They Say A Picture Can Paint A Thousand Words…

They say a picture paints a thousands words… Unfortunately I cannot take a picture of one of the worst examples of inhumanity I have witnessed so far in life so here is a thousand words to try and a paint a picture…

 

As you enter the police station of Kos, be sure your greeting will not be welcoming. You may even be lucky enough to bump into someone from Frontex, dressed like something from a sci fi film in tight black ops style uniform. You won’t get a smile but you will sure be intimidated by the weapons they are toting on their hip. The police station itself from outside looks like quite a grand old historical building but within it is run down with a feeling of a sleepy, small town local authority which in normal circumstances wouldn’t have huge amounts of crime to deal with.

 

As you walk through past the office you are faced with an open courtyard with a few bits of rubble lying around from an improvement which will probably never be made. You wonder where the cells are as you look around this small, dirty square, imagining there surely must be a door to a corridor somewhere to enter a building where people are being detained. But then you hear the voices, you see that the square is surrounded by openings in the walls, barred up and filled with faces.

 

Three cells can be found within this “prison” each only a few square metres wide. Within the cells conditions are almost indescribable. There is no access to clean water, no access to hygiene facilities. These “cells” keep the people locked inside but the bars leave them open to the elements, if there is heavy rain, the cells will be wet. If it is cold, the people are cold.

 
Then there is the number of people living in each tiny, dirty box. Up to 30 people can be found in one of these cells, up to 30 in a cell which would not be fit for half, or even a quarter of this number. People do not have beds to sleep on, just a few blankets and a cramped overcrowded impossible living situation.

 

When looking at the dirty, crumbling walls. When seeing the damp, dank, dark reality of these wholly unacceptable conditions it is almost impossible to imagine this is happening in modern day Europe. Back in October these cells hit the headlines for holding child refugees in such medieval conditions – Refugee crisis: ‘Orphan’ children locked up in ‘medieval’ prisons alongside adult criminals on Greek island of Kos – The Independent 14th October 2015

The conditions are worsening, the cells are filled beyond capacity now as everyone who enters Greece is effectively a prisoner.Thankfully children are no longer held in this appalling situation but vulnerable human beings are.

 

Food is a debatable issue. When the EU Turkey deal first came into action, everyone was unprepared, including the authorities. Access was granted to volunteers to provide basics like food and water. Although fundamentally everyone disagreed with the situation and didn’t want to participate in going into a prison , it was a situation where if no one did then those trying to survive this hell wouldn’t have food or something to drink. Therefor volunteers prepared and delivered food through the bars to the desperate people trapped inside. This all stopped around two weeks ago though when access to the prison was denied. Now no one can really see what is happening. There is no guarantee the people are receiving food of any nutritional value or enough to drink.

 
Day and night, for the indefinite number of days or weeks the people are held here before they are moved on to the next stage of deportation, the prisoners wear the same set of clothing they receive when they arrive on the island. When people arrive on the shores wet, volunteers are still able to give dry clothing before the people are locked up. Those clothes are all they have.

 
When you woke up this morning, did you have a shower? Did you take a fresh, clean pair of underwear from your drawer and choose your outfit for the day? Or have you been wearing the same set of clothing, unwashed for the last ten days? Clothing you have slept in, that you have lived in day in, day out?

 
The crime the prisoners committed to be subjected to this inhumanity – not being European.

 
The people locked up in Kos are trapped in these holding cells 24/7. There is no escape. No opportunity to see anything but the bars that hold them.

 
The holding cells of Kos police station are supposed to be for men. But this week, ten women where thrown into this disgusting mess. Forced to share a tiny box with men.

 
Medical care is basically non existent, MSF due to their position on the EU Turkey Deal refuse to enter any detention facility so the responsibility is up to the police… I wonder every day how long it will be before someone dies in these conditions.

 
There is one cell in particular where the barred window is so small, making the cell so dark, that all you can see is the hands of the inmates reaching out, you cannot even see the faces of those souls inside.

 
It makes me think of the RSPCA adverts about animal cruelty…bear with me on this. You know the adverts where a dog sits in a pool of its own excrement, in a surrounding of pure neglect. Or a group of abandoned kittens, squashed into a tiny cage, where there are so many in such a small space they cannot all survive and the sanitation is so horrific you almost feel like you can smell how terrible it would be through your TV set.

 
Well what is happening here is worse than any of these adverts. The smell is worse than anything you could ever imagine. Somebody would go to a jail for a very long time if they treated their animals like this.

 
But wait… WE ARE NOT TALKING ABOUT ANIMALS! WE ARE TALKING ABOUT HUMAN BEINGS!

