Government bans nudity and gynecological examination to determine the age of young immigrants

The Council of Ministers on Tuesday approved a bill that fully regulates the new procedure for assessing judicial age, a process that is particularly relevant to young immigrants in cases where a person has no documentation or it is impossible to determine age otherwise. As the Minister of Justice Pilar Lop explained at the press conference, the new text will be banned, for example, “full nudity or gynecological examination” to determine the age.

For the Minister, this is a “preliminary leap” to guarantee the rights and dignity of young people who are undergoing the above procedure, and this is crucial in the case of immigrant minors, as long as they are considered minors under 18 years of age. Depending on their age, the state is obliged to give them special protection. Lop insisted that “all invasive tests to determine if a person is an adult will be completed.”

After the approval of the preliminary draft in the Congress, the whole process, Lope explained, will be carried out on the basis of “juvenile hearing” and “principles of juvenile dignity”. “This rule is much more guaranteed than the procedure used so far and has greater legal certainty,” he said. Thus, the process is administrative in nature and will be of a judicial nature, with “respect for the rights of young people” and “legal guarantees”.

The new evaluation procedure will be carried out in a “thoughtful and holistic” way. “The juvenile will always be heard,” said the minister, who also wanted to say that “always” “free legal aid” would help the procedure. “Within a maximum of 25 days, the procedure should be resolved with a sentence that will be entered in the civil registry and will have full force,” he said.