France was condemned, Thursday, July 22, by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) for having placed in detention for eleven days a young Malian and her four-month-old daughter, a measure judged “Excessive”.
The ECHR found a violation of the European Convention on Human Rights under Articles 3 “Prohibition of torture” (“No one may be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”) ; 5.1 “Everyone has the right to liberty and security. (…) “ ; and 5.4 – “Anyone deprived of his liberty by arrest or detention has the right to lodge an appeal before a court, so that it decides promptly on the legality of his detention and orders his release if the detention is unlawful”. France will have to pay the mother and her daughter the sum of 16,780 euros.
The applicant, a Malian born in 1995, arrived in France on January 15, 2018 via Italy, to flee her country where she said she was risking “Genital mutilation” and forced marriage, states the Court in its summary of the judgment. In July 2018, she gave birth to her daughter.
At the end of November 2018, with a view to being deported with her child to Italy, the country responsible for examining her asylum application due to the Dublin agreements, she was placed in the Mesnil administrative detention center. -Amelot (Seine-et-Marne) for forty-eight hours, the prefect of Loir-et-Cher invoking “A significant risk of flight”.
“A treatment that has exceeded the threshold of severity”
The young Malian, who had refused to board a plane to Italy, unsuccessfully challenges the order in court, which will extend it for twenty-eight days. On December 6, his request for provisional measures was validated by the ECHR and the French government ended the detention after eleven days. The young mother and her daughter are then taken care of by social services and will benefit from temporary residence permits.
“Taking into account the very young age of the child, the reception conditions in the detention center” and the length of detention, France has “Submitted the child” then 4 months old, as well as his mother “To treatment which has exceeded the threshold of severity required by Article 3 of the Convention”, considers the judicial arm of the Council of Europe.
Justice did not hold “Sufficiently account” of his “Minor child status” especially before“Order the extension of the detention”, emphasizes the Court. This recalls that French law provides that the detention of a minor “Can only be decided as a last resort and for as short a period as possible”.
“For several years, the Defender of Rights has called on the French authorities to put an end to the administrative detention of children”, insists in a press release the institution, intervened in 2019 in the procedure as a third party intervenor. The Defender of Rights, Claire Hédon, “Once again calls on the government and Parliament to change the legislation to outlaw, in all circumstances, this measure”, adds the press release.