VATICAN CITY (CNS): “National security” is not a good enough reason to systematically detain refugees, asylum seekers and undocumented migrants, said Catholic, Jewish and Muslim leaders at a Vatican press conference.
The leaders were gathered in Rome on June 15 by the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS), a member of the steering committee of the new International Coalition on the Detention of Refugees, Asylum Seekers and Migrants.
The coalition, which includes human rights and faith based organisations, was formed to study detention policies, assist detainees and lobby for changes in detention practices.
President of the pontifical councils for Justice and Peace and for Migrants and Travellers, Cardinal Renato Martino said, “There are real concerns about detention becoming a systematic policy to which many countries resort, more as a rule than as an exception, and justify the policy by so-called national security concerns.”
JRS director, Jesuit Father Lluis Magrina, said more and more governments are using systematic detention “to arbitrarily discourage migration, even flight from persecution”.
Cardinal Martino, Fr Magrina and representatives of a Jewish group and a Muslim organisation agreed governments have a right to control entry into their countries and sometimes to detain people, but not indiscriminately and not in conditions that violate their human rights.