 
Human beings are supposed to have rights but human rights most certainly do not apply here.

 

Human beings are being treated worse than animals and there is no consequence for those allowing this situation to continue. The people who should be arrested are those treating people like this, those who implemented a dirty deal without ensuring those detained would have access to basic human needs and rights.

 

But what can we do when no one is listening?

 

The prison of Kos is just one example of human rights violation currently being ignored daily in Greece and throughout Europe.

 

It is hard not to give in to the feeling of utter hopelessness when faced with such a hopeless situation.

 

When will this end? When will humanity start being human again?

 

Ferries Not Frontex

“Safe Passage” we blazoned on our banners, we spread across our social media, we shouted in the streets.

“Ferries not Frontex”

“Refugees Are Human Beings”

“Don’t Let Them Drown”

We campaigned, we protested, we wrote to the powers that be, we signed petitions, we exclaimed our outrage, our desperation, to anyone who would listen and more so to those that would not.

We filled the gaps the governments left, trying to provide basic humanitarian assistance to those making the journey across the Aegean. We watched the horrors unfold, we saw so many lives lost so unnecessarily.

 
The 45 minute ferry from Bodrum to Kos, only costing a few Euros, but only for those with the right passports, forever taunted us and those forced to climb into a dinghy and risk their lives crossing under cover of darkness for the hope of a better life.

 

But on the 4th of April ferries arrived on the islands. After a year of a crisis unfolding on Europe’s doorstep which allowed for thousands of people to drown in these waters, the ferries we always dreamed about arrived… But of course… They only brought only more misery.

 
At last the ferries arrived – but with Frontex. Ferries arrived to ship back those who made it to the islands in broken down old boats and dinghys to take them back to where they started in Turkey.

 
It almost feels like some kind of sick joke.

 
There is no information about what will become of those who have been taken back but this date marked the first of the deportations from both Lesvos and Chios with plans to be implemented to remove everyone who arrived to Greece after the 20th March.

 
“If we are sent back, we will kill ourselves,” is a phrase I have heard all too often by those who find themselves as pawns in the EU/Turkey game. It has been reported that already out of the first deportations there have been suicide attempts and one life has been lost.

 
I believe these numbers will grow.

 
Frontex are suggesting that nobody is seeking to claim asylum… I do not believe this for a millisecond. This is just proof that the system is not even considering asylum claims. Papers are somehow being “lost,” and people are simply being ignored and forced back.

 

You do not risk your life and make these journeys to give up and say, “Ok, fine, send me home.” Although numbers are lower, people are still arriving on the islands even though they know they have no chance to continue on or stay but everyone has the belief that they will somehow make it through. Even when there is no chance, desperate people still hold on to the dream. When they have made it so far and when there is nothing to go back to, you don’t just simply give up, you keep going.

 

I wonder in the end who will answer for the crimes against humanity we are witnessing in Europe right now. The blood of every life lost through this corrupt system, from suicide to the thousands who have drowned in the Aegean due to indifference and inaction, is on the hands of those who had the power to do something and didn’t. Those who had the power to be decent human beings and treat people with dignity and humanity and didn’t.

 

The direct deportations have not yet began on Kos, we still have people rotting in medieval jail cells and living in a camp only because the prison is too full. Yesterday a fellow volunteer shared that someone in the prison told him that the only water they are provided is the bottles we take into the cells and without this they resort to drinking from the toilet. Yesterday the police would not allow volunteers into the prison to deliver food or bottles of water…

 

If you treated an animal in the way the people are being treated here you would be arrested. How are human beings being allowed to be kept under such conditions?

 

Shame is not a strong enough word for the response of the EU. There is not a strong enough word.

 

Thousands of people remain living outdoors in the port of Piraeus and at the border in Idomeni, forgotten.

 
Protests are popping up all over the mainland and on the islands but still, as we have seen since this humanitarian crisis began, nobody listens.

 
What will happen next? Can it get any worse?

 

Every action has a consequence. The actions of Europe will not be forgotten. Our response now will shape our future and the way it is going we have a very bleak future ahead of us.

 

Every day I wake up and just for a little minute think maybe all of this is just a bad nightmare, but no, this is reality. 

Integrity.

How do you keep your head when all those around you are losing theirs?

 

Back in September, I had had enough of simply sitting around watching an unraveling humanitarian crisis unfold on the shores of Europe so I decided to try and do something. I had no idea what I could do, but I had time and I found some cheap flights and thought, why not? I could sit around my house becoming angrier and angrier or I could get on that plane, land on a Greek island and physically, actually, do something. Of course, I am not naive, my little actions were exactly that, just little actions in a mammoth crisis, but I knew that in the future I would not be able to look back on this dark time and know that I just sat by and did nothing.

