Dewael wants family deported

2 April 2007

BRUSSELS – Home Affairs Minister Patrick Dewael is appealing a decision by the court in Bruges to allow a Kazach family to stay. The family entered the country illegally in 2000. Dewael says the court ruling is “legal nonsense.” He stressed that a decision had already been taken by the Council of State and that the court was not authorised. “We are going to appeal,” Dewael said on Sunday.

Last week the court in Bruges temporarily suspended the planned deportation of the family on grounds of the children’s good school results. The court also suspended the deportation order ratified by the Council of State on 7 February 2002 until three months after the Ministry for Foreigners (DVZ) makes a decision on the family’s new applications for asylum. The applications date from 8 September 2005 and 4 January 2007.

Dewael says the court ruling is “legal nonsense.” “In this case the court is not authorised. The Council of State, which is authorised, declared the deportation order to be valid. The court in Bruges should have declared itself unauthorised to rule in the case and that is why we are going to appeal,” Dewael says.

Dewael says the Kazach family should have left the country a long time ago. “There are hundreds and thousands of people who do comply with this kind of decision and there are others who wrongfully think that they can draw rights from an illegal stay,” Dewael says.

It is unacceptable that the parents are trying to “use their children” to get resident permits. “I cannot work with that kind of reasoning,” he said.

Dewael reiterated that he does not think there is any support in Parliament for a general amnesty for people without legal papers. Nor does he want to send out the message that “illegality pays” and says he does not want to return to the situation years ago when more than 40,000 asylum applications were submitted each year. Less than 1,000 are submitted each month now.

Subject: Belgian news