Peoples’ Court To Be Held in Palermo. The Accusation: Crimes Against Migrants By the Italian Government and the EU
Press release – We understand that the Minister of the Interior, Marco Minniti, has been invited to a celebration in Palermo organised by the newspaper La Repubblica, in order to discuss migration and reception. This all while a vast number of men, women and children are tortured and left to die in Libyan prisons, left to down in the Mediterranean or finally reach Italian shores but without life in their bodies.
We hold that the Italian government, represented by Minister Minniti, ought be invited to present himself, along with the European Union, in an entirely different context – one in which their responsability for crimes committed against migrants can be properly assessed.
We thus comunicate to the Minister of the Interior that the Sicilian organisations signing below have called for the Permanent Peoples’ Court to open an investigation into the crimes in which the Italian government is involved. This involvement is taking place in the context of recent policies based on agreements with migrants’ countries of origin and transit, an expression of border policies handed down by the European Union. Such crimes and responsabilities are complicated yet nevertheless demonstrable. We feel it is our duty to investigate them immediately.
To this end, we have requested that the Permanent Peoples’ Court hold a session on the Italian government’s border policies, within the remit of the Session on the Rights of Migrants and Refugees which opened in Barcellona in July 2017.
The session will be held between December 18th and 20th in Palermo, capital of migrant reception. Witnesses and experts will be asked on to present their analyses and evidence to the international jury called by the Court.
In order to launch this important event, we have called a Press Conference for today, November 13th, at 12:00, to be held in the Centro Santa Chiara.
The Permanant Peoples’ Court (TPP) was founded in 1979 by Lelio Basso as tool to provide visibilty and give a voice to peoples who are victim to violations of their human rights as enshrined in the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Peoples (Algeria, 1976) and those marginalised by international law. Experts are called from across the world to examine the causes and manner of these violations, and reporting the authors of these violations to international public opinion.
Network of the TPP associations.
To join or contact the network: palermotpp@gmail.com
Addio Pizzo – Palermo
ARCI Sicilia
Arci Porco Rosso
Arte Migrante – Palermo
Associazione ADDUMA avvocati
Associazione contro le discriminazioni razziali Noureddine Adnane
Associazione Diritti e Frontiere – ADIF
Associazione Giocherenda
Associazione Handala
Associazione per gli Studi Giuridici sull’Immigrazione – Palermo
Associazione “Pellegrino della terra” Onlus
Associazione PRO.VI.DE-Regina della Pace onlus –
Associazione Pluralia – Palermo
Borderline Sicilia
Caritas di Palermo-Aarea Mondialità
Casa della Cultura Araba – Al QUDS
Centro Astalli Palermo
Centro Diaconale La Noce – Istituto Valdese
Centro Italiano Aiuti all’Infanzia/CIAI Palermo
Centro Salesiano Santa Chiara
Clinica Legale per i Diritti Umani- Cledu
Comitato Antirazzista Cobas Palermo
Cooperazione Internazionale Sud Sud – CISS
Coordinamento Antitratta di Palermo
Emmaus Palermo Onlus
Forum Antirazzista Palermo
Istituto di Formazione Politica “Pedro Arrupe” – Centro Studi Sociali
Laici Missionari Comboniani
Libera – Palermo
La Migration sportello immigrati Lgbti
L’Altro Diritto Sicilia
Mediterraneo Antirazzista
Missionari Comboniani Palermo
Moltivolti
Movimento Internazionale della Riconciliazione/ MIR – Palermo
Osservatorio Migrazioni
Per esempio Onlus
ROMpiamo i pregiudizi
Refugees Welcome Gruppo territoriale Palermo
Ufficio Migranti – CGIL Palermo
Project “OpenEurope” – Oxfam Italia, Diaconia Valdese, Borderline Sicilia Onlus
Translated by Richard Braude