 
I showed up not knowing what I could do, I arrived just as a human being who wanted to extend some humanity to other human beings. Not from some kind of them and us or “Oh those poor souls, let’s take pity on them, ” place but from a simple, “Hello, I’m here, what do you need,” place. I didn’t know what I could offer, but in the end I knew at least I could offer a smile.

 
Now… I do not even have that to offer.

 
When I first arrived, I was part of a movement of true solidarity. A movement of everyday people who had come together to stand side by side with those fleeing war and persecution to offer a helping hand to the next step of their journey. Greece was never the destination, simply a transition, and we did our best to provide the best support during that transition.

 
Now… there is no destination, there is only detention, now there is only deportation.

 
Integrity is a word that has meant a lot to me during this time. In a physically and emotionally trying experience, when I could control nothing else, I could control my integrity. During the months I have spent in Kos, it has been essential to me to hold up my own personal principals in my involvement in this crisis. There are so many people, just like me, individual volunteers who have arrived on the shores of Greek islands, and as individuals it has been up to us to set our own principals. We may have joined organisations but in the end we are all individuals with our own ideas, opinions and motivations.

 
I had a few basic principals, for example that I would never take a picture of a vulnerable person because, I personally, do not believe it is my place, I never wanted anyone to feel like they were some kind of exhibition, I never wanted to cross that line or break that trust of being simply on a level with someone. This for me was important, but I understand the other opinions on this and other people’s motivations to use pictures.

 
My personal principals were just that, personal. I never ever wanted any press or publicity that painted the “Small-town Scottish Girl Goes To Help The Helpless,” which was sold to me on many occasions by a variety of news outlets, locally and nationally. This was my personal principal. Of course, I understand the opposing idea that if I had gone about things this way maybe I could have raised more awareness but also I wouldn’t have been able to sleep at night taking credit and proclaiming myself as some kind of hero out of other people’s suffering. I have only ever been doing what humans should be doing for other humans. But I understand those who do feel the need to share their stories like this, but for me, I cannot and I have tried as much as possible to maintain the integrity of myself throughout this journey.

 
But now… I do not know where my integrity stands.

 
Since the EU deal, we are not a bunch of well meaning everyday people gathered on Greek shores offering support to those on their transition into Europe. Now we are a bunch of confused, angry individuals, facing impossible decisions on a moral level.

 
Do you cooperate with authorities in an inhumane system of deportation against human rights and international law so that people are not left cold, wet and starving? Or do you do what all the agencies and NGO’s have done like UNHCR, MSF, Save The Children etc and walk away leaving vulnerable people cold, wet and starving?

 
I agree with the position the agencies have taken. I understand completely why they have refused to be a part of this system of detention. But without them… the people are left with no help in their time of need.

 
To walk into a prison and push food to cold hands through bars under the watchful eye of the police feels wrong in every way. To be faced with the choice of whether to leave someone wet on a beach to possibly have to walk miles to where they will be detained or to transport them and offer them dry clothes before they are detained seems almost impossible. I want to help, I want to do something, even a tiny thing to offer a glimpse of humanity in a system where there is none but how can I do this and sleep at night. How can I participate in something I find so rotten, so fundamentally wrong on every level?

 
If the authorities want to take this course of action I feel like I must also walk away… but as I said about the agencies… if everyone walks away it is the people who suffer.

 

The authorities are not prepared or they are unwilling to be. They will not feed those in detention. They will not provide dry clothing. They, apparently, cannot provide transportation from the beaches. So where does that leave the volunteers and those on the ground who have been supporting arrivals in these ways for the last months when we can only provide these basic things under police instruction and in cooperation with them as they arrest vulnerable people to be deported.

 
It feels almost like a blackmailing of goodwill. You can help, but only if you help us do our job… What is this?! It’s disgusting.

 
For me, I cannot and will not have any part in transporting anyone to detention, no matter how much the police make me feel like I am letting down the vulnerable. Once arrested, OK, maybe I guess I could provide clothing and food and some kind of human connection, this I guess I can do but it does not make me feel good. It still makes me part of this horrific system, it makes me complicit in the inhumanity whilst simply trying to provide basic humanitarian support. The fact I even have to think about this makes my skin crawl.

 
I am very lost in all this. My integrity does not know up from down. I do not know what to do?

 

I want to walk away, I want run onto to those beaches and scream and shout and block Frontex and the authorities from treating people like this, I want nothing to do with this but I want everything to do with this because I cannot simply just turn my back.

