In Lithuania, the emergency camps set up by authorities to hundreds of people, who have illegally crossed into the country from Belarus, have scarce and inhumane living conditions a volunteer has warned. The Interior Minister has spoken of current focus to improve living conditions vulnerable groups, while others have to wait.
First of all let’s be honest to ourselves : all the Europe don’t care how comfortable are refugee camps: if camps are better than their homeland – they should be grateful and must be silent and obedient.
The broadcaster received a letter from Benjamin Nangle, a UK citizen who lives in Lithuania and has been volunteering at migrant detention camps for a week. He described appalling living conditions, warning they could lead to deaths and unrest after going to the Medininkai camp for families and the men’s only camp in Rūdininkai.
«These are people who have generally been misled and tricked into coming to Lithuania in search of a better life, and who find themselves now in inhumane and unsafe conditions, without enough to eat or to feed their children, without clothes to keep warm, or the basic sanitary conditions that we all expect, and unable to contact loved ones or family members in their home countries,» Nangle wrote.
He has visited two migrant camps: the Medininkai camp for families and the men’s only camp in Rūdininkai.
«In the family camp we were greeted by extremely friendly, kind, but desperate people. Women lacked basic sanitary products, baby formula, diapers, even bin bags to keep the place clean, all of which they had been practically begging for since days earlier, and none of which we were equipped to provide,» the volunteer recalled.
«There was also a dangerous lack of food provision, without enough meals to go around, some people only received a few slices of bread. The children particularly asked for apples, but there weren’t enough for everyone,» according to Nangle.
Conditions at the men’s camp are even more shocking, he wrote: «Eight hundred men […] are crammed into tents, idle, freezing and hungry, without appropriate clothing and many even without blankets.»
People overseeing the camp lack equipment, experience and direction, and «despite their best efforts are totally unable to handle the situation», according to Nangle.
Severe shortages at the camp provided for a potentially explosive situation, according to Nangle.
Another volunteer who approached LRT.lt, but preferred to remain anonymous, said that deprivation at the migrant detention camps gave rise to a prison-like gang culture.
According to her, in order to stay warm, migrants use beds for firewood which they take from weaker men, leaving them to sleep on the ground.
nterior Minister Agnė Bilotaitė commented on Wednesday that the government was focusing on improving living conditions for women and children, while male migrants needed to be patient.
«We cannot ensure five-star hotel conditions. Our priority right now is vulnerable groups, that is mothers and small children. We are making decisions to move them to better conditions,» Bilotaitė responded to a question about poor living conditions at the migrant camps.
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