The Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights is encouraging CARICOM leaders who are in The Bahamas to lobby the government to comply with eight precautionary measures the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) requested to be implemented. The Bahamas is hosting the 26th Inter-Sessional Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of CARICOM at the Melia Nassau Beach resort.
RFK Center President Kerry Kennedy said in a statement, “The squalid detention conditions and discriminatory treatment of Haitians and those of Haitian descent in The Bahamas are a dark stain on a country so often recognized for its hospitality. The timing of the Inter-American Commission's decision comes at a critical moment. We ask all Caribbean leaders to use [the] gathering in The Bahamas to urge the Bahamian government to fully comply with the court's measures."
The IACHR made the request to “ensure the life and physical integrity” of migrants at the Carmichael Road Detention Centre. IACHR said it made the request based on the “factual and legal arguments” presented by several non-governmental organizations, which visited the facility on November 12, 2014.
The organizations named were the Caribbean Institute for Human Rights, the International Human Rights Clinic of the Inter-American University of Puerto Rico and the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights. The government has said many of the concerns expressed by the human rights organizations were “overstated and inaccurate”
The recommendations were outlined in a report released last Thursday. These measures included providing adequate medical treatment to detainees, addressing the situation of unaccompanied children in accordance with international standards and ensuring legal assistance is available.
The commission also requested the government take immediate action to substantially reduce overcrowding at the center. It asked that the government ensure civil society organizations and relevant international organizations have access to the facility for the “purpose of monitoring detention conditions”. The RFK Center said detainees at the detention center are subjected to what it called “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment”.
“The protracted detention of migrants and conditions that amount to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment are absolutely unjustifiable," Executive Director of RFK Partners for Human Rights Santiago A. Canton said. "The government of The Bahamas must act immediately to comply with the precautionary measures issued by the Inter-American Commission to protect the lives and safety of all those detained, and grant monitors full access to the facility.”
Caribbean Institute for Human Rights Executive Director Annette Martínez-Orabona said while The Bahamas has the authority to define and implement migratory policy it cannot violate fundamental human rights norms in the execution of its policy.
Minister of Foreign Affairs and Immigration Fred Mitchell acknowledged in Parliament on Monday that there may be issues surrounding the immigration policies that are open to debate or may be challenged. But he denied the government is targeting any national group and said it does not sanction abuse of any kind against migrants in The Bahamas.
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