The acting Ombudsman of Spain, Francisco Fernández Marugán, has recommended the General Department of Foreign Affairs and Borders to give instructions so the system of registration for the asylum requests is established in the Foreign Detention Facilities (CIE) and therefore fulfills the unitary Law of Common Administrative procedure.
The complains received in the institution highlight the difficulties to request international protection in the CIE and report that some applicants were thrown out without getting support to access the procedure.
At the CIE of Madrid, the inmates enter their letters of application for international protection in a mailbox and have to wait for the opening of it in order to start the procedure. Thus, there have been cases in which the opening of the mailbox has occurred after the expulsions have taken place or the return of the applicants.
The Ombudsman points out that this system does not comply with the procedural regulations and prevents inmates from having access to the international protection procedure since their wish to request it is not recorded and they do not receive any receipt that proves their request.
The Institution recalls that the Asylum Law does not establish a procedure for the registration of applications for international protection in the CIE and because of the absence of a regulation, publication pending since 2009, it is bound to govern by the Law of Common Administrative procedure.
Furthermore, he points out that the lack of access to the procedure for applying for international protection of the inmates of the CIE also violates the European Union’s norms and the applicable international treaties on the matter and may endanger the life and integrity of these people.
In the opinion of the Ombudsman, while there is no specific regulation to register applications for international protection, the General Department of Foreign Affairs and Borders must issue instructions so that these requests are processed immediately, registering the application and delivering a copy of it to the inmate so that the rights entailed by the condition of the applicant are guaranteed, among others, the suspension of the expulsion and return procedures are guaranteed.
For this reason the Ombudsman has recommended establishing in the CIE a system for registering asylum applications with all he guarantees established by the current legislation.
