Current Events > Cute Chinese student overstays visa due to covid, is thrown in detention center.

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UnfairRepresent
02/16/21 6:39:46 PM
#1:


80/80

A Chinese international student said she has been left traumatised after she reported herself to Danish authorities due to a visa overstay and was subsequently placed at Ellebk, a detention centre for people without legal right to be in the country.

Bingzhi Zhu, a graduate student of Environment and Development at the University of Copenhagen, was scheduled to finish her studies in August 2020 but faced delays due to the Covid-19 pandemic and ill health so was given permission to hand in her thesis in May this year.

When she realised on December 30th that her study visa was about to expire (on December 31st), she attempted to contact the Danish immigration services Agency for International Recruitment and Integration (SIRI).

Under visa rules, she was also required to submit a statement from the University of Copenhagen. Because the authorities were closed for the public holiday, she called the police and was advised to wait.
I tried to contact SIRI through email and phone call but they were on holiday and until today [February 11th, ed.] I still havent received any email from SIRI, Zhu told The Local. She also called the police in early January after her visa expired to report the issue.

On January 5th, police were called to the Absalon Hotel, where she was renting a student room. She was subsequently arrested for overstaying her visa and, ultimately, detained at the controversial Ellebk centre before eventually being deported from Denmark.

In written communication with The Local, Zhu described several instances of harsh treatment and possible discrimination at Ellebk, a detainment facility that was last year slammed in a report by the Council of Europe's Committee for the Prevention of Torture.

Ellebk houses migrants who are under arrest based on Denmark's immigration laws. After being apprehended by police, she was taken to the Vestre Fngsel prison and later admitted to psychiatric departments at Amager and Bispebjerg hospitals. After a series of interviews with police and psychiatric consultations she was eventually taken to Ellebk on January 29th.

Later, she was placed in an isolation cell without warm clothes and was verbally humiliated, threatened and pushed by staff, according to her account.

Zhu, who says she has no criminal record in Denmark or China, told The Local she has suffered with depression, in part due to the circumstances in which she found herself in Denmark due to the pandemic. But she was not medicated at any time after being detained by police, she said.

Im a 24-year-old graduate student who paid a huge amount of tuition fees in Denmark, but I have now been in prison, a psychiatric centre and at a deportation centre, she said. She called Ellebk a jail and a hell.

Everyone in Denmark should know what happens here. I would rather be in prison or on the psychiatric hospital ward, she said.

In social media posts describing her treatment at Ellebk, Zhu describes several incidences of possible discrimination or humiliating treatment by some of the staff. The Local has been in contact with Zhu to confirm her account of the events.

These include being pushed by staff without provocation; a refusal by staff to use Chinese inmates names, instead referring to them as China 1 and China 2; and isolation without being given warm clothes or a Bible she had requested.

She told The Local that other staff, including medical staff, some female guards and three male guards, were nice.

An image of an information leaflet given to Zhu at Ellebk outlines rules and daily routines for detained persons at the facility. The leaflet is in Danish with a few lines translated in handwritten English.

The Local has contacted the Danish prison service (Kriminalforsorgen) and the University of Copenhagen to request comment. This article will be updated with responses if we receive them. It should be noted that authorities cannot comment on individual cases due to data protection rules.

Annika Rckle, who studied with Zhu on international programmes at the University of Copenhagen, said she was appalled at her classmates treatment by Danish authorities, events she described as traumatic.

It is unacceptable that Denmark operates Ellebk in the first place, and I'm truly shocked that my friend and fellow student was met with such force from the authorities when her thesis was delayed due to the pandemic, she said via email.

Bingzhi is an incredibly fun, energetic and outgoing person. Her bubbly personality and great sense of curiosity means she easily connects with people and finds friends wherever she goes, Rckle said of her fellow student.

I hope that Bingzhi will be able to graduate and I expect the University of Copenhagen to provide every support possible to make that happen, she also said.

Kristian Hegaard, the justice spokesperson and spokesperson for immigration with the Social Liberal (Radikale Venstre) party, last week submitted an official parliamentary question to the immigration minister, Mattias Tesfaye, over the issue.

