visAvis no. 9

No. 9 - 2014

Voices on Asylum and Migration

Indhold / Content

4 9 17 22 27 31 35 37 41 46 52 56 57 59 65 72 75 78 80 84

Leder Sundhedslabyrinten – Hannah Lutz og Mia Mone Johansen Refugee riot in Békéscsaba – H. & activists from NO BORDER Serbia network Syreres kamp for beskyttelse i Danmark – Mette Lundsfryd A Prison Is A Prison Is A Prison – Katarzyna Winiecka and Louis Reumann "Be careful in the camp, be careful outside" – Lise Olivarius and Mia Mone Johansen Where are we now? – Abdullah Akbarjan Visual Vocabulary for the Refugee Protest Vienna – Katherine Ball, Katarzyna Winiecka and Imayna Caceres Migration and Cinema – Mark Le Fanu Kaninland – Ursula Scavenius We Are Here – Andrea Meng and Johannes Hein of the Bon Courage network Fra mudder og himmel – Ina Serdarević The Human Condition – Ina Serdarević A view of Ma'arrat al-Numan in liberated Syria – Adam Qvist and Ida Rump Fra Kalaallit Nunaat til København – Linea Kornum Rask "De sagde, jeg ikke eksisterer" – Linea Kornum Rask Comics from the Refugee Protest Camp in Berlin. – Yahya Hamdan The Promise – Hassina Burgan Do you want to know who I am? – Kourosh Farzin and Lise Olivarius Comic – Jimmy

2014 • visAvis №9

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Kolofon / Colophon:

visAvis er / visAvis is:

Redaktion / Editorial Board:

Bank Info

Anders Abildgaard Birte Wedel-Brandt Bonnie Fortune Carolyn Amrein Casper Øbro Christina Wendelboe Heidi Erschbamer Iain Boal Ismael Suleiman Ivona Kristic Jennie Kaae Ferrara Jimmy John Burgan Karen Ravn Vestergaard Kasper Abild Katherine Ball Katja Lund Thomsen Katrine Skovgaard Kipanga Kirstine Nordentoft Mose Kristjan Wager Kristian Byskov Kourosh Farzin Line Høeg Skov Liv Nimand Duvå Louise Rosengreen Marie Boye Thomsen Marie Markwardt Marie Northroup Morten Buchardt Paula Bulling Paula Nimand Duvå Sylvester Roepstorff Thomas Elsted Tora A. Schultz Larsen Yildiz Arslan Raz Mohammad Selab Ali Ali

Ann Sofie Brink Pedersen Ina Serdarević Rasmus Brink Pedersen Taniele Gofers Rikke Andersen Mia Mone Johansen Nimish Gautam Maria Timiș Lise Olivarius Hannah C. Lutz Linea Kornum Rask

Bank account/Bankkonto Jyske Bank Reg. Nr. 7851 Kontonr. 3285805 CVR-nr. 33788827 IBAN: DK4978510003285805 SWIFT: JYBADKKK ISSN: 1904-528X

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Design & layout: Casper Øbro, Marie Boye Thomsen

Print: Specialtrykkeriet Viborg

Types: Minion Pro, Sofia Pro

Cover: Ammenallah (see page 52)

Kontakt / Contact Skyttegade 3, 2200 Copenhagen N www.visavis.dk visavis.contact@gmail.com

Tak til/ Thanks to: The Trampoline House YNKB (Ydre Nørrebro Kultur Bureau) Makvärket Roskilde Festival (economic support)

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About visAvis

Om visAvis

visAvis is a magazine on asylum and migration, the movement of people across borders and the challenges connected to this.

We work to improve the debate on asylum and migration, among other things by publishing texts that people seeking asylum want to share. visAvis is an activist project where people with and without citizenship in Denmark meet to create an alternative public space and debate. visAvis is also a web magazine.

See more on www.visavis.dk and follow us on Facebook.

visAvis er et tidsskrift om asyl og migration, menneskers bevægelser over grænser og de udfordringer, der er forbundet med dette. Vi arbejder for at forbedre debatten omkring asyl og migration ved bl.a. at bringe tekster af folk, der søger asyl. visAvis er et aktivistisk projekt, hvor folk med og uden statsborgerskab i Danmark mødes om at skabe en alternativ offentlighed. visAvis er desuden et webmagasin.

Se mere på www.visavis.dk og følg os på Facebook.

Support visAvis

Støt visAvis

visAvis is free.

We are happy to receive any donation on our account: Reg. Nr. 7851 Account number. 3285805 IBAN: DK4978510003285805

visAvis er gratis.

Vi modtager med glæde donationer på vores konto: Reg. Nr. 7851 Kontonr. 3285805 IBAN: DK4978510003285805

2014 • visAvis №9

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Leder #9

Kære læser I dette nummer af visAvis bringer vi for første gang lederen på såvel dansk, engelsk og arabisk som pashto. Vi har efterhånden måttet erkende, at sproget til tider sætter grænser for, hvem der læser visAvis. Et problem, som især campgruppen ofte konfronteres med i lejrene. At kunne præsentere lederen på arabisk og pashto, som noget helt nyt, afspejler derfor vores ønske om at udbrede kendskabet til magasinet, de mange fortællinger, værdier og budskaber, på tværs af sprog og nationaliteter.

I efteråret 2013 lancerede campgruppen visAvis #8 i lejrene Avnstrup, Sandholm og Auderød. Det var, ligesom i foråret, dejligt at opleve stor interesse for magasinet og ønsker om at komme ud med og dele, ikke bare beretninger på skrift, men også visuelt kreative fortællinger fra og oplevelser med et frustrerende asylsystem og usikre rejser på tværs af grænser. Samtidig mødte vi dog mange, der hverken taler dansk eller engelsk og derfor ikke har adgang til at læse eller mulighed for at bidrage til magasinet.

