BRUSSELS: According to newspaper sources the Belgian government has launched a massive crackdown on Asylum seekers from India, mainly Sikhs from Punjab, and has shut the doors on the refugees from India who arrived there to escape police atrocious in Punjab,
Belgium, holding current presidency of the 12nation European community, has decided to reverse its Hitherto Liberal Asylum and immigration rules to prevent asylum seekers,
Special camps are being set up to detain illegal immigrants for longer periods pending their repatriation and fresh guidelines have been issued to deny them work, especially in the fruit rich areas of Limburg, which witnessed ugly scenes of race related arson at tacks by local skinheads on Sikh fruit pickers in August.
Several Moltov cocktails were thrown at a house with 25 Sikh occupants in Sint Truiden town on the night of Aug.26, but the in mates escaped unhurt,
The Belgian government has taken up the matter at the political level with India and a high-level Belgian delegation led by its ambassador for immigration policy, ambassador Winter, is expected to visit New Delhi shortly for official talks with authorities in India to evolve some institutional frame work of Indo Belgian cooperation to solve what is commonly known here as a “Sikh problem,” The Belgian government has told
India that the recent petrol bomb attack on a Sikh house in Sint Truiden and the subsequent race related violent incidents in Walloon region were not isolated cases in Belgium.
The Sikhs have been the center of attacks in recent days. They work long and hard hours as fruit pickers for abnormally low wages. This has led to discontent among local unemployed and Right Wing extremists, who have launched a campaign of hated against the “flood” of Indian immigrants making the situation “explosive.”
“If together we do not succeed in checking this growing and worrisome phenomenon, it could have far reaching consequences for both our countries,” Belgian interior minister Tobback said.
Apparently seeking to raise the temperature, Tobback, Belgian interior minister said “there may be damage to our bilateral relations should this attitude be presented as unwillingness of the Indian authorities to readmit their own citizens,”
He said “there may be damage to India’s reputation: India’s political and human rights record in no way justify it stop ranking amongst refuge’s producing countries,”
Also, there may be danger to the legal Indian community in Belgium “It the public were to identify this community with the masses of Asylum seekers from India,” Tobback warned. He was perhaps hinting at possible threats to the affluent Indian diamond merchants in Antwerp.
The asylum procedure has been drastically amended to dispose of asylum applications in 20 days. Work permits to asylum seekers have been banned, Heavy fines would be imposed on employers trying to engage them as illegal workforce.
He said asylum seekers would remain in custody pending their repatriation, Special asylum seeker camps have been set up where they can be kept for longer periods. There will be effective monitoring of asylum seekers through a substantial reinforcement in personnel of the “commissariat general aux refugees” and the “office des etrangers.”
The Sikh community in Belgium is very shocked, The Gurdwara in Halmaal is guarded day and night for fear of attacks, local residents are also shocked by the attack on the “friendly and kindhearted Indians.” They think that trouble makers are stirring up young people in Sint Truiden, The Sikhs started arriving in Belgium as asylum seekers from the troubled state of Punjab. In the beginning they were welcomed as cheap labor for fruit picking and subsequently encouraged to bring more of their fellow countrymen,
The fruit growers associations initially moved heaven and earth in order to legally hire them. Since then Sint Truiden became the hub of illegal Sikh migrants who generally came by land route,
The small town of Sint Truiden now accounts for some 1,000 Sikhs. They are estimated (0 be around 3,000 in the whole of fruit belt of Limburg, mostly in” Unhygienic” conditions.
Some human rights and anti-racism groups, fighting for their cause, fee) that there is a “genuine housing problem which should be at tended to immediately. The Sikhs in Belgium now fear a social catastrophe and dispute the legality of the government measures to repatriate them.
They are planning to challenge them in a court of law. Most of them are unwilling to leave should there be no alternative solution and apparently are in a mood to defy the government’s ultimatum,
When asked why there had been no problem when the Sikhs were coming as fruit pickers all these years, Tobback said, a few years ago it did not cause tension, But now it is, There is reaction among people, especially among the un employed.”
The Belgian government has urged the local Sikh Gurdwara in Sint Truiden to stop the Sikhs from coming from Punjab.
Hiring a local unemployed costs too much and this has led to re course to immigration channels. But the Belgian government has decided to suspend for six months all those long term unemployed who refuse to pick fruit.
One European member of Par lament, J. Happart, said “the incident in Sint Truiden could have taken place in any city. We are moving to a situation of conflict, in which the poor are likely to be forced (a go to war among themselves.”
The Burgomaster of Sint Truiden, J.Cleeren, who condemned the arson attack in which three whites were charged, was reported to have remarked “the town is flooded with Sikhs, too culturally different from US: We have no choice if we want to avoid escalation of hate, no longer register them in the commune.”
He said “this kind of incidents: can happen everywhere, It is a problem of concentration of com munities, of different cultures, but no racism, The issue should be solved at federal level. It is not the: task of one commune to carry all the reception weight.”
Mr.Gummit Singh Aulakh of the Council of Khalistan was contacted by WSN to know what the council was doing about the plight of Sikh asylum seekers in Belgium, he said, “lam aware of it I am doing everything to help our Sikh brothers in Belgium many of whom have been forced to flee their homes On account of police persecution in Punjab, T am in touch with human rights organizations there.”
Article extracted from this publication >> October 29, 1993