In the written question, Hegaard asks whether the minister considers it to be fair that a young Chinese student who was only in Denmark to study can end up in Ellebk as a result of an expired visa, a place that has been strongly criticised by the Council of Europes torture committee for prison-like conditions?


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UnfairRepresent
02/16/21 6:40:03 PM
#2:




Tesfaye responded by saying he could not comment on the specifics of Zhus case but had asked ministry officials to look into what had taken place.

I can say that my general view is that you should leave the country if you dont have the right to be here. That is self-explanatory, he said.

He added that he was very satisfied that authorities can detain people at Ellebk if needed, for example to prevent them from going underground if they are not in the country legally.

If the authorities have the opportunity to make a smaller intervention, they should of course do that, he also said. The minister said he would not intervene in Zhus case personally.

Asked by Hegaard whether he agreed that students with expired visas should not be sent to Ellebk, Tesfaye said that I dont think you can generally say that Ellebk is not meant for students because people who enter Denmark on study visas can stay once their permits have expired.

He noted that the decision to detain a person who is not in Denmark legally is always taken by a judge and said that, as far as he was aware, there had been no administration in breach of the law in the case in question or in other cases. The exchange between the two lawmakers can be viewed via the video link on the Danish parliament's website.

Hegaard told The Local it was important that international students come to Denmark to study and that their presence is beneficial to the country.

He said that people without legal right to stay in Denmark must leave under the law but, given that Zhu is a student and had contacted police herself, her treatment appeared out of proportion.

"You don't call the police if you're going to go underground," he said.

Authorities can use milder measures, such as confiscation of passports, in response to foreign nationals who breach immigration laws.

I dont think the minister gave an entirely good answer, I can understand the minister cant speak about the specific case but I would have liked to hear more about why a student can be put in Ellebk in circumstances like Zhus, Hegaard said in reference to the responses given by Tesfaye in parliament.
Tesfaye was not available for comment on the matter.

In early 2020, the Council of Europe's Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) said Ellebk was one of the worst facilities of its kind in Europe.

The centre in north Zealand was censured for poor treatment of residents who have breached immigration rules but are not criminals.

In our view it is unacceptable to keep people in (prison)-like conditions and furthermore with (poor) sanitary conditions and bad hygiene, Hans Wolff, the leader of a delegation which visited Ellebk in April last year, told broadcaster TV2 at the time.

There are a lot of reasons why Denmark is proud of its human rights (record), but when you come to these places and you find such appalling conditions then one might question either the capability of Denmark to do it better or maybe the will of Denmark to do it in such a bad way, he added.

It is not compatible with human rights to keep people under such bad conditions in immigration detention centres, Wolff also said.

Rckle questioned whether her friends treatment was a breach of human rights.

I wonder if Bingzhi is the first international student this has happened to and I doubt that she will be the last. International students from outside the EU are paying tuition fees to study in Denmark, receive no SU [state student grant, ed.] and risk being treated with no regards to their human rights when visa issues occur, she said.

Full Article: https://www.thelocal.dk/20210216/denmark-imprisons-international-student-at-migrant-facility-after-visa-overstay



Well that's pretty damn fucked up.

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Prismsblade
02/16/21 6:42:17 PM
#3:


Track em, find em, deport em.

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UnfairRepresent
02/16/21 6:44:06 PM
#4:


Prismsblade posted...
Track em, find em, deport em.
Shut the fuck up.

She literally did nothing wrong.


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Zikten
02/16/21 6:50:33 PM
#5:


Damn. I usually think of Nordic nations as being cream of the crop in terms of morality and human rights and all that. This is disappointing. I'd expect this to happen in America but not in Denmark
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Lairen
02/16/21 6:52:00 PM
#6:


Hows her ass?

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Prismsblade
02/16/21 7:11:44 PM
#7:


UnfairRepresent posted...
Shut the fuck up.

She literally did nothing wrong.
You wouldnt have given two shits about this woman if she wasn't hot so fuck off with this moral garbage.


