Amnesty International call on Spain’s Government to investigate human rights violations that occur

The report states that many of the children, who enter the facilities under the protection and care of government, are subject to penalties (tied, gagged) admitted to solitary confinement and medication is forced

Amnesty International call on Spain’s Government to investigate human rights violations that occur in child protection centres

The organization collects reports of children who have lived in these facilities, in which there are juveniles who have personality disorders or have experienced social hardship, and conducts research focused on three communities: Andalusia, Catalonia and Madrid, which houses 55 percent of them.

The report states that many of the children, who enter the facilities under the protection and care of government, are subject to penalties (tied, gagged) admitted to solitary confinement and medication is forced.

"Minors who enter these facilities are totally defenceless, because no one knows how many there are and how many centres the government and private companies manage making it more difficult to perform independent investigations," said the director of Amnesty International in Spain , Esteban Beltran.

"They gave me tranquilizers continuously, entered me in a punishment cell, I was tied to the bed, they put tape on my mouth to keep me from screaming, punched and beat me and sometimes I wake up sitting in a chair, to which I had been tied up for twelve hours "said Sara, an ex detainee.

Her attorney, Jose Antonio Bosch, has highlighted the paradox that most of these girls are taken to these sites "because their mothers or families can not afford to keep them" and when they are 18 years, "they are returned, without education and without social networks, completely defenceless." "the State have an obligation to ensure the integrated development of children, helping their families so they can recover their children back from these centres," said the lawyer, who lamented about the legal helplessness which children and their families have against administrative decisions.

Amnesty recalled that the Ombudsman, in his latest report, and several autonomous defenders have denounced these situations, but authorities have done practically nothing.

It has therefore announced that there will be demonstrations, particularly in the three communities studied, "to ensure that these children have the protection they deserve. Of the 58 known sites, three are public management and the rest are private, the organization said.



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