of detainees and for adequate humanitarian assistance and protection services to be provided to them upon release.
MSF has been working in detention centres in Libya since 2016.
Thousands are detained in the North African country, having been stranded after failed trips to Europe.
– CAJ News