Workshop Magazine Conflict Sensitive Journalism, Berlin, Germany

TimeLines

A DW Akademie Workshop Magazine Berlin, Germany – 21st October to 1st November 2013

TimeLines A DW Akademie Workshop Magazine With financial support from the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooporation and Development (BMZ) Editors: Sigrid Thomsen, Beate Weides, Annedore Smith Reporters: Mostafa Hashem Abdou, Safaa Ashour Segelly, Jes Aznar, Ibrahima Nouhou BaldĂŠ, Cheryl Baldicantos, Nan Tin Htwe, Asel Kalybekova, Umida Maniyazova, Asyl Osmonalieva, Nesmon De Laure Pie, Ibrahim Zayed Design: Moritz Tschermak Cover photo: Jes Aznar As of: 1st November 2013

From One Prison Camp to the Next | 04

Pain and Fun | 06

The Last Refugee | 08 “I just want to work“ | 12

Invited but Unwanted | 14

Invisible Borders for Roma | 18

The Need to Remember | 20

Restoring Shredded Memories | 28

A Tale of Two Camps | 32 Authorities versus the Media | 36 Ambassador of Antiquities | 38

Portraits of Soviet soldiers displayed in the former Nazi camp Sachsenhausen.

From One Prison Camp to the Next The story of a Soviet soldier, who was imprisoned by the Germans and later by his own countrymen. He is one of the forgotten victims of World War II.

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During World War II, an ordinary Kyrgyz man had to go from Central Asia to Europe to fight. He suffered in German Nazi camps and later in a Soviet prison being classed an “enemy of the nation”.

He died in 1998 – like many others without receiving an apology or compensation from any of the regimes.

Text by Asyl Osmonalieva – Photo by Jes Aznar

Nearly 70 years later, the German government takes on the responsibility and promises compensation payments to forgotten victims of the Nazi regime.

But the discussion about former Soviet soldiers is still going on.

Sagynbay Moldokulov was only 19 years old when in 1939 he was called up for military service in the Ukraine. He was on the frontline when World War II started on the territory of the Soviet Union. German troops launched massive attacks, and the Soviet soldiers who 04 TimeLines

survived had to hide in the forest. When winter set in, they were hungry and cold and dispersed among the Ukrainian villages which were occupied by the fascists.

For one and a half years, Sagynbay was hiding in the home of a Ukrainian family without a chance to join the Red Army because enemy soldiers were all around the place. In 1943, the Soviets started to push the fascists back, but they in turn took some Soviet soldiers as prisoners.

Sagynbay was one of them. “They sent my father to a camp in Germany, later he was sent to occupied France. Only in

1945, these prisoners were freed by the American army”, explains Sagynbay’s daughter Halima Moldokulova. The Americans handed the freed soldiers over to the Soviets, and they were transferred to Russia.

Sagynbay ended up in a camp in Sochi where he was questioned whether he had collaborated with the Germans. He was there together with Azamat Altay who later founded the Kyrgyz language radio station Freedom in the USA. They wondered what to do. Friends offered them to escape to America on a ship because the Soviets might arrest them as traitors.

“However, my father could not escape and leave his own family, parents, brothers and sisters. He chose his motherland”, says Halima Moldokulova. Promptly, Sagynbay was arrested as an “enemy of the nation” and imprisoned for another ten years, but he managed to survive not only the war but also the camps. Historian Dmitri Stratievski, a member of the German-Russian foundation Kontakte-Kontakty, says that this was truly a miracle.

“The Nazis engaged in deliberately genocidal policies towards Soviet prisoners of war. Working conditions and meals were calculated in a way that people in camps could live only for about three months.

People died from starvation and hard work and were then replaced by others, it was a vicious circle. Later, when the Nazis needed more workers, they improved the conditions a little bit. Now our foundation demands that the German government pays them compensation because they were the second major group of victims after the Jews. It was a racial genocide. For example, 3.5% of captured American and British soldiers died in concentration camps, but 60% of Soviet soldiers, up to 3.5 million people. We try

to draw public attention to this fact. But the German government says that in such a case Russia should compensate former German prisoners. But who started a war?”, asks Stratievski. He thinks that the key reason is not financial but political: “There are strong feelings of ‘Russophobia’ in Germany and the idea that Russians are enemies still occupies the minds of many people.”

A special department of the former USSR investigated where and how prisoners were captured by the Germans during the war. According to Dmitri Stratievski, 14% of these prisoners were later arrested in the Soviet Union as an “enemy of the nation”.

“This is less than many people think.

Among the prisoners of German camps, there were real collaborators as well as innocent victims. Some military investigators, however, wanted to improve their careers and accused innocent people, and the system supported them”, he says.

Sagynbay’s daughter remembers what her father told her about the Soviet camp: “First they were loaded on passenger trains to the Ukraine and later under escorts to Sochi and lodged in so-called filtration camps. Every day, there were interrogations, confrontation meetings etc. Dad was afraid that he would never see his relatives again and decided to escape from this camp. How he did it, he never told us. When Sagynbay came back to Kyrgyzstan, all relatives thought that he was already lost. He was at home only for a few days. His older brother said that he must turn himself in to the police to avoid all of them being arrested. Sagynbay had to surrender and was imprisoned without a court hearing for ten long years.”

In 1955, he was released and got married a year later. He had six children and gave 05 TimeLines

them the good education that he had dreamt of for himself.

On 12 June 2013, the German Bundestag Petition Committee met to consider a proposal by the Social Democratic and the Green Party to compensate former Soviet prisoners of war. The governing parties CDU and FDP decided to send the petition to the Budget Committee, the Finance Committee and the Committee of Culture and Media. Dmitri Stratievski fears that this lengthy process will eventually kill the petition.

Green Party MP Volker Beck agrees that the bad treatment of Soviet prisoners during the war was an act of “racial discrimination”. But Manfred Kolbe, MP from the conservative CDU/CSU party, says: “During the international negotiations in 2000 about creating the Foundation Remembrance Responsibility and Future, government representatives from the former USSR participated. A decision was taken then to exclude former Soviet soldiers from the list of possible recipients of compensation payments. The petition doesn’t consider other victims, but for reasons of equality it shouldn’t be limited to Soviet soldiers only. And it is necessary to remember that German soldiers suffered too. Therefore, my party refuses to support one-sided decisions.”

Sagynbay’s daughter Halima thinks that not only her father was a victim: “We are victims, too. To talk about his fate was taboo, and only after Stalin’s death did we start to celebrate Victory Day. With Dad’s intellectual potential, he could have received a good education and career. He didn’t like to talk about his difficult times, and when he spoke about it, tears would come to his eyes. Five years ago Dad died.

He carried the marks of a double-conviction throughout his whole life.”

