An Iranian woman spends 48 hours in the Corbenarrieu detention center, near Toulouse
Farideh does not wear a veil, she is wearing a light-colored jogging. She has just spent two days at the Cornebarrieu administrative detention center, northwest of Toulouse. She fled Iran two months ago, traveling to Italy, where she obtained a visa. It was with a Luxembourg passport which was not in order that she arrived in France, in Chambéry, in Savoie, this Sunday, January 15. When she got off the plane, at the airport, she was arrested by the police, placed in police custody, and finally escorted to the detention center in Cornebarrieu, in Haute-Garonne, where there was room.
Farideh arrives at the Palace of Justice, for a hearing before the judge of freedoms and detention, this Wednesday, in handcuffs. This 38-year-old woman is under an obligation to leave French territory. After spending 48 hours in detention, the judge must say if she can be released. Farideh is scared, it’s the first time she’s left Iran. This 38-year-old woman explains – a Persian translator is present – that she is divorced, her ex-husband beat her, he broke her nose, she has not seen her children for 5 years, he obtained the keep. She lived with her parents, her brother and sister were arrested after talking against the regime. His sister was eventually released on bail. Her parents are under pressure from the Islamic regime, which is now looking for her. Farideh hopes to reach London, where her current partner lives, and seek asylum in Britain.
“I prefer to be repeated in France rather than return to Iran”
Farideh’s lawyer, Maître Alexandre Mazéas, pleads for his release, he points to numerous irregularities in his arrest: “my client has nothing to do in the detention centre. And it hasn’t escaped your notice that she belongs to the freedom movement in Iran. She risks, if she returns there, incarceration, the women who have been raped, tortured in prison“. Farideh, she says: “I prefer to be moved here, rather than return to Iran“.
At the end of the hearing, the judge of freedoms and finally declared Farideh free. The Cornebarrieu neighbors association will help him find temporary accommodation.
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Farideh is the second Iranian to be imprisoned in Toulouse
Another Iranian woman stayed at the Cornebarrieu detention center last November. Supported by the association The circle of neighbors of the Cornebarrieu detention center, she was finally able to join part of her family in Dublin, Ireland, where she applied for asylum, her obligation to leave the territory was abandoned by the prefecture. Which makes Alain Cwiklinski, a member of the association, say: “in three months it is the second woman who finds herself locked up, it is terrible all the same. We must protect Iranian women.”
“The Minister of Interior should have issued orders to the prefects for Iranian women to be treated properly, even if they do not have a passport. We are still a little ashamed of our country.”
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Maître Alexandre Mazéas, specialized in the law of foreigners, explains that “these cases of Iranian women placed in detention centers are not very common but extremely shocking”. For this lawyer “The government is completely hypocritical. Emmanuel Macron assured his support for the Iranian opposition, received activists, motivated their revolution, but the Minister of the Interior does nothing to protect Iranian women who arrive in France. “
Me Mazéas recalls that, in the case of Farideh, the authorities took less than 48 hours to notify the Iranian consulate in France, in order to obtain a pass and put Farideh on a plane.