Drahonice, North Bohemia, Nov 15 (CTK) – Migrants in the Czech Drahonice detention facility denounced Sunday the terrorist attacks in Paris on Friday and said they are interrupting their hunger strike out of compassion for the suffering of Europeans, in a statement that Marie Hermanova has passed to CTK.
Hermanova is a spokeswoman for the volunteers who work with the migrants.
Some 40 migrants, most of them Iraqis, went on hunger strike on Tuesday out of fear of being deported from the Czech Republic.
“We, migrants held in the detention facility in Drahonice, sharply denounce the criminal and cowardly act that the criminal group that calls itself Islamic State carried out,” the migrants said in their statement.
They expressed sympathy for the victims and wished quick recovery to the injured.
They wrote that they were also terrorised by the same crimes of the same group in their country and that is why they fled into security and peace in the countries of peace and democracy.
“At the same time, we announce that we are interrupting our hunger strike out of compassion for the families of the victims and the injured and out of respect for their pain,” the migrants wrote.
Only nine did not come to dinner on Saturday and only one left out Sunday´s lunch, foreigner police spokeswoman Katerina Rendlova has told CTK, adding that she considers the hunger strike ended.
Rendlova said the situation in the centre was calm this morning and that no problems have been registered in any other detention facility in the country.
Rendlova said hunger strike as a form of protest is often used in detention facilities, but it does not help the persons concerned.
The foreigner police enhanced patrolling the detention facilities after the terrorist attacks in Paris on Friday that claimed 129 lives and more than 300 people were injured.
Rendlova did not say whether the measures have been taken with regard to the migrants, or over possible attacks by Czech anti-Islamic radicals on the facilities.
The detention facility in Drahonice was a prison in the past. It has a capacity of 240 beds and it is exclusively destined for men.
Rendlova said there are 92 people in the facility now.
“They are not only migrants,” Rendlova said.
She said there are also Ukrainians and Belorussians whom the foreigner police have repeatedly detained because they worked illegally in the country.