Lederen her er første skridt i retning af at gøre magasinet tilgængeligt for flere.

Artiklerne præsenteres endnu udelukkende på dansk og engelsk - også selvom vi med jævne mellemrum modtager og publicerer artikler, der oprindeligt var skrevet på et væld af andre sprog - hvorfor vi også løbende har mange overvejelser omkring, hvordan vi kan blive bedre til at arbejde på tværs af sprog. Med denne leder håber vi også på at kunne nå ud til folk, der har lyst

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til at være med i redaktionsgruppen, og som kan bidrage med nogle af de sprogkundskaber, vi mangler, så vi engang i fremtiden vil være i stand til at udgive et flersprogligt tidsskrift. visAvis #9 står i billedets tegn og vi håber netop, at vi med de mange visuelle bidrag når en bredere skare af "læsere."

I visAvis #9 berettes om et kriseramt, ødelagt og menneskeforladt Syrien. Om opstande og protester blandt asylansøgere mod det europæiske asylsystem i Østrig, Danmark og Ungarn. Og om lange rejser på tværs af landegrænser samt udokumenterede migranters liv under jorden i forskellige europæiske lande, herunder disse menneskers adgang til sundhedsklinikker og lægehjælp. .

Vi ønsker jer rigtig god kigge- og læselyst! /visAvis redaktionen

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#9

2014 • visAvis №9

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Editorial #9

Dear reader In this issue of visAvis, we're publishing the editorial in Danish, English, Arabic and Pashto for the first time. We came to realize that language can limit who reads visAvis. A problem which the camp group in particular has been confronted with frequently in the camps. Being able to present the editorial in Arabic and Pashto, something completely new for us, reflects our desire to spread knowledge about the magazine, as well as the many narratives, values, and information across languages and nationalities.

In the fall of 2013, the camp group launched visAvis #8 in the Avnstrup, Sandholm and Auderød camps. Just as in the spring, there was strong interest in the magazine and a desire to share stories, both written and visual, expressing frustration with asylum systems and unsafe travel across borders.

However, many people that we met didn’t speak or read Danish or English, and therefore didn't have an opportunity to access or contribute to the magazine.

would like to be part of the editorial group, and who are able to contribute with the language skills we need, so that in the future we will be in a position to publish a multilingual periodical. This issue of visAvis is devoted to images and we hope that with its many visual contributions, we will be able to reach a wider audience of readers. visAvis #9 talks about a destroyed, crisis-struck, and forsaken Syria; and about uprisings and protests among asylum-seekers from the European asylum system in Austria, Denmark and Hungary. The magazine discovers long trips across national borders and undocumented migrants’ lives underground in various European countries, including access to health clinics and medical help.

We wish you all good viewing - and reading! /the visAvis editors

This editorial is the first step towards increasing the accessibility of the magazine.

Right now, the articles are still presented exclusively in Danish and English, but we regularly receive and publish articles that were originally written in a number of other languages. Because of this, we think it is important to continue to discuss how we can be better at working across languages. With this editorial we hope to reach people who

