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Brussels mayor accused of clearing park of homeless refugees before Tour de France

City insists moving rough sleepers on follows complaints by residents but charities disagree

City authorities in Brussels have been accused of trying to rid a park in the Belgian capital of homeless immigrants ahead of next weekend’s Grand Depart of the Tour de France by making increased funding available to provide shelter for them.

Last Friday, police moved around 90 people from the city’s Maximilian Park, with refugee charity Civic Platform saying that officers said it was due to preparations for the Tour de France, reports The Guardian.

A week beforehand, homeless shelter charity Samusocial had reportedly been granted an additional €170,000 to provide additional accommodation ahead of the clearance operation.

Civic Platform spokesman Mehdi Kassou said: “The police only focused on people who were in the Maximilian Park and on the Willebroekkaai. They had to leave. Those who were a little further away were left alone.

“Our volunteers called us in panic around 10.30pm because a police operation was held at the Maximilian Park with dogs.

“We can only rejoice that places have opened to accommodate people. We can however absolutely not be thankful for the manner in which things have been carried out.

“If the reasoning is one of commercial interest or image then these places are opening up for the wrong reason and we deplore such actions.”

A spokesman for Samusocial said: “There is currently money to provide a month-long daycare. We hope that this period will be extended.”

However, a spokesman for the city’s mayor denied that the operation was linked to the Tour de France, saying that it had been undertaken in response to complaints by local residents who had complained about refugees camping in the park after they had been moved on from Brussels-Nord station in recent weeks.

She said: “We continue to look for a balance between the two groups of people involved.

“There are the refugees for whom we are looking for a humane solution and trying to provide a bed. And there are the local residents who want to see peace and quiet return to the park.”

Homeless refugees - some failed asylum seekers, others using Brussels as a stopping-off point before trying to travel to the UK - is a subject that has been covered in the local and international press in recent years, including this report from vrt.be.

Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.

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Xenophon2 | 5 years ago
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Of course they kicked them out in preparation for the TdF, can't have anything spoil the imagery.  Those people have been camping out there for the better part of two years, winter and summer.  Neither the region, city or commune could ever be bothered to do anything about them, complaints by residents were ignored.  One exception:  just a week prior to the elections a similar stunt was pulled.

Almost all the people staying there are 'transit migrants' who are not interested in requesting asylum anywhere else in the EU except in the UK.   As long as they don't request asylum, they're not entitled to anything in Belgium except emergency medical care.  Every night they try to reach a port or get into a truck or container heading to the UK.  And I'm sorry to say, they cause a lot of trouble in the general area of the railway station where they congregate.  Can't really fault them, if I needed food and had no money I wouldn't be overly concerned about the law either.  Legally, -and far from being a right wing nut case this also happens to be my opinion- they should be detained and sent back (or request asylum).  But our system can't cope and there's no political consensus on how to deal with the issue.   If the UK wishes to accept them, I'm sure our local politicos will chip in for the cost of transport.

 

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brooksby | 5 years ago
1 like

Didn't Windsor did this for the Royal Wedding because homeless people don't look good on Instagram?  Didn't Westminster do this with their social housing in the eighties because the prople there were voting the wrong way?

Makes me very angry, but doesn't actually surprise me at all that they want to make their local parks look all pretty just in time for world media to descend on them.  Of course, said world media couldn't care less about anything except the riders and their bikes...

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