Minor asylum seekers sleep on chairs in the IND office in Ter Apel

Since Tuesday, around 50 unaccompanied minor asylum seekers (AMV) have been staying at the Ter Apel application center at the office of the IND, the Immigration and Naturalization Service. There is no place for them elsewhere at the moment.

There are chairs in this room, but there is no mattress to sleep on, writes RTV North. Also, no guidance is available. However, the minors who stay there receive food and drink and can go to the toilet. There are no shower options.

There are now around 350 unaccompanied minors at Ter Apel. The other three hundred are staying in regular reception centers under surveillance. They all have a bed and access to sanitary facilities.

The Ter Apel registration center has been overcrowded for months. In recent days, hundreds of people have had to sleep outside.

Deputy Prime Minister Kaag called it “dehumanizing that people in a country like the Netherlands have to sleep outside”. Minister De Jonge (Public Housing) described the situation in Ter Apel as “indigestible”. “We will have to figure something out.”

Since yesterday, the international aid organization Médecins Sans Frontières has a team in Ter Apel providing care to asylum seekers who have to stay outside the gate due to the lack of reception places.

The team treated 80 people today, a spokesperson said. These include neglected wounds and skin infections.