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ttracts a n i l r Be . rial in o m e nually M n t a s u s r a to oloc nd visi a The H s u o h to the red t t d c n a u e r h to five le tend p four to o e p . young s ways t d n n e a r e s f t dif Adul ast in p i z a nN Germa

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Text by Nesmon De Laure Pie – Photos by Nesmon De Laure Pie and ISOtob

15-year-old Marcia Bargel 2 , on vaccation from the United States, is accompanying her boyfriend Jeroen Smets 3 , a 16-year-old student from Frankfurt in Germany. For them, it is just nice to visit this “beautiful city”, but they also like the Memorial, occupying 19,000 square meters of space near the famous Brandenburg Gate and just a short distance from where the ruins of Hitler’s bunker are buried.

Children run through the narrow aisles made up by the big slabs of the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin. Cheerfully, they are racing into all directions or jump from one slab to the next, often watched by amused parents. They are obviously having a good time.

One of the many visitors this Tuesday morning is media manager Horst Ohligschläger 1 , 55 years old, with his twelveyear-old daughter. In his opinion, the Holocaust Memorial is one of the most important sites in modern-day Berlin and should be treated with more respect. “We live in the south of Germany, and I have come here with my young daughter to show her this place. However, we didn’t go into the museum because it is not really suitable for children.”

The Holocaust Memorial is made up of 2,711 gray stone slabs or stelae that don’t bear any markings like names or dates.

The museum is located underground below this field of pillars. It presents an exhibition on Nazi terror in Europe and holds the names of all known Jewish Holocaust victims. Visitors can also find original letters left by victims before their deportation to the concentration camps.

Meanwhile amongst the stelae, one can catch teenagers kissing and taking pictures.

“For youngsters, I think it’s more of a fun place because they don’t know anything about its real significance”, says 40-year-old Martina Kössler 4 , mother of two young children who are running around the aisles. She likes the architecture of the Holocaust Memorial. Peter Eisenman, the architect, hoped to create a feeling of groundlessness and instability. But for 18-year-old high-school student Katrin Kolomiec 5 he has not succeeded. “This work of art doesn’t really show what happened to the Jews because its meaning isn’t clear unless you ask somebody. I think there should be a notice board to explain what it is all about”, says the young girl from Stuttgart. Reflecting on the German history, she adds: “As Germans, we should of course be ashamed of our past. It’s so awful.”

Martina Kössler went into the underground museum four years ago.

She remembers how bad she felt at that time: “I think that I’m too young to feel guilty directly. I know that my grand-father was in the Second World War as a soldier, but he would never talk about that.

In our family, nobody ever talked about the war or the Holocaust.”

In many German families, the Holocaust is a taboo subject indeed.

Martina only learnt at school what had happened – and later through the exhibits in the Memorial Museem. In her opinion, people should never forget this dreadful past, but should also look into the future.

“When we are here, we remember the history of Germany”, says Dieter Steinwender 6 , a 58-year-old computer scientist from Hamburg. He and his wife disapprove that some people come to the Holocaust Memorial just for fun. “When people are just laughing and running around here, we feel that this is not right. We feel ashamed.”

Michael Sontheimer, German writer and historian who talks openly about the role of his family during the Nazi era, recalls the long debate in the country before it was decided to build this monument: “When you don’t know the past, you cannot succeed in the future. “

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“A monument mustn’t be politically connected” Interview with Dr. Juliane Wetzel, historian at the Centre for Antisemitism Research at the Technical University of Berlin:

they might hide their uneasy feelings by saying they are just coming to have fun.

It might be just an excuse.

Is it right that people go to the Holocaust Memorial just for fun?

I would say it is not normal that people go there just for fun. There are many reasons why people want to visit this place.

Generally, they want to get something out of it for themselves, but certainly not fun. There are some young people who are ashamed of their country’s history, so

Should the goverment have put the place away from the city centre?

Not at all. It has been the intention of the architect to have it right in the centre so that many people can see it. I don’t think it would be a good idea to put the monument far from the city. The correct place is right in the middle of Berlin because Jews were killed in Europe in the name of

the German government in Berlin. That doesn’t mean that young people are guilty.

Should countries like Ivory Coast build monuments after a war?

I think they should. But a monument mustn’t be politically connected. In Germany, every Chancellor accepts that the Nazi past is part of German history.

It is important for people to be aware of the past. Monuments must differentiate between victims and perpetrators. And they must be expressive.

The Last Refugee

Dr. Yashar Hirshaut (lower right) with family and friends.

The story of a German Jew who took refuge in the Philippines together with 1,200 more during the Holocaust.

The shambles of Manila. February 1945.

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Text by Cheryl Baldicantos – Photos from Dr. Yashar Hirshaut

“The German government was ordering Jews to leave. My father saw a newspaper ad saying that the Philippines were hiring Jewish professionals and he applied”, Dr. Yashar Hirshaut, a Jew from Berlin, recounts as he sits on his big brown chair in his New York office. Dr. Hirshaut is one of the more than 1,200 Jews who fled to the Philippines as the German Nazis under Adolf Hitler started sending thousands of them to concentration camps.

After the destruction of Jewish shops and synagogues on November 9, 1938, Filipinos in Manila staged a rally for their government to help the Jewish people in Germany and Austria. The then Philippine President Manuel Quezon, Colonel Dwight Eisenhower, American High Commissioner to the Philippines Paul

McNutt and the Freider brothers, American Jews, devised a plan for the settlement of 10,000 Jewish people in the Asian country.

“I was about a year old then. We had to leave. Me, my sister, my mother, who worked as a teacher, and my father, who had a career as an accountant”, Dr. Hirshaut recounts. It was a time when a lot of countries around the world turned their backs on the Jewish people. There was an instance when a ship full of Jewish escapees from the Nazi regime was not allowed to dock in the United States.

But they had to flee Europe or risk death in the systematic killings in concentration camps.

“I remember the Philippines very fondly. It was a magical time for me. I remember the American school and our house in Taft Avenue.

I remember the kalesas (Filipino horse-drawn carriages). Oooh, there were so many horses!” Dr. Hirshaut recounts. From around 250 American Jews in Manila, the number grew multiple times almost overnight. The Philippines were under the American colonial guidance then.

Dr. Racelle Weiman, director of the Center for Holocaust and Humanity Education at the Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati, believes that President Quezon was thinking of his own country then. She has copies of letters of correspondence that prove that he had plans to modernise the Philippines and educate the Filipino people with the help of the foreign Jews. The country 09 TimeLines

needed well-educated doctors, accountants and other professionals to help improve the economy. He saw the need for European know-how.

The Jewish people were to be resettled in Moro-occupied Mindanao – the biggest island of the Philippine archipelago. An opposition group barred these plans, saying that President Quezon just wanted to control that part of the country.

For a time, Dr. Hirshaut’s father worked for an American company in Manila.

“I remember our Filipino maid Gracia.

