A group of sympathizers of the hunger strikers without papers occupied the building of the Immigration Office (DVZ) on the Pachecolaan in Brussels for several hours on Tuesday. With their action they expressed their support for the sans-papiers and asked for an immediate regularization for the hunger strikers. The operation ultimately passed without incident.
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The group of occupiers consisted of students, citizens, social workers and activists from the collectives and committees that have been helping the undocumented hunger strikers for a month. They wanted to meet with Freddy Roosemont, director-general of the Immigration Department, to discuss a solution to the hunger strikers and lay the groundwork for a legalization policy that would benefit all undocumented migrants.
Outside the DVZ building, the activists had hung banners with the inscriptions ‘Die for papers, really?’ and ‘The lives of the strikers are in danger’. Inside the building were hung portraits of hunger strikers and posters with slogans like: ‘Sammy Mahdi, can you hear us?’, ‘A strike to the end?’ and ‘Let not the people die, change the law’. The activists thus addressed themselves directly to the federal secretary of state for Asylum and Migration Sammy Mahdi | (CD&V).
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The riot police arrived with several officers and vehicles. They blocked the entrance to the building and began negotiations with the occupiers. They lay on the floor with their arms crossed. But in the end, the police intervention went without incident and without arrests. There were 38 people inside the building. They left on a voluntary basis after identification. Several dozen protesters stood outside the building, and they also eventually left without the intervention of law enforcement.
Since May 23, about 450 undocumented migrants have started a hunger strike in three different places – in the Beguinage Church in Brussels and in two rooms on the campuses of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and the Université Libre de Bruxelles. They see it as their last straw.
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