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‫‪#9‬‬

‫عساتلا ددعلا ة ّ‬ ‫يحاتتفا‬ ‫ةغللاب ةيحاتتفا رشنب ىلوألا ةرملل موقن فوس ‪ ،‬زيفازيف نم ددعلا اذه يف‬ ‫نكمي ةغللا نأ انكردأ دقل ‪.‬وتشابلا و ةيبرعلا ‪،‬ةيزيلكنالا ‪،‬ةيكرامنادلا‬ ‫نم ريثك يف ةلكشملا هذه تهجاو ذإ ‪.‬ئراقلا نيب و اننيب ازجاح ل ّ‬ ‫كشت نأ‬ ‫و ةيبرعلاب ريرحتلا ميدقت ىلع انتردق ‪.‬تاميخملا يف ةصاخ انءاّرق نايحألا‬ ‫ةفرعملا رشن يف انتبغر سكعي و انل ةبسنلاب امامت ديدج ءيش وه وتشابلا‬ ‫تاغل ربع تامولعملاو ‪،‬ميقلاو ‪ ،‬تاياورلا نم ديدعلا نع الضف ‪ ،‬ةلجملا لوح‬ ‫‪.‬ةفلتخم تايسنجو‬ ‫تاميخم يف ‪ 8‬زيفازيف ميخملا ةعومجم تقلطأ ‪ 2013 ،‬ماع فيرخ يف‬ ‫يوق مامتها كانه ناك ‪،‬عيبرلا لصف يف و ‪ .‬دوريدوأ و ملوهدناس ‪ ،‬بورتسنوأ‬ ‫ر ّ‬ ‫بعت يتلا ةيئرملا وأ ةبوتكملا ءاوس ‪ ،‬صصقلا لدابت يف ةبغرو ةلجملاب‬ ‫نكل ‪.‬دودحلا ربع رفسلا ةروطخ و ءوجللا ةمظنأ ببسب نيئلجاللا طابحإ نع‬ ‫ةءارقلا وأ مّلكتلا ىلع نيرداق اونوكي مل مهانيقتلا نيذللا سانلا نم ريثك‬ ‫وأ لوصولل ةصرف مهيدل نكي مل يلاتلاب و ‪ ،‬ةيزيلجنإلاب الو ةيكرامنادلاب‬ ‫‪.‬ةلجملا ىوتحم يف ةمهاسملا‬ ‫ىلإ لوصولا ةيناكمإ ةدايز وحن انيعس يف ىلوألا ةوطخلا وه لاقملا اذه‬ ‫ةيكرامندلاب ا ّ‬ ‫يرصح مّدقت تلاز ام انّداوم ‪ ،‬يلاحلا تقولا يف ‪.‬ةلجملا ىوتحم‬ ‫نم ددع يف الصأ تبتك تالاقم ماظتناب رشننو انلصت نكلو ‪ ،‬ةيزيلجنإلاو‬ ‫هيفيك لوح شاقنلا لصاون نأ مهملا نم هنأ دقتعن ‪،‬ببسلا اذهل ‪.‬ىرخألا تاغللا‬ ‫سانلا ىلإ لوصولا لمأن ريرحتلا اذه لالخ نم ‪ .‬تاغللا ربع لمعلا نيسحت‬ ‫ةمهاسملا ىلع ةرداقلا و ‪ ،‬ريرحتلا ةعومجم نم اءزج نوكت نأ يف بغرت يتلا‬ ‫رشن نم لبقتسملا يف اننكمي امب ‪،‬اهيلإ جاتحن يتلا ةغللا تاراهم يف‬ ‫اذه نأ لمأن نحنو ‪ ،‬روصلل سركم ددع وه ‪ 9‬زيفازيف ‪.‬ةددعتم تاغلب تا ّ‬ ‫يحاتتفا‬ ‫ىلإ لوصولا ىلع ًارداق نوكي فوس ةيرصبلا تامهاسملا نم ديدعلا لالخ نم ددعلا‬ ‫‪.‬ءارقلا نم عسوأ قاطن‬ ‫تاضافتنا نع و ‪ ،‬ةروجهم و ةرمدم ‪،‬ةمّزأتم ة ّ‬ ‫يروس نع ثدحتن ‪ # 9‬زيفازيف يف‬ ‫و كرامندلاو اسمنلا يف يبوروألا ءوجللا ماظن نم ءوجللا يبلاط تاجاجتحاو‬ ‫نيرجاهملا ةايح و ة ّ‬ ‫يموقلا دودحلا ربع ةليوطلا تالحرلا علطتست ةلجملا ‪ .‬رجملا‬ ‫ًالوصو ‪،‬ةيبوروألا نادلبلا فلتخم يف ةيّرسلا ةايحلا كلت‪،‬نييعرشلا ريغ‬ ‫‪.‬ةيبطلا ةدعاسملا و ةيحصلا تادايعلا ىلإ‬ ‫! انروص و انتالاقمل ةب ّ‬ ‫يط ةدهاشم مكل ىنمتن‬ ‫زيفازيف وررحم‬

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‫ ‪2014 • visAvis №9‬‬

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№9 visAvis • 2014

translation page 87

Sundhedslabyrinten Af Hannah Lutz og Mia Mone Johansen IllustrationS AF Marie boYe

Sundhedskortet er den gule nøgle til det offentlige danske sundhedssystem. Men hvordan ser retten til sundhedsydelser ud for de personer, der opholder sig i landet uden CPRnummer? Tildelingen af rettigheder varierer alt efter hvilken 'status' man tildeles - 'asylansøger', 'udokumenteret migrant' osv.. Og mens der er væsentlig forskel på tildelingen af rettigheder, kan der også være forskellige barrierer forbundet med den faktiske adgang til sundhedsydelser for personer, der søger asyl og personer, der lever i Danmark uden dokumenter og opholdstilladelse. Det er misforholdet mellem formelle rettigheder og den faktiske adgang til disse, som er udgangspunkt for initiativerne ’Sundhed for Alle, IMCC’ og ’Trampoline House Health Group’ og deres arbejde. I den første del af visAvis’ artikelserie om emnet, har vi mødt repræsentanter fra de to grupper til en snak om rettigheder og udfordringer forbundet med adgang til sundhed.

Konsultationer i Trampolinhuset For to år siden startede Jacob Antonsen, der er uddannet læge, med at lave konsultationer for asylansøgende personer i Trampolinhuset på Nørrebro. ‘Trampoline House Health Group’ (THHG) udsprang af en interesse og en bekymring for asylansøgeres reelle adgang til behandling inden for det offentlige sundhedsvæsen. Til konsultationerne tilbydes der primært rådgivning, og i dag laver gruppen også sundhedsrelaterede workshops. Konsultationerne afholdes hver fredag inden husmødet og fællesmiddagen for husets brugere, for da ved gruppen, at der alligevel vil være folk tilstede i huset. På månedsbasis kommer der omtrent 20-30 personer. Udover de ugentlige konsultationer er der en medicinstuderende fra gruppen til stede hver anden lørdag, hvor der er kvindedag i Trampolinhuset.

Ifølge Jacob er hensigten med konsultationerne at skabe et tillidsfuldt rum, hvor folk kan føle sig trygge til at komme med deres spørgsmål og bekymringer. "Det er meget de samme ting de kommer med som i en almindelig dansk lægepraksis; ondt i ryggen, ondt i halsen.

Derudover er der selvfølgelig en masse ting, som har at gøre med det at være fanget i et asylsystem i mange år, og det at have set sine venner og familie blive sendt tilbage, eller at være flygtet uden sin familie. Det at komme fra nogle ikke særlig rare situationer til en situation, som ikke nødvendigvis er mere rar. Så det er meget almindelige ting, men med en overbygning af det problem det er at være asylansøger."

