Immigration Detention in Switzerland
Switzerland has one of the highest rates of immigration in the world, with over 20 percent of the country's population (approximately 7 million people) claiming a foreign nationality. The country also has notoriously tight naturalization laws; being born in Switzerland does not automatically grant a person Swiss citizenship.
In 2012, Switzerland received 25,900 applications for political asylum, placing it in the number six spot for countries receiving asylum seekers. Every foreigner has the right to apply for asylum, but fewer than 12 percent of applicants are accepted.
Special Flight tells the story of the other 88 percent (as well as undocumented migrants who never asked for asylum), all of whom are swept into one of the country's detention centers. Frambois, established in 2004, is recognized for its high cost and relative comfort, yet its deportation rate, 86 percent, is the highest in the country. Many of the "paperless" immigrants and asylum seekers detained there have lived in Switzerland for years--20 years in the case of Ragip, a Kosovar man featured in the film--and have jobs and families. They may be locked up for as long as 18 months before being deported.
Detention Infrastructure in Switzerland
Switzerland is composed of 26 states--also known as cantons--each with its own constitution and freedom to interpret and enforce federal law.
Although some cantons have dedicated migrant detention facilities, others arrange to send migrants to neighboring cantons and have joint agreements with shared facilities. For example, the cantons of Vaud and Neuchâtel pay to use the canton of Geneva's Frambois facility, which is featured in the film. Short-term periods of detention are often carried out in police facilities, while longer periods are carried out in cantons with facilities like Frambois.
While there are no federal statistics on the number of detention centers and cells in Switzerland, the Global Detention Project reports that there are 32 facilities in use as immigration-related detention sites. These sites included transit zone (airport) facilities, semi-secure centers for asylum seekers, dedicated immigration facilities, police stations and prisons with separate sections for migrants awaiting deportation.
Separate facilities are reportedly used to detain women, though Geneva's Frambois facility is exclusively male, as are the majority of facilities in Geneva, Vaud and Neuchâtel. The Global Detention Project reports that this is due to gender segregation requirements limiting facilities' capacity. Minors under the age of 15 are not subject to detention.
Detention Policy in Switzerland
The Swiss Federal Office for Migration (FOM) coordinates all matters related to asylum seekers in Switzerland, which includes organizing the controversial "special flights" that are arranged when applicants who are denied asylum or visas refuse to leave the country voluntarily. The men who are filmed in Special Flight are all asylum seekers or undocumented immigrants who were detained after their applications were denied. There is no pattern to which immigrants are targeted, though Switzerland has signed agreements with certain countries regarding immigration policy. For example, in February 2011, Switzerland signed an agreement with Nigeria under which it forcibly repatriates all Nigerians living in the country illegally. In 2010, nearly 2,000 Nigerian citizens applied for asylum in Switzerland, accounting for 13 percent of all asylum requests.
In order to receive asylum, an applicant must register in person at one of the FOM's four reception and procedure centers, provide proof of identity to Swiss authorities and prove a legitimate fear of persecution in his or her home country. As stated in the Swiss Asylum Act, the FOM examines each application and determines whether or not the applicant fulfills the requirements for refugee status, which includes whether or not it is safe for the applicant to repatriate. If a decision cannot be made about an asylum application within 90 days, the applicant is transferred from the reception center to an assigned canton, and it is the job of the cantonal authorities to keep the applicant housed and fed while the applicant awaits a decision. According to the Global Detention Project, the maximum period foreign nationals can be detained while awaiting notice is 18 months (though at the time Special Flight was being filmed, the maximum period was 24 months) and for minors between the ages of 15 and 18, the maximum period is six months. An applicant who is rejected is required to leave Switzerland. If a rejected applicant then refuses to leave, he or she is removed under supervision on a "special flight." According to the FOM, over half of asylum seekers who do not fulfill requirements to remain in Switzerland leave unsupervised.
The FOM deals only with asylum seekers, which means the cantons are left to handle the status and deportation of all other foreign nationals who do not have proper paperwork. The deadlines for leaving the country vary depending on the canton. To encourage voluntary departures by asylum seekers, cantons sometimes offer repatriation allowances to encourage foreigners to return to their home countries.
In June 2013, the Swiss people are scheduled to vote on several revisions to Swiss asylum policy and law that were made effective by the country's parliament in September 2012. The revisions are an attempt to reduce the number of asylum requests (up to 22,551 applications in 2011--40,677 underwent the official asylum procedure by the end of 2011).
