More than twenty young people who have started an asylum procedure in Belgium are officially missing. This is reported by aid organization Caritas, which is trying to track down the young people on behalf of Fedasil. They ended up on the street in Brussels due to a lack of shelter.
The reception crisis has been dragging on for months, which means that unaccompanied minors cannot always count on a reception place in the Fedasil network.
In November, for example, about 150 young people had to spend the night on the street, aid organization Caritas estimates.
24 of them are now officially missing, according to the organization. “The young people were seen for the last time in Brussels, at the Immigration Office,” says Laurence Bruyneel, coordinator at Caritas. “Three young people came to the hub, but then they disappeared from the radar.”
It concerns 24 young people from Congo, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Tanzania and Afghanistan. “No idea where they are at the moment, some may have traveled to other countries, others may have been picked up by gangs or have ended up in prostitution,” Bruyneel suspects.
‘Exceptional’
According to aid organizations, it happens more often that people on the run go missing, but it is less common after they have first started an asylum procedure.
Meanwhile, the search continues at Caritas. “The other aid organizations were asked to keep an eye on things,” it sounds. Fedasil has meanwhile drawn up a disappearance sheet for the missing young people.
This article is originally published on bruzz.be