2014 • visAvis №9

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Samtidig understreger Jacob, at de med konsultationerne sandsynligvis ikke når de asylansøgende personer, som har de største sundhedsrelaterede problemer. "Det er aktive, forholdsvis ressourcestærke mennesker, der opsøger os i Trampolinhuset.

Vi ser jo formentlig ikke de værste tilfælde, dem der ligger derhjemme og er meget deprimerede eller vanvittig syge." Af samme grund har gruppen tidligere forsøgt sig med en mere opsøgende tilgang i Avnstruplejren for at nå nogle af de mennesker, som er mere isolerede. Men på nuværende tidspunkt foregår alle deres aktiviteter i Trampolinhuset.

Oplysning om rettigheder ’Sundhed for Alle’ (SFA) er et initiativ under studenterorganisationen ’International Medical Cooperation Committee’ (IMCC), der laver sundhedsfremmende aktiviteter i ind- og udland. I SFA arbejder sundhedsfaglige studerende med og for udokumenterede migranters rettigheder til offentlig sundhedshjælp i Danmark. Gruppen startede op i 2010, og deres aktiviteter består af oplysningsarbejde, fortalervirksomhed, oplæg og workshops til primært andre sundhedsstuderende.

Aktivisterne i SFA har undervist på sygeplejerskeuddannelsen på Metropol. De har blandt andet arbejdet for at få inkorporeret et fast modul i curriculum om udokumenterede personers rettigheder og udfordringer, der er forbundet med deres adgang til sundhed. Det er især de nyuddannede sygeplejersker og læger, der er fokus for gruppen, idet de mener, at disse grupper har brug for en bedre indføring i den virkelighed, de vil møde ude på hospitalerne. Det fortæller Ida Buhl, som har været en del af SFA siden 2010: "Jeg tror flere af os tænker, at det er et større problem lige når man starter end når man har vænnet sig til, at der er en bestemt procedure. Vi har angrebet problemstillingen ud fra, hvordan man oplever det sundhedsfagligt - som er

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den ene indgangsvinkel, men den er meget tilgængelig for os. En anden tilgang kunne være, at man hjalp udokumenterede migranter mere praktisk med at bruge sundhedsvæsenet."

I november måned 2012 afholdt gruppen en international konference under overskriften ’Graviditetsundersøgelse i frokostpausen?

– Offentlig sundhedshjælp til udokumenterede migranter’. Konferencen satte fokus på problemstillingen om, hvorvidt og hvordan behandling af udokumenterede migranter kan løftes i offentligt regi, og hvorfor dette er så vigtigt. Konferencen var den første af sin slags, og den blev afholdt i samarbejde med en lang række lægefaglige foreninger og interesseorganisationer, som arbejder med og for personer, der søger asyl i Danmark, og flygtninge og migranter, der opholder sig udokumenteret i landet. Det var en meget positiv oplevelse, fortæller Ida: "Med 150 deltagere oplevede vi dagen som en stor succes. Det var spændende og kraftfuldt med et rum til denne diskussion, og min oplevelse er klart, at mange var parate til at ændre den offentlige debat, og til at turde tage diskussionerne om, hvordan vi agerer som sundhedsprofessionelle i forhold til denne brogede, blandede, skrøbelige gruppe mennesker." Der er blevet lavet en lille film over konferencen, som har været vist i Trampolinhuset.

SFA blev oprindeligt dannet af medicinstuderende aktivister, som havde været med til at sikre lægehjælp til de udvisningstruede irakere, der søgte tilflugt i Brorsons Kirke i 2009. "Idéen med gruppen var at danne et forum for sundhedsprofessionelle studerende, der havde en holdning til den her problemstilling. Både hvis der skete noget i stil med Brorsons Kirke igen, men også for at sige, at det var et problem, at der var en masse mennesker, der ikke kunne få behandling", fortæller Helle B. Krogh, som også har været aktiv i SFA siden 2010. Aktivisterne bag begge initiativer, SFA og THHG, var i sin tid med til at diskutere og arbejde for

№9 visAvis • 2014

oprettelsen af en sundhedsklinik for udokumenterede migranter og flygtninge.

Mens der allerede eksisterer flere og mere etablerede klinikker for migranter og flygtninge uden dokumenter i Sverige og Norge, findes der i dag to klinikker i Danmark. I 2011 åbnede Lægeforeningen, Dansk Flygtningehjælp og Dansk Røde Kors, ’Sundhedsklinikken’ på Vesterbro ved Hovedbanegården. Den er privatfinansieret, og var den første klinik i Danmark, der tilbød ikke-akutte behandlinger til personer uden dokumenter. Disse behandlinger er gratis og anonyme. I klinikken er der mulighed for at få ’almindelig’ lægebehandling, såvel som fysioterapi, akut tandlægebehandling, jordemoderkonsultationer og psykologsamtaler. Det frivillige sundhedspersonale er til stede i klinikken tre dage om ugen. På deres hjemmeside skriver Røde Kors, at der næsten har været 4000 besøg over de første to år. Grundet det store behov for lægehjælp åbnede de samme stiftere en lignende klinik i Århus i december 2013.

Formelle rettigheder Alle personer, der opholder sig i Danmark, har ret til akut hospitalsbehandling. Dette gælder for alle uanset juridisk status. For personer, der opholder sig i landet uden dokumenter, er akutte behandlinger de eneste sundhedsydelser, der løftes i offentlig regi. Personer, der er indregistreret i asylcentre har endvidere ret til anden 'nødvendig' behandling, det vil sige behandling, der på baggrund af en medicinsk vurdering, kan anses for at være 'uopsættelig og smertelindrende'. De er altså heller ikke dækket af sundhedssystemet i samme omfang som danske statsborgere eller personer med opholdstilladelse. Fra konsultationerne i Trampolinhuset har Jacob fået praktisk kendskab til nogle af de begrænsninger, som folk møder i det han kalder et parallelt sundhedssystem. "På papiret har du som asylansøger ret til nogenlunde det samme som folk med permanent opholdstilladelse

2014 • visAvis №9

eller statsborgerskab. Børn under 18 har ret til alt. For voksne bliver det en lille smule mere kompliceret."