If the Swiss vote against these changes, they will only remain in effect until September 2013. If not, they will remain in effect until September 2015.
If the revisions are approved, Switzerland will no longer grant refugee status to conscientious objectors and army deserters and will no longer permit asylum seekers to fill out applications at Swiss embassies abroad. The law will also allow for the construction of new centers dedicated solely to uncooperative asylum seekers already inside Switzerland. Federal authorities will be permitted to house asylum seekers for up to three years without cantonal permission.
The controversial revisions are opposed by the Social Democratic Party and the Green Party, as well as by several human-rights groups, while the right-wing Swiss People's Party is in full support of the changes.
Sources:
» "Swiss to Vote on Deporting Criminals." PBS NewsHour, November 16, 2010.
» Federal Office for Migration. "Foreigners and Asylum Seekers in Switzerland."
» Fleiner-Gerster, Thomas. "The Current Situation of Federalism in Switzerland." Revista d'Estudis Autonòmics i Federals, October 2009.
» Global Detention Project. "Switzerland Detention Profile."
» Bradley, Simon. "Paying Undesirables to Leave Switzerland." Swissinfo.ch, April 26, 2012
» Federal Office for Migration. "Foreigners and Asylum Seekers in Switzerland."
» Global Detention Project. "Switzerland Detention Profile."
» Jorio, Luigi. "Swiss Wrestle with Expelling Undesirables." Swissinfo.ch, May 10, 2012
» Keiser, Andreas. "Switzerland and Nigeria to Cooperate on Migration." Swissinfo.ch, February 14, 2011
Special Flights
The final possibility is a special flight chartered by the FOM. The only passengers aboard are deportees, police officers and FOM representatives. To avoid resistance, inmates are notified at the last moment. They are then taken to the airport in chains and escorted to the aircraft, where they are tied to their seats and equipped with helmets and diapers. A special flight may take up to 40 hours, during which the passengers remain tied to their seats. When there are prisoners from different nationalities on board, as is often the case, the planes stop in several countries.
The conditions of these deportations are a source of controversy. The Federation of Swiss Physicians opposes special flights for medical and ethical reasons and urges doctors to refuse to participate in deportations under duress, because providing proper medical supervision is considered impossible. Special flights have already cost three people their lives.
A special flight to a nearby destination can cost 20,000 Swiss francs ($20,657), and longer flights to places such as Africa can cost up to 200,000 Swiss francs ($206,568). The cost per deportee person can be from 15,000 to 23,000 Swiss francs. The annual cost is estimated at approximately 1.9 million Swiss francs ($1,962,676).
Sources:
» Special Flight Press Kit.
Frambois
Inside the prison there are 22 individual cells equipped with refrigerators and TVs, and inmates are free to leave their cells between 8:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. The common room on the ground floor is the core of Frambois. It is equipped with tables, chairs and table tennis facilities. Inmates spend most of their days there, participating in discussions, games, meals and even visits by chaplains.
The so-called "Frambois concept" has a price: Construction of Frambois cost 4 million Swiss francs ($4.1 million), 90 percent of it supplied by the government. Frambois costs 280 Swiss francs ($288) per day per inmate and nearly 100,000 Swiss francs ($103,100) per year per inmate. With a capacity of 25 inmates, Frambois accommodated 272 people at various times in 2009.
Frambois is staffed by a team of 13 people who meet every morning for discussions. Management communicates the dates of deportation or arrival; officers describe what happened during the night.
Sources:
» Special Flight Press Kit.
Immigration Detention in the United States
Detention facilities in the United States typically operate under Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which is a part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Since the detainees are in federal custody, they can be placed in any facility in the country where the ICE has a contract, regardless of the detainee's home. For example, in March 2007, 361 workers were arrested at a factory in the state of Massachusetts and many were moved to facilities in Texas within 48 hours.
Nearly two-thirds of immigrant detainees are held in local jails, and the Global Detention Project reports that local law enforcement agencies profit substantially off of confining immigrants. In 2008, the federal government paid nearly $55.2 million to 13 local California jails housing detainees.
The ways in which immigrants end up in detention centers and prisons have come under scrutiny in recent years. The immigration system is not a criminal system--it is a civil one--so the Department of Homeland Security has discretion to apprehend immigrants it suspects of being in the country illegally. Amnesty International outlines the various ways immigrants are detained: Individuals may be apprehended at the border, during employment or household raids, as a result of traffic stops by local police or after having been convicted of a federal offense.
