Three more arrested after asylum center attack
Posted by africanpress on July 29, 2008
Police were holding three more Chechen men on Monday after they allegedly returned to an asylum center south of Oslo that was the target of an attack last week. A total of eight Chechens are now charged, while several Kurdish men involved in the attack face deportation.
Two of those caught in the attack on the asylum center said the Chechens went from room to room, beating Kurds with clubs and other weapons. PHOTO: SCANPIX  Several residents were prevented from returning to their rooms, and many were in despair. PHOTO: KYRRE LIEN/SCANPIX |
Police continue to patrol the grounds of the Nordbybråten asylum center in Våler, after conflicts among residents led first to a brawl and then an attack by as many as 40 Chechen men from outside the center.
Eight persons were being held early Monday, but six were later released by a local court. The assault charges against them remain, and the two others face a custody hearing Tuesday morning.
Newspaper Aftenposten reported over the weekend that the violence apparently stemmed from a fight on Wednesday between Kurdish and Chechen women living at the center. Two Chechen women reportedly were annoyed that a fellow Kurdish asylum seeker allowed her two-year-old child to run around the center with shoes that made noise.
The Chechen women complained that their own children were being kept awake, and a fight broke out between the Chechens and the Kurds. Another refugee from central Africa attempted to break them up, but then one of the Chechen women called her brothers who lived in Oslo. They headed for the center.
Meawhile, some Kurdish men confronted and beat one of the Chechen women. That inflamed the other Chechens, and on Thursday night several arrived at the center, broke in and attacked any Kurdish refugees they could find, both men, women and children. It took around an hour before police arrived, “much too long,” according to one resident from Liberia.
Tensions have long been high at the center, which houses many residents due to be deported because their asylum applications have been rejected. Frustrations can run high, and the center at Våler is relatively large, housing up to 250 persons from all over the world.
Many have come arrived directly from wars in their homelands, they have different religious backgrounds, living conditions are crowded and stress levels high.
The combination of many people with little to do, few staff members, crowded conditions and fresh memories of violence back home can lead to more violence at the asylum center, warns Berit Berg, a researcher affiliated with the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (Norges Teknisk-Naturvitenskapelige Universitetet, NTNU).
Other refugees from Chechnya who earlier won asylum in Norway worry that the violence last week can spark new prejudice and hurt their reputation. “There’s no reason why Chechens and Kurds should be fighting,” said Mouslim Kourakaev of a Chechen youth group in Oslo.
Other Chechens said they don’t condone the violence, but understand it. “In our culture it’s completely unacceptable for anyone to touch a woman they don’t know,” said Ibja-Shapi Shaihi, who joined around 50 other Chechens in an Oslo park on Sunday. He blamed the Kurds for setting off the brawl.
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Korir.API/Aftenposteneng