Der er ifølge Jakob en begrænsning på eksempelvis, hvor mange speciallægebesøg man har ret til som asylansøger. På dette område mener han ikke, at lovgivningen følger med virkeligheden i lejrene. "De har ret til at blive set af speciallæger et vist antal gange, derudover har de ret til tandlægehjælp, men der er en økonomisk begrænsning, som jeg mener er på ca. 3000-5000 kroner. Det fungerer rigtig godt i forhold til, at flygtninge og asylansøgere er berammet til at skulle sidde i en lejr maksimalt 12 måneder. Det er bare ikke godt nok, når du sidder otteni år." På papiret er der ikke sat nogen begrænsninger på antal speciallægebesøg, besøg hos jordemoder eller praktiserende læger. Det er der ved psykolog og psykiaterkonsultationer. For et år tilbage blev det desuden besluttet at 'nødvendig' tandbehandling kan initieres af sundhedspersonale i asylcentrene uden en forudgående godkendelse hos Udlændingestyrelsen. Med Jacobs erfaringer in mente er spørgsmålet dog, om lovændringen kan mærkes af patienterne i praksis?

Udokumenterede migranter og udokumenterede flygtninge er blandt de grupper, der har færrest formelle rettigheder i det danske samfund, når det kommer til sygdomsbehandling. Derfor har SFA valgt at lægge deres fokus her. Personer uden dokumenter har som sagt ret til akut behandling, men denne rettighed kompliceres af, at betegnelsen ’akut’ ikke er nærmere defineret i loven.

Det er derfor op til den enkelte sundhedsfaglige at beslutte, hvornår en sygdom eller en skade er akut, og hvornår den ikke er. Ida påpeger dog, at det er klart, at det er ulovligt ikke at behandle i de tilfælde, der vurderes akutte. "Man skal give akut hjælp, og man bryder loven, hvis man ikke hjælper folk".

Både Ida, Helle og Jacob giver udtryk for, at adgangen til de formelle rettigheder ofte er fyldt med forhindringer. "Får de dét som de

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på papiret har ret til at få?", spørger Jacob, og formulerer dermed en fælles bekymring hos SFA og THHG. De formelle rettigheder kan ikke stå alene, og det er den væsentligste årsag til gruppernes virke.

Fra formel ret til praksis opfølgning og CPR-registrering Som det er nu mener Ida og Helle, at det største problem for personer uden dokumenter er, at de ikke har ret til opfølgende behandlinger på sygehuse og hos praktiserende læger. "Problemet er, at man ikke kan køre de længere forløb. Der kan være nogen, som har behov for at komme ind flere gange og måske blive testet. I disse tilfælde kan man ikke rigtig gøre noget", fortæller Helle.

Og skønt Røde Kors klinikken har et større råderum end de offentlige sygehuse, så er der endnu ikke noget samarbejde mellem disse aktører, fortsætter Helle: "Lige nu er der ikke en linje mellem klinikken med de praktiserende læger og hospitalerne. Der er jo også fysioterapeuter tilknyttet klinikken og alt mulig andet. Det ville derfor være optimalt, hvis man blev udskrevet til klinikken sådan, at de skulle følge op."

"Hvis jeg bliver indlagt, udskrevet, og så indlagt et andet sted, så kan man spore min behandling på mit CPR-nummer. Men de får lavet et nyt CPR-nummer hver gang, så man kan ikke vide, hvad der er foregået før, hvilket typisk kan betyde overbehandling og fejlbehandling." (Ida, SFA) Mens personer, der lever i Danmark uden dokumenter, har formel ret til akut behandling, så er selve adgangen til sygehusene præget af forskellige udfordringer.

Der kan være nogen, som af frygt for myn-

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dighederne, vælger at blive væk. Men der er også administrative udfordringer, mener Helle og Ida, når en patient ikke har et CPRnummer. "Hvis jeg bliver indlagt, udskrevet, og så indlagt et andet sted, så kan man spore min behandling på mit CPR-nummer. Men de får lavet et nyt CPR-nummer hver gang, så man kan ikke vide, hvad der er foregået før, hvilket typisk kan betyde overbehandling og fejlbehandling", siger Ida. Disse midlertidige CPR-numre gemmes ikke i systemet, hvilket sætter både patienten og behandleren i en vanskelig og potentielt farlig situation.

For asylsøgende personer kan der også ligge nogle betydelige udfordringer i adgangen til lægekonsultationer og behandlinger. I Trampolinhusets konsultation møder Jacob og hans kolleger personer, som ikke har fået den behandling, de har brug for. Jacob fremhæver tandlægebehandling, som et af de områder, der skranter. Med begrænsede ressourcer til dyre procedurer som rodbehandlinger, tyder hans erfaringer på, at lægen ofte ender med at bruge den billigste metode. "Så sidder der en ung, fancy afghansk dreng med håret sat rigtigt, og med det rigtige tøj og solbriller på, og får at vide, at han skal have hevet sine tænder ud, og skal rende rundt og ligne en gammel mand." Jacob tilføjer, at standarden ved behandlingerne kan være en del af problemet.

