MIA Told For Whom Immigration Detention Facilities Are

The agency tries to assure Belarusians that there will be no Syrian refugees there.

The European Commission has decided to allocate 7 million Euros for the realization of the project "Helping Belarus Address the Phenomenon of Increasing Numbers of Irregular Migrants".

The project to be financed under the European Neighbourhood Instrument on the basis of the corresponding financing agreement, which is to be signed by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Belarus, the European Commission and the Office of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in the Republic of Belarus. Its draft has already been submitted to the Belarusian side for consideration.

" One of the areas of work to be performed under the project will be the establishment of centers of temporary detention of foreign citizens. It is important to note that we are talking only about foreigners, who were detained in our country as illegal migrants, there will be no Syrian refugees or other refugees from the EU in the centers," – tut.by has learnt from MIA.

It is planned, that illegal migrants are to be kept there during the necessary procedures related to the identification of the person and / or deportation. " To date, the Interior Ministry and the State Border Committee have no specialized facilities for keeping this category of citizens. Such citizens are kept in temporary detention facilities of the regional departments of internal affairs and State Border Committee."

"Apart from the establishment of the centers, it is intended to allocate the funds for facilitating the voluntary return of foreigners from Belarus to the States, which citizens they are, as well as for solving a number of other tasks," – the MIA added.

Let us remind, that it has become known on January 13, that the EU was going to allocate 7 million Euros to Belarus for the establishment of migrants accommodation centers (MAC). It was noted, that the centers, with a capacity to accommodate between 30 and 50 people, would be constructed "in line with best international and EU standards." As reported by the Western media, three categories of migrants would be kept in the MACs: refugees from Ukraine, Syria and person, who are in flight from the "economic crisis in Russia, which force many third-country nationals to look for new (job) opportunities in the EU" – including Chechen refugees.