Asylum seekers continue hunger strike

Detainees at an immigration centre are continuing to refuse food in a protest over delays in dealing with their cases.

A spokesman for about 40 men at Dungavel immigration detention centre, near Strathaven, Lanarkshire, says the protest will continue.

The men, who say some detainees have been held for more than a year, want the Home Office to hear their cases faster.

The detainees held at the former prison, which was opened as an immigration detention centre last year, began refusing meals on Tuesday.

Spokesman Eduardo Sanchez, 35, said: "We are not eating breakfast - I have no idea how long this will take, as long as necessary."

Some men have been using a shop to get things such as cigarettes, but deny they have been buying food.

Mr Sanchez, who has a nine-year-old son in Scotland, is appealing against his deportation to Peru.

The centre, owned by the Home Office Immigration Service, is managed by the Premier Prison Service, which is also responsible for running Scotland's only private jail, Kilmarnock Prison.

The facility does not house asylum-seekers but is for people being detained before deportation.

Premier Prison has said it will make sure detainees receive the best possible medical treatment if it becomes necessary. Scottish Socialist MSP Tommy Sheridan is backing the protests.

Story filed: 09:34 Wednesday 10th April 2002