"Der er mange, som har fået nogle forfærdelige behandlinger hos tandlægerne."

Lige præcis med tandproblemer, er det desuden svært for THHG at hjælpe, da tandlægebehandling ofte er meget omkostningsfuld. "Vi har kontakt til tandlæger, der godt vil hjælpe os med akutte situationer", fortæller Jacob. "Men tit så siger de, at man selv skal betale for udstyret ellers så gør de det meget, meget sjældent." De asylansøgende har ikke selv mulighed for at betale for deres behandlinger, da de ikke har lov til arbejde så længe deres sag er under behandling, og de ikke er blevet tilkendt opholdstilladelse.

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Utryghed En anden årsag til, at personer, der søger asyl i Danmark henvender sig i Trampolinhusets konsultation er, ifølge Jacob, at de føler, de har brug for en ’second opinion’ efter besøg hos en praktiserende læge i lejrene. Det er Røde Kors, der har ansvaret for sundhedsklinikkerne i asylcentrene, og dette, mener Jacob, er ikke helt uproblematisk, da det kræver tillid at henvende sig med fysiske og psykiske problemer. Da Sundhedsklinikken på Vesterbro også administreres og drives af Røde Kors, kan det betyde, at nogle er utrygge ved at opsøge klinikken. "Røde Kors er den organisation, der i nogle asylansøgeres øjne holder dem i lejrene. Det er Røde Kors, der bestemmer, hvor mange penge de må få. Det er Røde Kors, der bestemmer over dem, og hvorfor skulle man så gå til dem med sine problemer? Der er nogle, der har sagt, at vi burde nedlægge os selv, fordi vi ikke skal modarbejde Røde Kors’ system. Men alle har ret til at få en second opinion, og hvis man ikke er tryg ved det system, der behandler en, så er man hjertens velkommen hos os", understreger Jacob. Han påpeger dog, at THHG på mange måder har et velfungerende samarbejde med Røde Kors klinikken på Vesterbro. "I ni ud af ti gange er vi fuldstændig enige i, hvad der er blevet sagt af Røde Kors, de er jo vores kollegaer, og de arbejder under det samme etiske kodeks, som vi gør. Vi, der sidder i Trampolinhuset, er for det meste unge nyuddannede læger, mens dem i Røde Kors har mange års erfaring med lige præcis denne patientgruppe.

Men nogle gange føler jeg, at patienterne i Trampolinhuset har brug for at høre det fra nogle de stoler på, og de stoler på os, fordi vi er en del af Trampolinhuset, som er deres egen organisation."

Manglende tillid til myndigheder kan som nævnt også stå i vejen for, at udokumenterede migranter opsøger hospitaler, selvom det drejer sig om noget akut. Det kan både handle om mangel på viden om rettigheder og om frygt for statslige institutioner som hospitaler. Hvordan kan man vide, at man

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ikke bliver meldt til politiet? Frygten for afvisning eller anmeldelse kan få nogle til at låne et sygesikringskort, når de skal på hospitalet. Helle fortæller om deres møde med en akutlæge, som nær havde fejlbehandlet en patient på baggrund af en andens journal. "Han fortalte om en, der lå på infektionsmedicinsk afdeling, hvor de nærmest havde været ved at slå ham ihjel, fordi der stod, at han havde diabetes. Det var hans fætters sygesikring." Ida og Helle mener derfor, at det er bedre at folk møder op uden et sygesikringsbevis. "Det er en misforståelse, når man tror, det giver behandling, hvis man kommer ind med et sygesikringsbevis.

Det er sådan noget, man skal oplyse om," siger Helle. "Og det kunne være rart for folk at vide, at sundhedsprofessionelle har tavshedspligt", tilføjer Ida.

Svært at nå kvinder Ifølge Jacob ser det ud til, at tærsklen til at søge lægehjælp er højere for kvinder, der søger asyl eller opholder sig udokumenteret i landet. Det er en anden tendens, der vanskeliggør aktualiseringen af formelle sundhedsrettigheder, og størstedelen af Trampolinhusets, og dermed THHG’s brugere, er da også mænd. "Statistisk set er kvinderne den mest udsatte gruppe i det danske samfund, såvel som i mange andre samfund, og ud fra et sundhedsmæssigt perspektiv er det også den mest udsatte gruppe blandt flygtninge og indvandrere", siger Jacob. Derfor mente THHG, at det var særlig vigtigt at kommunikere med kvinderne i asylcentrene, og opmuntre dem til at henvende sig med spørgsmål og bekymringer. Det fik gruppen til at afholde deres første workshop for kvinder i Avnstrup, men det opsøgende arbejde sluttede grundet administrative forhindringer på daværende tidspunkt, fortæller Jacob: "Vi ville også meget gerne arbejde i Kongelunden, hvor der blandt andet sidder enlige forsørgere, enlige kvinder og handicappede. Men Røde Kors er jo en kæmpe organisation, og tingene skal gå ad kommandovejen. De lå i en

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omstrukturering og havde ikke overskud til at åbne op for, at vi kunne komme igen."

Da THHG heller ikke har haft adgang til de andre asylcentre, foregår workshop-gruppens arbejde primært i Trampolinhuset.

Det betyder, at de står overfor samme udfordring igen; de kan holde workshops i Trampolinhuset, der er rettet mod kvinder, men kommer de mest sårbare, og dem med de største helbredsmæssige problemer?