She knew about Jewish customs, and so she taught me as a child. There was no one else like Gracia. She was maybe 25 or 28 years old at that time”, Dr. Hirshaut sniggers. At that time, there was an underlying division of classes through the colour of skin – the brown Filipinos and the white foreigners.

However, the Jewish people’s bare escape from the Nazis’ hands in Europe was short-lived as they had to endure another war when the Japanese came on in 1944.

The Americans, who were part of the allied forces in the combat against the Germans in Europe, had already pulled out their troops from the Philippines at that time.

“I remember a Spanish-American lawyer who taught me and my sister, together with his children, during the war when the schools were closed. We lived with the Brady family when we were forced to flee our house in Taft”, Dr. Hirshaut recalls as he shifts on his chair.

The Japanese used the Jewish synagogue, Temple Emil, as a storage house for weapons. By that time, the Jewish community was already integrated with the Filipinos in the country. Some of the Jews who were in the Philippine army died in the war according to Dr. Weiman.

Dr. Yashar Hirshaut

“I remember the Japanese going from house to house. Then the Americans came back. It was the Americans versus the Japanese. They were shelling each other. It was a Friday. We watched that 10 TimeLines

night how old Manila burned down. I can still see the fire fall off the church that night. A lot of people got killed”, Dr. Hirshaut speaks and gets silent for some seconds.

The Jewish people were witnesses to the stages of the recapture of Manila – from the struggle of Filipinos to resist the Japanese to the coming back of General Douglas McArthur and his troops.

“The Japanese soldiers thought we were Germans so we got spared. The Japanese were not anti-Jewish but they were very vicious”, Dr. Hirshaut describes.

The Japanese sided with the Germans in the Second World War. In the Philippines, they killed more than 100,000 people. “We moved to another house then and this house, the Officers’ Club, accidentally caught fire so we had to move to the Jewish community house in Francisco de Montes. It was primitive living. I remember the mosquito nets and my mother cooking on charcoal. To me, as a child, it was very interesting”, Dr. Hirshaut laughs. Cooking on charcoal was common in the majority of Filipino houses at that time.

“To me, there was no sense of antagonism from the Filipinos. In the Philippines, I felt very welcome. The way I speak, the way I think, my early education was shaped in the Philippines”, Dr. Hirshaut smilingly explains.

After the war, Dr. Hirshaut’s father worked as a broker at the Philippine stock exchange. Life, he said, was good.

“I feel that there were no barriers. In Europe, people were seen as different. In Manila, people were all the same”, Dr. Hirshaut recalls.

However, in 1946 Jews started to leave the country. This was during the time of the declaration of Philippine Independence. “Even if we were doing good, there were no Jewish schools, the temple was very restricted, and there was only a limited sense of community. There were no Jewish holidays. It was a strange land.

Nevertheless, we were accommodated and became part of the culture. So we are very appreciative”, Dr. Hirshaut explains.

The majority of the German Jews left for the United States or Israel.

The story of helping the Jews remains unknown to most Filipinos. It is not mentioned in history books nor taught in schools in the country. “People don’t usually look at the good things. Nobody’s made it a priority. Filipinos should know and appreciate the story. It is the evolution of a country. It helps guide citizens into answering the question: What do I stand for?” Dr. Weiman explains. She has been awarded the Order of Lakandula in 2005, one of the Philippines’ highest honors, for her work on the Jewish refugees in the country.

A monument to President Quezon was unveiled at the 65-hectare Holocaust Memorial Park in Rishon LeZion in Tel Aviv, Israel on June 21, 2009. This is a step in the process of recognition. However, in studies about the Jews of Europe during the Holocaust, the Philippines is hardly ever mentioned. Even the Jewish Community of the Synagogue in Berlin, Germany, and the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance don’t appear to have knowledge about this.

“President Quezon’s story on the Jewish refugees – it could have been one of the greatest rescue stories ever told, until the bombing of Pearl Harbor in the Philippines by the Japanese happened”, Dr. Weiman comments.

Before leaving to see another patient, Dr. Hirshaut says that in the Philippines, he saw friendship. “Dr. Hirshaut is one of the leading doctors for cancer in the world today. If the Philippines had not opened their doors to rescue the Jews from the Nazis, he wouldn’t have had the chance to save many lives”, Dr. Weiman stresses.

The children of the Spanish-American lawyer, Joyce and Will Brady. Christmas 1945.

Dr. Hirshaut later adds: “Well, the Germans killed six million Jews. They killed at least 25 people in my family. How can I forgive and forget. The only thing I can do is encourage the people of Japan and Germany to explore for themselves how they turned from civilized people into unprincipled and merciless killers. The tragedy is that such transformations can lie within the bounds of human nature.”

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“I just want to work” The twenty-year old Nigerian never imagined himself as a refugee. He is one of many refugees who came to Europe via Italy. For nine months, they have now lived in Berlin, at Oranienplatz.

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Text by Nan Tin Htwe – Photos by Jes Aznar and Ibrahim Zayed

Dozens of faint-blue tarpaulin tents are set up under trees – barely leaving one foot space amongst some of them. A banner that says “NO BORDER NO NATION STOP DEPORTATION” is hanging in the branches. Judaism sits on an old sofa with his hands in his leather jacket’s pockets as he starts telling his story. Almost two years ago he left his home country, Nigeria. He had fallen in love with the daughter of a rich and powerful politician. His girlfriend got pregnant. As she was afraid of her father, the 19-yearold girl had an abortion and died. “I didn’t know that she was pregnant. She didn’t tell me”, explains Judaism. Losing his daughter, the father sent his bodyguards who arrested the young man.

“They beat me up really badly”, remembers Judaism. Bruises on his left cheek still tell part of his story. He was sued and sent to prison for one year. “I had no money. How could I hire a lawyer? I don’t have political power either”, he says.

As soon as he was released from prison in 2012, he fled to Libya where he worked for six months as a handyman.

When revolution raged in Libya, he decided to leave for Italy. “Sometimes people started shooting at each other”, Judaism describes his days in Libya.

“They arrested people, beat people in

the streets.” One day, he was stopped on his way to work and sent to jail for one month. “I was arrested for no reason.

They were soldiers. But I didn’t know whose soldiers they were.” Then he got released by giving 200 Libyan dinars (165 US-dollars). “I left Libya because I didn’t want to end up like I did in my country.”

The young Nigerian spent a year in Italy where he was recognised as a refugee, but then he decided to leave. “I was allowed to work, but there were no jobs. Even Italians have no jobs.”

Judaism went to Berlin hoping that he would find work and earn some money.

As a young boy he had dreamed of becoming a mechanical engineer. When he was 14 years old, his father died – leaving responsibilities to him as the eldest son.

To support his housewife mother and four siblings, he quit school and started learning handy-works. Always being very dynamic, Judaism soon had his own business. He also wrote Hip-Hop songs and performed on streets to earn extra money.

