Molenbeek: around thirty hunger strikers without papers hospitalized

Around thirty of the fifty members of the Voice Without Papers collective (Voix Sans-Papiers) who went on hunger strike on the 17th of November have been hospitalized since the start of the action at Molenbeek-Saint-Jean.   This was announced by the collective in a press release on Sunday. They say their aim is to denounce the inhuman conditions they have lived in for years. The collective, based in Molenbeek-Saint-Jean, is made up of 200 people. There are 13 children and around forty women from North and sub-Saharan Africa. They are living in a former retirement home on the Boulevard Leopold II in Molenbeek-Saint-Jean. The members want all those in the squat without papers to be given them.

“We already put our life in danger when we decided to cross the Mediterranean. Today, we are not ready to give up, we will continue to fight for our rights to the end”, says one of the strikers. This striker adds there is “no authority intermediary to talk to about our living conditions and future”.

On the 27th of November, the Molenbeek communal authorities said the situation was being monitored. The mayor Françoise Schepmans considered that, at this stage, no security, hygiene or public health factors justified ending the occupation. The authorities also said a thorough social check would be done to consider possible temporary rehoming.

(Source: Belga)


Copyright © 2024 The Brussels Times. All Rights Reserved.