Ambitioner og forhåbninger

Sundhedsklinikken på Vesterbro er privatfinansieret, og Helle og Ida er kritiske overfor, at man på denne måde opbygger et parallelt system, i stedet for, at klinikken løftes i offentlig regi eller, at hospitalerne åbent kunne behandle udokumenterede migranter og flygtninge. Men Ida, Helle og Jacob deler den erfaring, at problemet sjældent ligger hos lægerne og sygeplejerskerne. "Alle undersøgelser viser, at læger og sygeplejersker er villige til at bøje reglerne lidt", siger Jacob.

"Vi arbejder tit med skyklapper på over for systemer. I situationer, hvor man ikke er sikker på, hvad reglerne er, skal man lade sin tvivl komme patienten til gode – det er jo altid en subjektiv fortolkning. Generelt ser jeg en stor vilje til at behandle. Det er min generelle forståelse, eller min forhåbn-

Siden konferencen i 2012 har aktivisterne i SFA diskuteret, hvor de vil lægge deres fokus som gruppe. En af de udfordringer, som optager dem er, hvordan de kan være med til at gøre det nemmere for folk at opsøge hospitalerne og få den rette behandling. "Vi har "Vi arbejder tit med skyklapper på over for overvejet, om vi kunne systemer. I situationer, hvor man ikke er sikvære med til at organisere procedurerne og formalker på, hvad reglerne er, skal man lade sin isere dem lidt. Der er nogle tvivl komme patienten til gode – det er jo steder, hvor man kan søge på guidelines, for eksempel altid en subjektiv fortolkning. Generelt ser jeg intranettet på hospitalerne. en stor vilje til at behandle." (Jacob, THHG) I denne forbindelse kunne man sørge for, at der var nogle guidelines til, hvordan man hånd- ing om mit fag." Jacob mener, at det snarere terer situationer, hvor en person ikke har er i hospitalernes administration, hvor man et CPR-nummer", uddyber Ida. I både SFA eksempelvis møder små, men afgørende, og THHG mener de, at lægerne af ekstra forhindringer i computersystemet, "...hvor hensyn burde printe journalen ud til folk der skal indtastes denne her ene kode for, at efter endt behandling. Ifølge Helle ville det man kan putte folk ind i en boks, og komme gøre det meget nemmere for sundhedsper- videre til den næste side." Dette kan stå i vesonalet at få indblik i det forudgående for- jen for, at en person uden et CPR-nummer, løb, og for eksempel undgå fejlbehandling overhovedet når frem til dem, der står klar til at behandle. næste gang personen skal behandles.

SFA vil også gerne blive ved med at undervise og informere om de rettigheder, mennesker har i det nuværende system.

Det centrale spørgsmål, som blev diskuteret under konferencen i 2012, er stadig aktuelt, nemlig begrænsningerne i den offentlige sundhedshjælp til migranter og flygtninge uden dokumenter. På længere sigt ønsker SFA at arbejde for at forandre dette.

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Ida har dog for nylig set eksempel på en lille gestus, der gør det en smule lettere for en person, der lever udokumenteret i Danmark, at orientere sig i sundhedssystemets bureaukratiske labyrinter. "På et hospital her i København gik jeg helt tilfældigt forbi dér, hvor vagtlægerne holder til, dem der tager de almindelige ting inden man kommer på skadestuen. Og så står der et skilt: ’Hvis du

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ikke har noget sygesikringsbevis, så gå direkte til disken i stedet for at sætte dig ind’.

Det er måske mest af praktiske hensyn, men alligevel er det jo lige præcis det, vi godt vil have sker af sig selv, nemlig, at man prøver at tage noget ekstra hensyn."

I de kommende artikler i serien vil vi tale med personer, der har erfaring med at møde det danske sundhedssystem som asylansøgende, og som udokumenterede flygtninge og migranter. Vi ønsker også at tale med repræsentanter fra Røde Kors’ Sundhedsklinik.

FAKTABOKS - hvis du har brug for lægehjælp

Hvis du opholder dig i Danmark uden papirer, og har brug for hjælp ved livstruende akut sygdom eller skade, så ring 112. Har du brug for anden akut lægehjælp, så kontakt lægevagten (www.lægevagten.dk). Bor du i region Hovedstaden, så ring 1813.

På Sjælland kan du opsøge et af følgende hospitaler ved akut sygdom eller skade: Hvidovre Hospital, Kettegård Allé 30, 2650 Hvidovre. Hospitalet har Danmarks største fødselsafdeling – ring evt. til Dansk Røde Kors’ klinik lidt tid inden du skal føde.

Amager Hospital, Italiensvej 1, 2300 København S. Bispebjerg Hospital, Bispebjerg Bakke 23, 2400 København NV. Herlev Hospital, Herlev Ringvej 75, 2730 Herlev.

Køge Sygehus, Alléen 15, 4180 Sorø.

Nordsjællands Hospital, Dyrehavevej 29, 3400 Hillerød.

Roskilde Sygehus, Køgevej 7-13, 4000 Roskilde. Dette hospital har en psykiatrisk akutmodtagelse.

OBS. Rigshospitalet, Blegdamsvej 9, 2100 Kbh. Ø. Dette hospital har ikke en akutmodtagelse, hvor man selv kan møde op.

Hvis du opholder dig i København eller Århus uden papirer, og har brug for ikke-akut lægehjælp, så kontakt projektleder Vibeke Lenskjold for nærmere information om åbningstider og adresser (Dansk Røde Kors klinikker): Tlf. 3171 6164, vilen@rodekors.dk Her er også en tandlæge og en jordemoder, og de er meget hjælpsomme.

