Junior justice minister Fred Teeven is facing questions in parliament after the death of a failed Somali asylum seeker in Amsterdam and serious injuries to a second man after a fall.

Opposition MPs are calling on Teeven to organise ‘bed, a bath and bread’ for a group of around 100 asylum seekers who have lost their right to stay in the Netherlands and are currently living rough in squatted buildings in the capital.

GroenLinks leader Bram van Ojik has urged Teeven to take immediate steps to ensure ‘refugees who have exhausted every legal course open to them do not have to live in inhuman circumstances’, the Volkskrant said.

Scandalous

ChristenUnie MP Joël Voordewind describes the situation as ‘scandalous’ and has urged the government and city council to find accommodation for the refugees. ‘I do not know why it is taking so long,’ he said, pointing out that the council has allocated €1.6m to solving the problem.

Amsterdam’s mayor Eberhard van der Laan points out that the council is not allowed to help the refugees by law. ‘We have done what we can,’ a spokesman told the Volkskrant on Wednesday. ‘National government has to solve the problem’

The homeless Somali asylum seeker died in hospital after ending up in a coma following a fight with several others at an abandoned garage in Amsterdam where they have been living for several months.

The man is one of a group of around 100 refugees who have lost their right to stay in the Netherlands but are either refusing to leave or don’t have proper paperwork to return home.

On Monday, an Iraqi man was taken to hospital after falling through a balustrade in another building where a group of failed refugees were living. He is in intensive car with head and back injuries.

Appeals

The group of refugees are no longer entitled to council accommodation because they have lost their appeals to be allowed to stay in the Netherlands.

For the past two years they have moved in to various empty properties in the city, including a church, a prison and old offices.
Warning

The Dutch human rights board warned earlier this summer that the situation in the garage was threatening to get out of hand. ‘Take action before someone dies,’ the board is quoted as saying by the Parool newspaper.