Another deadly winter for refugees in Europe- how can we protect children in migration?

More deaths in the English channel between France and the UK, 18 Afghan refugees found dead in an abandoned lorry in Bulgaria last month and as I write this the previous day we hear about the tragic news of 62 people who have died after a shipwreck off the coast of Italy. For most of us, winter makes our life slightly harder, costs us more in heating, however for refugees on the move, bad weather significantly heightens the risk of death.

The routes refugees are forced to take to get to safety are incredibly dangerous and mass deaths are the most visible manifestation of this danger, although the overwhelming majority of the time we never hear about this danger. In recent months I’ve worked with two sisters in Greece, whose mother died in the same shipwreck they narrowly survived, only for them to be told more than a week later after recovering from their own injuries what had happened. Last month, when in France and planning a trip to refugee camps in Calais and Dunkirk, two people were shot in one of the camps, with one person sadly killed. I’ve worked with countless children who have stories of family members and friends who are killed in railway accidents, die of food poisoning after having to live of eating plants in forests in eastern Europe or freeze to death on mountain paths crossing borders into and out of Iran. We can only assume a similar fate of those removed from detention in Libya, never to be seen or heard of again. This is all without considering the harm which is caused through trafficking, exploitation and other abuse which although is severe, fortunately it is rarely fatal.

These tragic mass death events may be reported on and grab our attention, at least for a day or two, but there are definitely more people, including children, dying on these routes. If these deaths are reported on, often words such as ‘accident’ are used, inferring these deaths couldn’t have been avoided, that there is an inevitability of these deaths.

However, if we consider the most recent tragedy last weekend when 62 men, women and children have died in the Mediterranean off the coast of Italy. For those of us in this sector, something which was notable is that refugees were coming from Turkey, not the North African coast. We see that there are two main routes across the Mediterranean: first is the central Mediterranean route from various ports along the North African coast arriving in Sicily or other parts of southern Italy. Next is the eastern Mediterranean route, which involves going from Turkey to Greece across the Aegean sea or overland to Bulgaria and across the eastern Europe.

So why, in this instance were refugees taking the significantly longer and more perilous journey from Turkey to Italy? My suggestion is this is a direct result of the push backs and very hostile, anti-refugee stance of governments in Greece, Bulgaria and other countries in the region. For those attempting to arrive in Greece, there are persistent attempts to push them back to Turkey, even if they get to Greece, they are put in detention, not able to register for asylum or receive any sort of protection. Therefore once again we see a direct relationship between the hostile policies of governments, forcing refugees to take even more dangerous routes in an attempt to get to safety. The ‘distant port practice’, a recent policy of the Italian government is to only allow NGO rescue ships to dock in central and northern Italy, hundreds of miles away from where these rescues take place. This policy appears to be aimed at reducing the amount of rescues that can be done per ship, as these boats now need to spend several days getting to port. NGOs say this policy will cost hundreds of lives.

How can we stop these deaths?

These deaths are not inevitable and unlike many of the world’s most complex problems, this one is remarkably simple to resolve. It is certainly not the solution our politicians keep on repeating of hard borders, more patrols and more obstacles: we can see above these are the causes of the deaths. Instead, the solution is simple: provide refugees with safe routes to resettle in Europe. People fleeing war, conflict, environmental disaster and persecution will come: those who have never experienced forced displacement will never be able to understand how impossible it is to remain in their countries. Refugees will migrate no matter what, because it is essential for survival. Therefore instead of spending millions trying to push back refugees, building fences and patrolling the coast, open safe routes to resettle. It is as simple as that- are you thinking that this doesn’t sound possible? Think again.

You may notice a nationality which have recently been fleeing their country en masse due to conflict which has not yet been mentioned: Ukrainian refugees. We do not hear of Ukrainian refugees taking the dangerous route across the channel to the UK, being pushed back at fences or pushed back out to sea on the border of the European Union. We do not hear about Ukrainian refugees suffocating to death in the back of lorries or crossing the English channel in small boats and that is simply because they aren’t[1]. Ukrainian citizen refugees (I know from my work in Poland with those fleeing Ukraine, that non-Ukrainian citizen refugees do not have the same protection) have been granted safe routes and temporary protection across Europe, and this is the reason why they are not dying along these dangerous routes. Recent data released by the UK’s Home Office show more than 208,000 Ukrainian citizens have been granted visas since March 2022[2], whereas only 22 people have arrived in the UK on the key pathway of the Afghan Resettlement scheme since January 2022. That’s almost 10,000 times the number of visas for Ukrainian refugees compared to Afghan refugees, so why are we surprised that more than 8,600 Afghan refugees have crossed the channel in small boats and are the most common nationality of those arriving this way? Its because they have no other way.

So it is possible, we’ve demonstrated over the past year it is possible to bring large numbers of refugees to safety and if we extend this to all refugees, then we can help prevent hundreds and thousands of deaths.

[1] Refugee Council, 2023. The truth about channel crossings. Available at: https://www.refugeecouncil.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Refugee-Council-Truth-About-Channel-Crossings-briefing-2023.pdf [2] Home Office, 2023. Statistics on Ukrainians in the UK. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/immigration-system-statistics-year-ending-december-2022/statistics-on-ukrainians-in-the-uk#:~:text=1.-,Visas%20issued%20to%20Ukrainian%20nationals,(October%20to%20December%202022).