“You want to hear it?” asks Judaism and takes his hands out of his pockets. His arms start moving and his face loses the impression of carrying a heavy burden.

The title of his song: “A friend is a friend”. The voice of the young man is rising softly and sounds rather melodical – almost atypical for a rapping song.

And the text seems to have some deeper message: “I wrote this song for everyone on the streets. The good, the bad and the ugly, we see them waking up to life – that’s my favourite lyrics in this song.“ 12 TimeLines

From Berlin, once a week Judaism calls his family. For having lost the opportunity to finish his education, he always reminds his younger brother and sister to study hard – “I always tell them ‘Please read your schoolbooks’.”

As for himself, he continues to demonstrate with the other refugees of the camp for the right to stay in Germany and to work because he wants to support his family in Africa. Judaism doesn’t really feel safe in Germany, one of the richest countries in the world: “In terms of security, it’s ok. But my safety is not complete because I am not working.” The young man also worries about the police coming and taking away the only document he has – a paper that says he is a refugee in Italy. “No passport. Nothing.“ The night is coming. A bulb hangs from the tarpaulin-roof barely lighting the tent which Judaism and six other refugees from Chad, Niger and other African countries call their home at Oranienplatz in Berlin. “It’s very cold at night”, says Judaism. His bed in the corner is made up of some wood pieces put together.

“The German government said they will give us a new place before the winter. But you know promises are easy to be given but hard to keep.”

Being a Christian, all he does is praying to and believing in God. After what he has been through in the past years, Judaism still holds hope in his heart. “My future will be great and I know that.” His voice is surprisingly firm.

20-year old Nigerian refugee Judaism is still hopeful for a good future as he tells his life journey at Oranienplatz camp which he calls home in Germany‘s capital.

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Invited but Unwanted A growing number of migrants from Central Asia are going to Russia to earn money. Their situation became more complicated because of growing anti-immigrant sentiments.

For the time being, they don’t see a way out of this situation.

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Text by Umida Maniyazova Photos by Sergei Abashin, Jes Aznar and Sascha Kohlmann

Aziz left his home country to work in Russia in 2009, and he still lives there to this day. He is very well educated, speaks English, Farsi and Russian fluently. More than 15 years ago, his family moved from Tajikistan to Uzbekistan where he worked for various organisations. Later, he decided to move to Moscow because of the high salary prospects.

Aziz is mainly engaged in the unskilled labour market. “I was doing everything.

The most important thing for me is not to be involved in anything illegal and respect the culture of the country”, he says. “Now I go home to Uzbekistan as a visitor. There I can stay at the most for a couple of months, then I feel like I want to return to Moscow. So now, even back home I’m called a migrant”.

Labour migrants in Russia are called “gastarbeiter” – guest workers. This term

was borrowed from the German language and is widely used in Russia and the postSoviet countries. The German term “gastarbeiter” refers to employees who came to work in the country on a voluntary basis after an invitation by the German government. In 1961, Germany and Turkey signed an agreement on migrant workers which facilitated the temporary employment of Turkish citizens in Germany. The Turks came to Germany as “gastarbeiter”, but many of them stayed their whole life.

When Aziz is called “gastarbeiter”, it is offensive for him. Despite its positive meaning of being a “guest”, the word is usually employed in a negative context.

According to Aziz, in Russia people use it for “subordinates” – because in general migrant workers are employed in low paid jobs: porters, maintenance workers and cleaners. And their number is growing quickly: According to the Federal Migration Service of Russia, only in the first half of this year, ten million workers came to Russia. They often are the only breadwinners of their families left back home where the average salary is several times lower than in Russia.

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Turkish migrants came to Germany as guest workers. Many of them stayed, opening small business and now they are forming the largest minority group in Germany.

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Higher salaries and better life conditions attracted migrants to Russia. They want to return home when having earned enough money.

Even if they earn enough money to support their families at home, life of migrants in Russia becomes more and more difficult. A recent murder case in Biryulyovo, an area near Moscow, provoked what local media called a “Russian revolt against migrants”: A native of Azerbaijan killed a young Russian man. This incident outraged the Moscow population and provoked a riot. Groups of nationalists together with common people destroyed a shopping center and vegetable base that were considered a “nest” of immigrants. The participants demanded to ensure the safety of the population and to tighten immigration laws.

Moscow police conducted mass arrests of migrants. In Biryulyovo alone, more than a thousand migrants – men and women – were captured. In an article of the Russian magazine SNOB, the journalist

Valery Morozov criticised the authorities for “not capturing the murderer and not demonstrating intense activity in order to calm the population”. Two days after the riots in Biryulyovo, the body of a 51-year-old man from Uzbekistan was found. He died from multiple stab wounds. Russian bloggers claimed that the incident could be a provocative revenge for the Russian murder victim.

The leader of the Union of the Youth of Tajikistan in Russia, Izzat Aman, says that after the events in Biryulyovo he doesn’t see a future for migrants in this country anymore: “I didn’t even see my future, although I‘m a Muscovite and Russian citizen. Every night crowds of young people are walking under my window and shouting nationalist slogans. Young boys from 15 to 20 years. If you get into their hands, there is no way to get out 16 TimeLines

alive from the crowd.” Izzat says he is not alone with his fear: “All those who are like me, with black hair and dark skin, are scared. Even those who were born and grew up in Russia, they are too scared.”

According to the Tajikistan Youth leader in Russia after Biryulyovo everything changed dramatically: “Migrants didn’t have any rights before. But now they suffer not only from the hands of nationalists, but also from the hands of the law enforcement agencies.”

Representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Germany expressed concern about the unrest in Moscow with the manifestation of violence against migrants from the Caucasus and Central Asia. In response, the Russian Foreign Ministry recommended German colleagues to pay attention to the observance of human rights in Germany, noting that

Despite being born and raised in Germany, Ayse Demir wants to emigrate as soon as her son grows up.

“extreme right-wing, neo-Nazi and xenophobic sentiments continue to grow”.

According to the spokeswoman of the Berlin Senate Department for Labour, Integration and Women’s Issues, Elke Pohl, “there is some discrimination too.

For example, when young Turkish people come to a disco, and they aren’t allowed in and told that there are already enough men. And if Turkish and German candidates apply for the same job and have the same qualifications, the German gets the upper hand”, she says.

Talking about discrimination, Aziz from Uzbekistan says that he tried many times to get a good job but they all require a Slavic appearance. “I have a degree in production automation, work experience in managerial positions, I know English and Farsi. But they are asking for looks,

you know”, he complains. The representative of the Turkish Association of Berlin-Brandenburg, Ayse Demir, notes that in Germany the employer is subject to legal penalties for discrimination if he utters such a requirement. And yet in the German community there is still discrimination against Turkish workers.