Immigrants in the United States, like the detainees in Switzerland portrayed in Special Flight, are often detained after living in the country for decades as taxpayers who hold jobs, have families and have no criminal records. There have also been many accusations against detention centers for acts of physical and mental abuse. In 2008, The New York Times published under the Freedom of Information Act a list of 107 people who had died in U.S. immigration detention centers since 2003. Immigrant detainees in the United States spend an average of 31 days in detention while awaiting deportation, while asylum seekers spend an average of 64 days.
In recent years, however, the ICE has made improvements to its system. Unaccompanied, illegal minors are now housed in church-run shelters or halfway houses overseen by the Global Detention Project. Conditions in these facilities are superior to those in prisons and they are funded by different programs. The ICE has also established Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) to make immigration laws more transparent and effective. ERO prioritizes only immigrants who pose a threat to national security. For those who are detained, the ICE vows to provide access to legal resources and advocacy groups.
The financial aspects of detention are also of interest. In 2008, through intergovernmental service agreements the federal government paid almost $55.2 billion to house detainees. According to the National Immigration Forum, the cost to detain an immigrant is $164 per day. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is currently requesting more funding for ICE operations. If the ICE were to jail only immigrants who have taken part in illegal acts, taxpayers would save $1.6 billion per year. The National Immigration Forum proposes that immigrants accused of crimes be detained and the rest be monitored.
According to the ICE, the annual number of deportations has been stable in the past few years: 370,000 in 2008; 390,000 in 2009; 393,000 in 2010; and 397,000 in 2011. An ICE spokesperson recently stated that that body is "Congressionally funded to remove 400,000 a year."
Illegal immigrants detained by federal officials are usually deported back to their home countries without being informed of their legal right to counsel or being put in touch with their home country consular officials. As punishment for unlawful presence in the United States, undocumented immigrants must return to their native countries to wait out bans lasting three to 10 years before applying for legal residency (assuming they have legal ways to immigrate, which many do not).
While there has been an absence of comprehensive federal immigration reform in recent years, it has been a frequent subject of state-level legislation. Many states have advanced laws similar to Arizona's anti-immigrant SB 1070, which in 2011 made it a state crime to be an undocumented immigrant. In late June 2012, the Supreme Court ruled against much of SB 1070, but it did uphold a provision allowing police officers to check the immigration status of people they detain.
Sources:
» Amnesty International. "Jailed Without Justice: Immigration Detention in the USA."
» Bernstein, Nina. "Officials Hid Truth of Immigrant Deaths in Jail." The New York Times, January 9, 2010.
» "Deportation flights to Mexico cost $51 million." Associated Press, August 10, 2008.
» Global Detention Project. "United States Detention Profile."
» National Immigration Forum. "The Math of Immigration Detention: Runaway Costs for Immigration Detention Do Not Add Up to Sensible Policies."
» POV. "Sin País."
» U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary. "Written Testimony of U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano for a House Committee on the Judiciary Hearing Titled 'Oversight of the Department of Homeland Security.'"
United States Repatriation Programs
In 2011, the United States and Mexico piloted a new program that flew detainees back to Mexico called the Mexican Interior Repatriation Program (MIRP). Unlike the former initiative, the MIRP involved mandatory flights managed by ICE--not the border patrol. According to ICE, the program operated 70 flights over 80 days in 2011 and resulted in 8,893 Mexican nationals being repatriated. Passengers included Mexicans with and without criminal convictions. The United States paid for flights back to Mexico City, and Mexico paid to return people to their hometowns. There were no reports of passengers being chained up or maltreated.
Publicity brought attention to the flights' steep cost of $724 per passenger and, consequently, there were few flights through much of 2012. However, in October 2012 a new pilot program called the Interior Repatriation Initiative (IRI) was launched, and it was officially signed in April 2013 by secretary of the interior Janet Napolitano and the government of Mexico. This new program will use chartered aircrafts to repatriate Mexican nationals from all areas of the United States.
Sources:
» U.S. Department of Homeland Security. "Secretary Napolitano Meets with Counterparts from Mexico."
» Immigration and Customs Enforcement. "United States, Mexico Resume Voluntary Interior Repatriation Program."
» National Immigration Forum. "Analyzing Border Enforcement Operations: Interior Repatriation Programs."
» Persad, Khara. "Repatriation Program for Mexican Immigrants Evolving." Inside Tucson Business, September 14, 2012.
» Washington Valdez, Diana. "US Repatriation Program to Mexico ends." El Paso Times, December 6, 2012.