Human rights activists have made serious allegations against the EU country of Lithuania: Amnesty International criticizes that refugees are being “arbitrarily held in run-down detention centers under military command”. Only refugees from Ukraine could count on dignified treatment.
Amnesty International has accused Lithuania of violating human rights in its dealings with refugees of various nationalities from neighboring Belarus. While war refugees from Ukraine are welcomed with open arms in Lithuania, those seeking protection from countries such as Iraq or Syria are illegally imprisoned, severely abused and deported.
This emerges from interviewing migrants in two Lithuanian detention centers, according to a report published by the human rights organization on Monday. At the same time, Amnesty accused the EU of passively tolerating the actions in the Baltic member state. According to the report, migrants who were questioned complained of humiliation by the authorities and inhuman prison conditions.
Lithuania accuses Belarus of deliberately bringing refugees to the border
“The Lithuanian authorities have been arbitrarily detaining thousands of people for months in run-down military-run detention centers, where they are being subjected to torture and other ill-treatment,” Amnesty said. “They are denied access to fair asylum procedures so that they can ‘voluntarily’ return to the countries from which they fled.”
Lithuania accuses the authoritarian rule of neighboring Belarus under ruler Alexander Lukashenko of bringing migrants from crisis regions to the border in an organized manner. The situation at the EU’s external border escalated last late summer. Thousands tried to enter the European Union illegally.