The city of Mouscron is allowed to reduce the number of residents in the local asylum center. The Council of State has decided this in a judgment. The municipality will remain in dialogue with the federal agency for the reception of asylum seekers (Fedasil) in the search for a solution.
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The mayor of Mouscron decided in the middle of last month to reduce the capacity of the asylum center following a number of violent incidents. Currently, about eight hundred people reside in ‘Le Refuge’. Mayor Brigitte Aubert (CDH) wants to reduce that number, although she does not give a concrete target.
Fedasil appealed against that decision to the Council of State, asking for an urgent suspension of Aubert’s decision. But the Council did not agree, the local authorities of Mouscron said in a press release on Saturday.
Both Fedasil and the municipality of Mouscron want to study the judgment of the Council of State first before commenting on it, it said on Sunday. Aubert emphasizes that she wants to enter into a dialogue with Fedasil in a search for a solution, although ‘the safety of everyone, residents, employees and local residents, remains the first priority’.
The news is another blow for Fedasil, who is eagerly looking for extra reception places for asylum seekers. Their search for 5,400 extra buffer places to deal with the current crowds was already difficult. With the decision of the Council of State, Fedasil is now in danger of losing places once again in its ‘normal capacity’.
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