Izzat Aman from Tajikistan believes that the Russian immigration law is good but it didn’t work because of the high level of corruption. According to him it’s impossible to regulate migration in Russia because “it is beneficial to certain circles that receive billions of dollars in income from migrants”.

An ethnologist of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Sergei Abashin, believes that the situation with the migration policy in Russia will get worse. “This is due to the 17 TimeLines

deterioration of the overall situation in Russia, the economic crisis and the intensification of the political struggle that we have seen recently [...] At the same time, this government is allowing migrants to enter the country”, says Abashin. While preparing for the Olympic Winter Games in Sochi and the football championship, the Russian government enacts legislation to toughen penalties for immigrants for minor offences. Although some Russian experts think that German experience with migration is positive and could serve as a model, Ayse Demir of the Turkish Association of Berlin-Brandenburg says that personally she lives in Berlin only temporarily. Within two years her son reaches adult age and she thinks about emigrating – maybe to Turkey. Izzat Aman also thinks he will not live in Russia for all his life and some day he hopes to return home.

Invisible Borders for Roma Since the entrance of Romania and Bulgaria into the EU, many Roma move to Western Europe, seeking new opportunities. While being allowed to live there, they are not allowed to work.

So, Roma have to find roundabout ways to earn money.

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Text by Asel Kalybekova – Photos by Stefan Georgi and Ibrahim Zayed

Entering the metro train, Jovanni and Aurelia take out a guitar and enthusiastically start singing popular Italian songs. While Jovanni plays a well-known melody, Aurelia walks around the wagon with a plastic cup in her hand. After some coins are dropped into it, they hastily hop off at the next stop to try their luck on another train. For them, the metro is not merely a means of transport but also of earning money. Being part of the discriminated minority in Romania, they came to Germany three months ago with big hopes for a better life.

Hundreds of thousands of immigrants have moved to the countries of Western Europe since Romania and Bulgaria entered the European Union in 2007.

Even though Roma, accounting for ten to twelve million people, constitute the largest minority in the EU and are officially recognised as a minority in Germany, they face difficulties accessing such state services as education and healthcare.

They also have little chance to get a normal job with an average salary, because of the labour restrictions on Eastern European states. As a result, many opt for low-salary jobs at unofficial labour markets for two or three euros per hour or, like Jovanni and Aurelia, find other ways to make a living. By singing songs, they are able to earn twenty euros per day and still manage to send some money to their children at home. “We have two kids back in Romania, they miss us, they cry”, says Aurelia during her short break in between the trains.

In 2014, Germany will lift labour restrictions for migrants from Romania and Bulgaria. This seems to give a prospect for Roma migrants too, but some argue it will do little to improve their situation.

Employers are not interested in putting this law into daily practice, because then, perhaps, they would have to pay higher salaries and provide for better working conditions. Also, anti-Roma stereotypes often prevent employers from hiring them. “Because of the prejudice in German society, some Roma hide their identity, fearing discrimination”, explains Cordula Simon, a member of the district administration of Neukölln, one of the districts of Berlin.

Roma is that they are homeless, they are beggars and criminals. This image is not obtained from direct contact, but rather from old stereotypes”, says Krauss.

Neukölln is famous for its successful integration programmes for migrants. Simon admits that the district has made a lot of mistakes in the past, trying to ignore the wish of migrants to stay in Germany. “We now have a chance to make better decisions, different decisions”, she says.

Migrant-oriented programmes include language courses in German for adults and special classes for children as well as addressing accommodation problems: “We believe that education is the key for them [Roma] to fight for their rights and establish themselves in the labour market”.

Having received the Nobel Peace Prize last year for “peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights”, some claim that the European Union could do better in protecting human rights.

The Executive Editor of Roma Virtual Network, Valery Novoselsky, claims that “antizyganism” can be felt more or less in many EU states. He thinks that Spain could be a good example of successful integrationist projects that have been functioning there since the 1980s.

Speaking of the EU in general, he notes that “there are a lot of gypsies who lead normal lives, but they are just not noticed by the people. Unfortunately, only those who beg or steal attract public attention.”

Learning German could also be a key factor for communication between the Roma and non-Roma population of Germany, since the language barrier is a great obstacle. Joachim Krauss, an expert in the history of South-Eastern Europe, highlights the importance of “talking to the Roma” instead of “talking about Roma”, so that they are not left outside. Lack of communication shapes the general negative ideas about Roma within the German society. “The sketchy image of 19 TimeLines

Stereotypes and discrimination against Roma are widespread not only in Germany, but also all over Europe. They are even more fired up by recent cases of fair-skinned blond children being taken away from Roma parents in Greece and Ireland with a suspicion that they were kidnapped. CNN reported on October 24th that a girl in Ireland was returned to her family after a DNA test confirmation, while the fate of Maria from Greece is still undecided.

Meanwhile Jovanni and Aurelia, despite all the suspicious eyes staring at them in the metro, continue singing cheerful Italian songs and earning money to feed their children. “Germany is good”, says Jovanni, making a thumbs-up sign.

“There’s work, there’s money. In Romania, there’s no work”, he says, hopping on another train.

The Need to Remember Germany deals with its past

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Photos and Text by Jes Aznar

Winter is approaching fast in Berlin.

The last remaining leaves fall on crowds of people flocking to these monuments.

Braving the biting cold and silently gazing on pictures and words engraved on the ground and on walls. Perhaps more biting are the memories associated with them. They are memories of Germany’s cold and dark past. And they are here serving as reminders that events like these should never happen again.

There’s this certain feeling that the past is not so far away in Berlin. Somehow it can just be found with one peek through holes inbetween slabs of cold concrete walls in Bernauer Strasse. People line up, especially the younger ones who missed the era of division, and try hard to see what’s inside this giant box of memories. Or what was once there that is now gone.

Meanwhile swarms of warm feet slowly waltz along spaces between back-lighted letters of victims on the floor inside this dark room under the Holocaust Memorial near the Brandenburg Gate. Silent tears fall on faces of visitors as they read every line. These words were part of letters, diary entries and farewell notes written by victims before they were murdered by Nazis.

On one of the boxes are these words of despair and resignation to life: “Dear father, I am saying goodbye to you before I die. We would so love to live, but they won’t let us and we will die. I

am so scared of this death because small children were thrown alive into the pit.

Goodbye forever. I kiss you tenderly.”

The Sachsenhausen concentration camp just outside Berlin saw at least 30,000 inmates held inside its walls dying from exhaustion, disease, malnutrition, pneumonia etc, due to the poor living conditions.

A breeze of chilly autumn wind blows on every corner of this triangular shaped prison. It was used as a labour camp, said a tour guide; prisoners were forced to work in brick factories to serve the needs of the Nazis. Now, some red bricks are displayed inside the museum as a silent witness to this camp’s brutal past.