 
I have been here for many months now, I have seen so many things, I have shared in so many moments of people’s lives. I have now seen what could have been as friends who arrived on a dinghy on these shores now have a new life in Europe. I know what could be if we all just extended decent human behaviour. But that is all long gone. All the hope is gone.

 
Now… all we have is this.

 
There is no humanity left here. And for those individuals, like me, who are still just trying to provide it, are we really doing anyone any good? Are we now part of the problem?

 

I know the questions I have cannot be answered by anyone other than myself. This is all a discussion I must have with my morality, with my principals, with my integrity in this crisis.

 
But for now… All I know is I am not the same person I was in September, I am changed, but I had hoped for better where now if I participate in this I fear it will be for the worst.

 
When will this stop? When will we wake up and realise there is no them and us, there is only us!

When Words Fail Me…

In keeping with the general style of this blog since September last year, it is the middle of the night and I can’t sleep so I thought staring blankly at a computer screen, desperately searching for the words to make sense of what has happened over the last 48 hours, would help. Surprisingly it is not though as this time I have stared blankly at this screen longer than I ever have before because there really are no words, there is no way to make sense of the final nail in the coffin of the idea of human rights.

 
Today I was watching a photography exhibition being prepared to show the journey, the stories of this little island since last year. I recognised so many people, so many moments, so many memories. Yes, not all of these memories I care to think about too much, but what stood out for me as I gazed at these little moments caught in time was the humanity. The times where people, even in the most heartbreaking circumstances were offered the hope of human kindness. When people were treated as individuals, regardless of nationality and without categorization. When people were just people, refugees, volunteers, everyone in this situation together, in solidarity with each other simply as people.

 

Now I find myself unsure how I can still be that person I was back in those times. How do you look into someones eyes when you know you can offer no hope, no humanity, just simply some dry clothes before they are sent off to prison. I have had to do this now since certain nationalities began being imprisoned a few weeks ago and I have seen where they end up. The kind of place you imagine only exists in nightmares but you know you are awake because the smell reminds you that you are not dreaming about this hell but people are truly living it… well not living, it is not living, surviving.

 

Now everyone faces this fate. Everyone will be detained. Everyone will be deported. Men. Women. Children.

 

Since first arriving on this little island I don’t think I have ever felt so hopeless…

---

 

Fast Forward 24 hours from when I began writing this post… I met the first families arriving on these shores which will not be given the chance or the rights for a better, safer life. Huddled around a makeshift fire on a remote part of a beach, somewhere I have never seen arrivals, I guess somewhere they thought they could arrive without authorities realising, but of course they did.

One in one out. The selling point of this dirty deal was that it would supposedly stop people risking their lives in the Aegean? Of course not. All it means is those who survive this journey do not have any right to seek safety here, they will simply be sent back to Turkey. As they are sent back, a completely unrelated person will be relocated to somewhere in Europe (if the countries involved keep up their end of the bargain.)
What is this? Some kind of human swap shop? We are talking about people. Vulnerable people fleeing war and persecution.
We have begged for a solution for so long. We never wanted people to get into boats and make this dangerous crossing. We begged for a humane response, safe passage. But there was no humane response from the powers that be, nobody took responsibility. We begged and we begged for a solution to the ever rising death toll in the Aegean but our cries fell on deaf ears. All we wanted was a solution. This is no solution.

I feel more and more like I am becoming a cog in the machine. I feel like any part I play in this is enabling the detention and deportations. All I want is to continue to offer a glimpse of humanity under such inhumane circumstances but I don’t know how this possible.
I want to close my eyes, shut the door, runaway… but if we all do this then what becomes of the people caught in this trap. All the agencies are reacting by walking away, stopping activities, refusing to have anything to do with the disgusting situation. But without agencies, all we have is the military and authorities following orders from on high, orders without the slightest consideration of human rights.

What happens next I do not know. Nobody knows.

All I wish is that the people stop climbing in rubber dinghys, but I do not believe for a second this will happen. I have already seen with my own eyes this hasn’t happened.

I know this post is very I, I, I about my personal feelings in somewhat a selfish way when really this is not at all about me. It is about human beings who are seeking refuge. Human beings that are being treated like numbers, statistics, pawns in political game.

For now all I can do is take a step back and spend some time with my moral compass.

I will try to construct a more eloquent post about this situation at some point but for now I am really struggling to find words. Then I switch on the news and burst the little bubble of Kos and see what is happening in Brussels and… well… again I am lost for words. How did we end up here? Where do we go from here? Is this just our world now? A constant cycle of terror and mourning?

 

Hope is important, but I do not know where to find it.