Amnesty International announced today that Migrant women detained in Libyan detention centers are subjected to horrific sexual violence at the hands of the guards, such as being forced to exchange sex for clean water, food and access to sanitation facilities.
The report, which focused on migrants stranded in the Mediterranean and landing in Libya in 2020 and 2021, speaks of deteriorating conditions in detention centers, despite the fact that they have recently come under the control of the Libyan Interior Ministry.
Pope Francis and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres have called for the centers to be closed.
The guards of the centers say “Maybe you want fresh water and beds; let me have sex with you to set you free”, told a woman in Amnesty International, one of many who reported that guards inside the centers raped or forced women to have sex in exchange for their release or clean water.
The findings come from interviews with 53 refugees and migrants, aged between 14 and 50, from countries such as Nigeria, Somalia and Syria, most of whom are still in Libya and managed to escape from detention centers or had access to telephones.
Some pregnant women in the centers told Amnesty that they were repeatedly raped by guards, while the men stated that they were forced to wear only underwear in an attempt to humiliate them. Others, including children, spoke of sexual harassment.
These allegations of inhumane treatment follow a series of post-2017 reports of conditions in detention centers in Libya, alleging beatings, torture and lack of hygiene and food.
The European Union-funded Libyan Coast Guard intercepted about 15,000 people at sea and returned to Libya in the first six months of this year, Amnesty International said, more than in 2020 as a whole. Amnesty said about 6,100 people had been transferred to detention centers by the end of June.
Despite a ceasefire reached in October between Libya’s warring factions as part of a UN-sponsored peace plan, ten years after the fall of Muammar Gaddafi’s regime in 2011, armed groups remain on the ground, control of certain migrant camps.
Some MEPs have urged the European Commission to cut funding
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