A myriad of buildings makes up another enormous complex housing millions and millions of records on paper, where lives of people were closely monitored, classified and kept on index cards. The archives of the Stasi, the East German Secret Police, reveal humanity stripped down to its barest, where a person doesn’t need a name, just letters and numbers. It is nowhere near being a monument, nor anyone wants to celebrate this place, but it is a reminder of the evil of men in power.

From the Berlin wall memorial to the enormous obelisks in former concentration camps, Germany is trying to make its efforts known to all – the country is paying a high price for the horrors of its past. “People want their dignity back.

One of the first things that we should do after a genocide, sometimes more important than food, is to put up monuments”, says Tom Koenigs, a member of the German parliament. “Truth must be found, justice served and the victims’ honour regained.”

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Text by Safaa Ashour Segelly – Photos by Jes Aznar and Cheryl Baldicantos

Only one month after the Egyptian revolution which ousted president Mubarak, dozens of protesters stormed into the headquarter of “Mbahth Amn Al-Dawla�, the State Security Police, in Nasr City near Cairo. During 30 years of Mubarak regime, it had been a symbol of repression and the violation of private life. When they entered the building, angry protesters found many shredded and torn files and papers. The secret police officers tried to hide their crimes and acts of violation they committed under Mubarak.

While Egypt is still runnig an inquiry and public trials for the regime symbols and figures who destroyed the secret files, at the same time it banned the publication of the files that were taken in the chaos. Some 20 years back, when the two Germanies reunited, their government did exactly the opposite: it converted the files of East Germany’s secret police “Stasi� into an archive. Stasi victims can order their file and learn who spied on

them and why the secret police violated their personal lives.

The archive was established two years after the dissolution of the secret police.

It kept millions of files, films, audio documents, micro films and other data documents with a total of 111 kilometers in length, and over 1.4 million photos.

If it is your first visit to the Stasi archive, and you are from a country like Egypt, where three years after an unfinished revolution protesters still struggle for the concept of democracy and freedom, you will suffer a second of trembling.

The former building of the East German secret police reminds you of one of the well known buildings of “Mbahth Amn Al-Dawla’’, where you or one of your friends was once taken in for inquiry and maybe torture.

Converting one of the scary buildings of the Egyptian secret police into an archive, may be more like a daydream for many Egyptian protesters. In Germany it became reality when in 1990, soon after the fall of the Berlin wall, a new government agency was founded to preserve the archives of the Stasi.

Dagmar Hovestädt, spokeswoman of the Stasi records agency, said that the Stasi officers also tore and shredded many secret files. Employees of the records agency spent more than four years trying to put the torn paper from about 15,000 bags together again, developing a system for computer-assisted data recovery. Some shredded papers were completely damaged and could not be repaired though.

After a limited trial for some high officers, most officials who had known nothing but the Stasi are now able to live their life in peace, Hovestädt added. The Geman society thought that most employees who had worked for the Stasi were simply following orders and did what they were paid to do.

Victims, however, had to live with the fact that their spies got away without punishment. After the opening of the Stasi records agency in 1990, Stasi victim Hans-Jochen Scheidler made a request to see his file. The agency responded after two years. Now he is satisfied of knowing that no one from his family or his closest friends was spying on him on behalf of the Stasi. He also knows that the Stasi gave up on trying to recruit him for collaboration. He was seen as an enemy of

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the communist state, as it was written in his file.

Today, Scheidler is one of the team of former inmates working as tour guides for the visitors to the Stasi prison museum in HohenschĂśnhausen. He tells his story with a hopeful smile on his face, though it canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t hide the deep sadness in his eyes.

After graduating from the Humboldt University in Berlin with a degree in physics, Scheidler succeeded to get a scholarship in Prague. â&#x20AC;&#x153;My dream was to be a professor in physics and invent a new scientific theory or be part in the academic teamâ&#x20AC;?, he remembers. That dream was destroyed by the Stasi in 1968: Scheidler was arrested and put in the Stasi prison for protesting against the invasion of the Warsaw Pact in the socialist Czechoslovak Republic which was meant to halt the political liberal reform spring in Prague.

Scheidler refers to a cell similar to his own in the Stasi prison that now became a museum. He starts to remember the way he was treated by his guard: His cell lights were turned on at regular intervals through the night, prisoners would be woken up by the guards if they didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t sleep in the approved position. He spent three weeks awaking, until he got used to prison and the position he was supposed to sleep in.

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The former Stasi prisoner still remembers that he wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t allowed to look at his guardâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s face. He was ordered to sit in a chair all day, as using the bed was only allowed at night.

Sometimes he could hear the angry screams of other prisoners, followed by the strong violence of the guards. He was 24 years old and hadnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t committed any actual crime nor did he get a fair trial.

The Egyptian protesters who once spent nights in â&#x20AC;&#x153;La Zouglyâ&#x20AC;?, one of the unofficial prisons of â&#x20AC;&#x153;Mbahth Amn Al-Dawlaâ&#x20AC;? without a trial and no obvious crime, will understand.

Two and a half years later, Hans-Jochen Scheidler was released and tried to find a new job. However, the Stasi kept on chasing him, he did not find employment where he applied for jobs. An official secret paper said he was â&#x20AC;&#x153;not recommendedâ&#x20AC;?.

Every now and then, Scheidler still meets one of the former high Stasi officers while shopping in the neighbourhood of the Stasi prison, where most of the former staff lived.

Ironically, some of those who were left to live in peace by the society, still behave aggressively, considering him a part of their old business.

As Egyptians, we leave the place with some questions in our minds. How can the new transition government in Egypt make use of Germanyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s experience of getting over the Stasi past? How can we close the era of inhuman procedures being forced on innocent civilians, close the files of years of injustice and bad treatment and fears? Should we really rehire some officers who used to work for the secret police in Egypt, who were deeply involved in such shameful acts during the Mubarak era? Could we regard that as reconciliation?

A Tale of Two Camps A tour through the former concentration camp Sachsenhausen keeps the memories of Nazi-victims alive. If you come from Guinea Conakry, it also reminds you of another camp: Boiroâ&#x20AC;&#x2DC;s survivors are still waiting for the truth.

From 1936 to 1945, the current Sachsenhausen Memorial served as a concentration camp of the Nazi regime. Between 1945 and 1950, it served as a special camp of the Russian secret service.

Text by Nouhou Baldé Photos by Jes Aznar and CampBoiro.org

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A column of men and women comes out of a large courtyard. They have just visited a former concentration camp of the German Nazi regime – Sachsenhausen close to Berlin. 1961 it was declared a national memorial by the authorities of former East Germany and was integrated into the Brandenburg Memorials Foundation after German unification.

This Tuesday afternoon, three people welcome visitors in the information center: “Please give this gentleman an audio guide!” It will explain the history of the place, the testimony of survivors, letters of victims sent to their parents. “Even three hours are not enough, you cannot read everything in this vast camp”, warns Karsten from the welcoming team. “The audio guide alone is about five hours long.”