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Dark_SilverX
02/16/21 7:13:15 PM
#8:


3rd post nailed it.

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NeonOctopus
02/16/21 7:13:49 PM
#9:


Fuck, I love Chinese chicks >_>

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AtelierRyza3462
02/16/21 7:16:13 PM
#10:


I thought only America enforced immigration laws...
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UnfairRepresent
02/16/21 7:22:23 PM
#11:


Dark_SilverX posted...
3rd post nailed it.
No it didn't.

She didn't break any laws or do anything wrong. She did everything right and was humiliated and abused for it.

You're just being flat out racist for wanting to punish that

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Zikten
02/16/21 7:24:54 PM
#12:


UnfairRepresent posted...

No it didn't.

She didn't break any laws or do anything wrong. She did everything right and was humiliated and abused for it.

You're just being flat out racist for wanting to punish that

I bet that guy didn't even read the article so I wouldn't worry too much about his opinion
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SaccharineSmile
02/16/21 7:25:06 PM
#13:


She broke the law so guess face the consequences really

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Zikten
02/16/21 7:26:19 PM
#14:


SaccharineSmile posted...
She broke the law so guess face the consequences really

She actually didn't. Or at least not on purpose. She tried to stay within the law but a combination of Covid and the Denmark government not giving her a good reply caused this mess. Read the article
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R1masher
02/16/21 7:28:58 PM
#15:


Oh, she was cute

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UnfairRepresent
02/16/21 7:30:06 PM
#16:


SaccharineSmile posted...
She broke the law so guess face the consequences really
She did not break the law

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Dark_SilverX
02/16/21 7:32:22 PM
#17:


Zikten posted...
I bet that guy didn't even read the article so I wouldn't worry too much about his opinion
read it. it appeared her time was up :(

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SaccharineSmile
02/16/21 7:33:30 PM
#18:


Zikten posted...
She actually didn't. Or at least not on purpose. She tried to stay within the law but a combination of Covid and the Denmark government not giving her a good reply caused this mess. Read the article

so she still broke a law/rule regardless?


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Zikten
02/16/21 7:34:23 PM
#19:


Dark_SilverX posted...

read it. it appeared her time was up :(

It was technically but covid prevented her from graduating before that happened. And then she was trying to figure out what her options were and the government didn't give her a proper and timely answer
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Zikten
02/16/21 7:35:09 PM
#20:


And none of that excuses throwing her in the worst prison in Denmark over a minor crime
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UnfairRepresent
02/16/21 7:40:05 PM
#21:


SaccharineSmile posted...
so she still broke a law/rule regardless?
No

Covid pushed her graduation further along. They agreed to let her stay until she got it. She went to the government to tell them that her visa wouldn't last that long and they threw her into hell for it.

And it's sick that you guys are defending that

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SaccharineSmile
02/16/21 7:45:32 PM
#22:


UnfairRepresent posted...
No

Covid pushed her graduation further along. They agreed to let her stay until she got it. She went to the government to tell them that her visa wouldn't last that long and they threw her into hell for it.

And it's sick that you guys are defending that

so in that country when your visa expires (which hers was about to?) they either deport you or send you to jail?


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Dark_SilverX
02/16/21 7:46:40 PM
#23:


SaccharineSmile posted...
so in that country when your visa expires (which hers was about to?) they either deport you or send you to jail?
i think TC trollin :/

it breaks my heart

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pick4six
02/16/21 7:49:39 PM
#24:


If it was a Danish citizen arrested in China everyone would be crying about how China is evil, kinda hate double standard tbh

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UnfairRepresent
02/16/21 8:15:06 PM
#25:


SaccharineSmile posted...
so in that country when your visa expires (which hers was about to?) they either deport you or send you to jail?
Yup.

She informed them that her Visa was going to expire but due to Covid her graduation was pushed back and she's been allowed to stay. The authorities told her to wait, then threw her in a serious prison and treated her like shit for not breaking the law and doing everything right.

And you're defending that.

She literally did nothing wrong

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St0rmFury
02/16/21 8:19:28 PM
#26:


I have tagged a few users ITT as racists.
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