CEAR lawyer detained for assisting Iraqi refugees
01 January 2003
Francisco Jiménez, a lawyer from the Spanish Commission for Assistance to Refugees (CEAR), was detained after providing legal assistance on 29 December 2002 to three Iraqi stowaways on the Candelaria B, a boat that was anchored opposite Valencia port, leading to the submission of their asylum applications. The CEAR issued a press statement (below) condemning the detention, and alleges that this is not an isolated incident because "during the last few years, complaints have been made to several bodies (Ombudsman, UN Human Rights Commission in Geneva) about the practice by Spanish authorities in relation to asylum seekers, with a trend towards the denial of immediate legal assistance to stowaways who are detected along its coast."
The detention occurred on 8 January 2003 in a café near to the CEAR office in Cullera (Valencia). Two officers from the Policía Nacional (national police) told him that he was under arrest for falsifying documents and undertaking functions not related to his position, and he was taken to a police station. He was not shown any judicial warrant despite asking to see one, and CEAR lawyers later found that it did not exist. A chief inspector told him that CEAR did not have the authority to provide assistance to stowaways demanding asylum in Valencia harbour, and that he was being detained for usurping the authority of the police by signing in the wrong box of the asylum applications. He was fingerprinted and his rights were read to him, but he was released after refusing to give a statement to the police, because he wanted to make that statement before a judge. On 13 January 2003 CEAR lawyers found that no judicial initiative had been taken against Francisco Jiménez.
Meanwhile, the asylum application filed by the three Iraqis was not examined and they remained on the Candelaria B until it docked once again in Valencia on 10 January 2003, where police authorities and CEAR lawyers interviewed them and the asylum applications were finally completed and formally received for examination. Calling for an urgent action (below, in Spanish) for solidarity from ONGs, institutions, professionals and citizens in general, the CEAR criticised the administration´s "clear interference" in its work "through arbitrary measures".
Translated statement 8.1.2003
The Spanish Commission for Assistance to Refugees (CEAR) criticises the detention of one of its lawyers by the national police
This morning, on 8 January, members of the national police presented themselves in the offices of the CEAR in Cullera (Valencia) proceeding to the detention of Francisco Jiménez, lawyer and member of our oganisation´s Legal Service. At this time our colleague still remains in detention on police premises.
The events begin on (see CEAR statement of 30 December 2002) with the arrival on the Spanish coast (first Barcelona harbour, and later Valencia) of three stowaways in the ship "Candelaria B" that was flying a Spanish flag. The captain, Jorge Villar Tenreiro, reported that the interviews of the stowaways by police in Barcelona took place without the presence of an interpreter and a lawyer, as is mandatory. In the same way, the lawyer and translator provided by the ship´s insurance company were prevented from assisting. Before this situation that is in breach of the Right to Legal Assistance for persons who state their intention to enter Spain or to request asylum, and to guarantee legal assistance to the three stowaways, one of them in possession of UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) documentation, CEAR lawyer Francisco Jiménez, with permission from the insurance company, gained access to the boat which was anchored opposite Valencia harbour on Sunday 29 December 2002. After carrying out the interviews, from which acts of persecution from which the applicants are fleeing surface, the CEAR lawyer - identified as such at all times - and currently detained, completed and presented the asylum applications on beha