About 200,000 people were imprisoned in this site and up to 50,000 were brutally murdered. Every year, about 500,000 tourists visit it.

To immortalise their ‘‘pilgrimage’‘ to the memorial, many tourists take pictures of the front door. Visible from a distance, a cynical text mesh on the gate says (in German, of course): “Arbeit macht frei”, “Work makes you free”. Up to 500,000 visitors go through this gate every year, as the guide explains. Between 1936 and 1945, more than 200,000 prisoners were brought here. Entering the camp, internees knew they were now in the hands of the powerful SS, the notorious German defence corps that ran the concentration camps. Tens of thousands of inmates died of starvation, diseases, forced labour and maltreatment. Others were victims of systematic extermination operations by the SS. Tens of thousands, so it comes to my mind, also died in my home country during the totalitarian regime of Sekou Toure, the first president of independent Guinea,

between 1958 and 1984. Thousands were killed in the Boiro Camp alone.

disperse and ordered us to go to our cells.

This interlude was never repeated.”

Just after the entrance gate of the Sachsenhausen camp, you’re at the “call yard”, a semi-circular area where inmates had to answer to their names being called every day. Everyone had to respond instantly or risk reprisals. That could last for hours in the rain and cold. Just opposite, public executions took place.

A few meters from the entrance of Sachsenhausen are the barracks number 38 and 39. The Jewish prisoners were housed here between November 1938 and October 1942. Entering the cells, one finds reminders of their dreadful living conditions. In the basement of the building, visitors are encouraged to write down their impressions, suggestions and criticisms.

At Camp Boiro in Conakry, the guards did not allow detainees to stand together in order to avoid communication.

Survivor Amadou Diallo wrote in 1983 about the disinfection of cells under the command of guard Fadama Condé. The product used was highly toxic, so prisoners were sent to the yard: “We all gathered around the former Secretary General of the Organisation for African Unity, Diallo Telli. Panicking, Fadama made us 34 TimeLines

For me, dingy dormitories with bunk beds are a reminder of the old university campus in Conakry: beds, sinks, toilets, personal items. However, this was nothing in comparison to the atrocious prison conditions in Sachsenhausen or Camp Boiro.

Elie Hayeck, a survivor of Lebanese origin and a trader who had spent seven

Government opponents like ministers Ousmane Balde, Barry III, Magassouba Moriba and others were hanged on a bridge in Conakry.

years at Camp Boiro, said in a televised testimony after his release: “I drank my own urine! After ten days without water, my tongue got stuck and I urinated to drink.”

think of the mass graves where the bodies of illustrious opponents of Sekou Toure were buried. On a bridge in Conakry, dozens of opponents were hanged on January 25, 1971.

You are not allowed to make a noise, and tourists wipe their tears in silence. There are no words to describe the “creepy feeling’‘ that you have in block “Z” in Sachsenhausen. Humans have lost their lives in such a terrible way! The station ‘‘Z” included the ‘‘Genickschussanlage‘‘, an installation for killing prisoners through a shot in the neck. Leaning against the wall, the inmate was officially measured and then, by an invisible hand, shot in the neck. Then the body of the victim was dragged to the crematorium located a few meters away.

Recollecting the shootings in a bush area near a mountain in the province of Kindia, no one could have any illusions about the terror of the Guinean regime.

The bodies were never delivered to the families of the victims.

Seeing the wreaths in memory of the victims, as a Guinean I cannot help but

In the Boiro Camp, survivors report that authorities used an electric chair to extract confessions. “They put you on a chair, put some electrical plugs on your sensitive parts and then asked you to tell ‘the truth of the minister’. This meant that you had to praise ministers, and by doing so you accused yourself of being involved in conspiracies against the regime”, writes Alpha Abdoulaye Diallo 35 TimeLines

Portos in his book “The Truth of the Minister”, published in 1985, a year after the fall of the Sekou regime.

While in Germany rehabilitation of victims has been a political issue for a long time, this is still not the case in Guinea.

The current president, Alpha Conde, spoke recently to a delegation of the Association of Relatives of the victims.

He feared a boomerang effect of learning the truth about the past in Guinea: “Are children now ready to find out who killed their parents and continue to coexist peacefully with the perpetrators?” Conde does not believe it.

Yet for decades, survivors and relatives of victims have demanded truth and restitution. They want to know the location of the mass graves where the bodies of victims were buried in order to organise a dignified funeral and pray at their graves.

Authorities versus the Media There are still no free media in Egypt – even after the recent revolution. Germany after unification went a different way. A reflection on the role of the media in phases of societal transition.

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Bassem Youssef, Egypt’s top TV satirist, faces new legal action from the armybacked government which accuses him of creating chaos in the country – despite the fact that one of the reasons for the broad popular demonstrations against ousted President Morsi was his attempt to restrict the freedom of the media. Ironically, those who called for these demonstrations are the ones who are attacking Bassem Youssef now. In the first episode last summer, Youssef turned his comic jibes on the new government, joking about the popularity of army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

This opened a big debate about freedom of expression in Egypt, and the role of the media after the revolution.

Ahmed Farouq, an Egyptian journalist who has worked for the Arabic section of Deutsche Welle for 17 years, comments upon the recent developments in Egypt: “Almost all TV channels are speaking the same language, they are praising the military and damning anybody who criticises the armed forces. It is like the Hitler media or the media in any dictatorship.

Even in the Mubarak era it wasn’t like that. The printed press has still some critical voices, but the news coverage is anything else but professional.”

Farouq adds: “The Egyptian media at the moment lacks credibility and if it is

Text by Mostafa Hashem Abdou – Photo by Roger Anis

not controlled by the government, it is dependant on sponsors. The individual blogs and websites are more independent.” It is known that social media have had a significant role in the outbreak of the revolution on 25th January 2011.

Dr. Carola Richter, professor of media at Berlin’s University, says: “The media in Egypt tend to be loyalist to the army regime. This is a result of the media management under Mubarak where licences were granted to business moguls who benefited from the old regime and therefore supported it. Moreover, there has always been a press that stems from partisanship, thus reflecting only the opinions of a specific political group.

After Morsi came to power, the Islamist government did not change this fragmentation but tried to have its own impact on the media by establishing its own channels and newspapers. So, when it came to the protests, all media reported just a specific version and interpretation of the events. There was no objective journalism. In addition, most of the media sided actively with the army, thus providing for homogeneous reporting.”

Abeer Al-Saady, Vice Head of the Egyptian Journalists Union, says: “Hate speech reflected and fuelled by the media has increased and is exceedingly trapping media people in bias and polarisation.

There is no professionalism, and the hate speech sword is hanging over every journalist whose bad luck makes him cover the events in the streets. Attacks range from injuring, beating and harassment to 36 TimeLines

kidnapping and murder. At the very least, journalists are prevented from working and have their equipment like cameras and memory sticks seized.”

“Nine press people have been killed since the start of the revolution until now, in addition to dozens of injuries and arrests”, Abeer adds. “One journalist was killed in 2011, another one was killed in front of the presidential palace during the reign of Morsi in 2012. But seven journalists were killed between 27th June and September 2013, including four on 14th August alone, which is is a huge number. The result is that the increasing pace of violence reflected on journalists.

Fear and caution make them much more careful, and they are not even testing their boundaries anymore.”

Abeer confirms that impunity for killers and attackers of journalists will encourage further attacks: “None of the killers of the nine Egyptians journalists has been convicted yet.”

Dr. Najeh Al-Obaidi, an Iraqi journalist who witnessed media developments during the unification between East and West Germany, says: “The German media have dealt differently with the process of unity, despite the initial consensus to eliminate the phenomenon of a divided Germany.

But conservative papers focused on the advantages of unity for the Eastern part, while left-wing papers highlighted the disadvantages like high costs and unemployment because of the collapse of many East German industries.”

Egypt’s top TV satirist, Bassem Youssef, faces reprisals for criticising General Sisi, Chairman of the Military Council.

“The Communist regime in East Germany only allowed one opinion, that of the ruling party. Therefore the majority of the population was glad about the media freedom, pluralism and diversity that followed unification”, Al-Obaidi adds.

After unity, a limited number of East German newspapers and other media outlets could continue to work, many others had to close for political or economic reasons. Most of them could not withstand the competition from the West. In general, however, we can say that the German media maintained their diversity and independence after unification, despite many new challenges.

We visited the organisation “Media in Cooperation and Transition” (mict), an NGO that monitors the transformation and development of the media in states like Egypt, Libya, Iraq and Tunisia.

Managing Director Anja Wollenberg says: “In our experience, there are certain phenomena which often happen during revolutions and transitional phases.

The first thing is the appearance of new channels and newspapers that bring diversity in addition to the emergence of independent movements and committees. Strong media can influence politics and politicians as well as the constitution making process, as happened in Tunisia.”

But she resumes: “We do not see these things in Egypt. We do not see any media reform in Egypt, but other countries such as Tunisia and Libya are trying to reform themselves so that the media reflect the will of the people and not just the government. Therefore, what is happening in Egypt is an exception for us.”

Dr. Carola Richter agrees: “There have been no attempts to reform the Egyptian media institutionally. In my opinion, 37 TimeLines

there should be attempts to establish a truly public broadcasting, trying to encompass all relevant social and political groups. State TV and state press should be abolished. However, simply installing private media is not the solution. It needs a public monitoring system.”

Abeer Al-Saady from the Journalists Union admits: “Our Union itself needs to be reformed just like legal and other state institutions. The revolution in Egypt is now going into a fourth phase with the deterioration of the economic situation as well as the security situation.”

Rose- Anne Clermont, editor of the NGO mict, agrees: “The revolution in Egypt is not over, what is happening now is multiple waves of revolutions. And so far there has been no change because each regime that comes in is trying to control the media.”

Ambassador of Antiquities The bust of Egyptian Queen Nefertiti is the attraction of the Egyptian Museum in Berlin.

In an imaginary conversation, a countryman tries to convince her to return.

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The photo on the banner looks to the south-east where the sun is rising and where the land of her loved ones lies. My feet get almost stuck to the ground. It is the first time that I shall meet her. People from everywhere in the world come here to see her, nothing at the museum seems of value without her. She is the most beautiful woman, the beloved wife of Akhenaten, Nefertiti.

Many artefacts from ancient Egypt can be admired in large rooms before one gets to her place. Most of them were brought here at the time of the First World War. Nefertiti was taken even before that, in 1912, by the German Egyptologist Ludwig Borchardt. He transported his treasure hidden under broken pieces of pottery which were sent to Berlin for restauration.

Egypt’s former Minister of Antiquities Zahi Hawass demanded in 2010 “a formal return of the head of the Egyptian Queen Nefertiti to her native Egypt to be reunited with her husband, King Akhenaten”. The German Foundation for the Ownership of Prussian Cultural Goods, however, claims that no official request for the bust has ever been submitted and that it was legally acquired by the Prussian State. Also, a transport could not be recommended, as their scientists found out.

Wherever the sensitive old lady legally belongs – here in the museum, they make her stand alone in a glass box, protecting

Text by Ibrahim Zayed – Photo by Lux Tonnerre

her from abuse, spotting a dim light on her face. For me, she belongs to my home country, she is a relative.

“Hello my grandmother, how are you?”, I say loudly, full of happiness, stepping as close to her as I possibly can.

In my dream, she starts responding ...

My grandson, I am fine. How is Egypt and the Nile?

The Nile is still running. Now we have demonstrations everywhere, marching for democracy. It is a long way. Would you want to go back to Egypt?

No, I am here the Ambassador of Egyptian Antiquities, and they have treated me well since my immigration.

But this is not your land?

Well, I do no belong to any specific land, but every land belongs to me. I am a heritage of humanity. So don’t worry about me, let the people in Egypt know that it’s comfortable here for me. Everyone can come to visit me, I am the most important Egyptian statue here. If they treated me badly, demand to return me back.

Wouldn’t you like visiting Egypt?

I would like the chance to do even a short

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efertiti, whose name means “beautiful woman has approached”, was one of the most powerful women in ancient Egypt. Her husband was Akhenaten, who ruled Egypt in the fourteenth century BC. Her tomb is believed to has been found near the one of King Tutankhamun. It is also possible that her body was buried in the Royal Necropolis 38 TimeLines

visit to my husband and my tomb. But as you know that museum depends on me, missing me means closing it down, even if it was for a few days only.

But they can come to Egypt! We are welcoming people, and we miss you so much. Not all Egyptians can come here. I faced a lot of difficulties to get a visa. We don’t treat them like that.

If politicians can give up hate, the world will live in peace. I hope they learn from the past for their future.

Egypt without your face feels shameful.

Don’t say that, I am a sign of Egypt and Egypt is what I am. Every person visiting me, the wonder of Egypt, can also go to my birth land and see my history, drawn on the walls of temples, till my place of death.

Before we say good-bye, let’s take a memory photo!

Officer: Sorry, no photos, no photo with her.

At that moment, I wake up from my dream with a lot of questions. I wished there would be more cooperation between Germany and Egypt on the saving of our treasures. graves in Tel el-Amarna. However, it was not found amongst their mummies.

Her statue is more than 3,300 years old.

It was kept in the museum in Berlin after restoration. There were many demands to bring it back to Egypt. Both countries, Germany and Egypt, want to keep Nefertiti’s head.

TimeLines

A DW Akademie Workshop Magazine Berlin, Germany â&#x20AC;&#x201C; 21st October to 1st November 2013