Hvis du vil vide mere om Sundhed for Alle, så se her: http://imcc.dk/aktiviteter/sundhed-for-alle-imcc/ Hvis du vil vide mere om Trampolinhuset, så se her: http://trampolinehouse.dk Kontakt til Trampoline House Health Group: jacobantonsen@gmail.com Kontakt til Sundhed for alle: sundhedforalle@imcc.dk

Litteratur: • Natasja Koitzsch Jensen, Signe Smith Nielsen og Allan Krasnik: Migrantstatus og adgang til sundhedsydelser i Danmark, 2011.

I Ugeskrift for Læger.

• Rune Aabenhus & Peter Hallas: Sundhedsloven og sundhedsydelser hos udokumenterede migranter, 2012. I Ugeskrift for Læger.

• Sundhedsloven, § 80 om adgang til akut behandling for personer uden bopæl i landet.

• Dansk Røde Kors’ Sundhedsklinikker: https://www.rodekors.dk/det-goer-vi/sundhedsklinik • Retningslinjer for bevilling af sundhedsbehandling til voksne asylansøgere mv. 2013, Udlændingeloven.

• Retningslinjer for bevilling af tandbehandling til voksne asylansøgere mv. 2013, Udlændingeloven.

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Oversættelse side 95

Refugee riot in Békéscsaba In Hungary, most asylum seekers are kept imprisoned in closed camps under constant threat of deportation and without the chance of a fair asylum procedure. In November 2013 around 200 residents of one such camp rose up against their unjust detention, the inhuman conditions of the camps, and all deportations. This article provides a brief introduction to the situation in Hungary, followed by an eyewitness account from the riot at Békéscsaba.

By H. & activists from NO BORDER Serbia network IllustrationS by Kristian Byskov

Most of the asylum seekers in Hungary are kept in closed camps, detained while awaiting the result of their asylum claim. Some are placed in so-called "open camps" or "nonsecure facilities", which they are allowed to leave for up to 24 hours. Whether a refugee is brought to an open or a closed camp depends on her or his country of origin. Refugees from countries that have better chances of being granted asylum in Hungary (such as Eritrea, Afghanistan and others) are "accommodated" in the open camps, whereas others are kept in detention in the closed camps for an uncertain period of time. A status quo representing a permanent violation of human rights by the Hungarian state and the European Union.

After a temporary interruption of the detention of asylum seekers as normative standard in Hungary, it was reestablished again in 2013. Now there are two ways in which people might find themselves at a detention center in Hungary. First, there are people who have been arrested in Hungary after crossing the border, and thus are forced to apply for asylum in Hungary. Secondly, there are those who have been deported to Hungary from other EU countries under the Dublin II Regulation, because they have fingerprints on record in Hungary.

In most cases it is assumed that the refugees have entered Hungary, and hence the EU, through Serbia, which is not a part of the EU, and where the largely dysfunctional asylum system leaves little hope that refugees will get any "protection". In this sense, the detention system in Hungary is an integral part of the general restriction of freedom of movement in Europe through Dublin II/III. After a hunger strike among refugees in October 2013 and a new wave of deportations, refugees started a riot inside the closed camp of Békéscsaba in November 2013. The majority of the residents of this camp had been caught at the border between Serbia and Hungary.

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The riot was a demonstration of the residents’ frustration at having been detained without reason, at the inhuman conditions in the camp, and the daily danger of sudden deportation to Serbia. Their struggle was against being kept like prisoners, for the possibility of living without the threat of deportation, and for freedom of movement. Their struggle reflects the strong dissatisfaction with the current European border system. H. is one of the 192 refugees who participated in the protest. This is his testimony: "Many times we made some small protests inside the camp in order to improve our conditions inside. For example we organized to reject food collectively. It all started when they took us to the closed camp. After our asylum application we were brought there. A court extends cases for at least two months; afterwards they keep us waiting.

The closed camp is like a prison. In Békéscsaba there were about 200 people, distributed among two buildings. The conditions were quite bad. We couldn’t decide for ourselves when to eat, or how much. It was also often bad food, or cold.

Then we heard that if we stayed in the camp for six months, they would deport us back [to outside of the EU or to Serbia]. We didn’t know exactly what would happen after these two months with which our cases had been extended. During this period I had seen that they

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deported people who had been there for four months (from Pakistan, Algeria, and other countries). They [the wardens and the police] would just come, without informing them beforehand, and deport them the same night, or the early morning of the following day. People here were angry that they are deporting us back. We came to seek asylum and they would just push us back to Serbia. Some of the people who were deported had not even officially received a negative verdict in their asylum cases.

We talked about it and discussed what to do. When some refugees from Mali arrived at the camp, they asked what was going on. Why we are kept in detention; we are not criminals, we are refugees. They then began a hunger strike for freedom. It started on the tenth of October 2013, and lasted for eight days. On the 14th of October, about 55 people from different countries joined the hunger strike. The camp authorities came and said they should stop the hunger strike immediately. The director promised that if they stopped their hunger strike, he would accelerate their asylum procedure. But they didn’t trust these empty promises. After the eighth day of the hunger strike, one on the refugees fainted. He was taken to a hospital. I also saw that there were people from the media trying to get access to the camp for interviews.

After that they stopped the hunger strike.

Surprisingly, after only one week, seven of the eight Malians, who had first started the hunger strike, received negative asylum verdicts. This was a direct response to their protest.

If you receive a negative verdict in your asylum case, you have three days to make an appeal against it, in order to let your case be checked by a higher court. This means that you have to wait another month in the closed camp. But many of us don’t know that. Only one of the seven people from Mali appealed, the other six got deported to Serbia four days later.

The situation was then the same as before. I only knew of two people who were granted the possibility of moving from the prison camp to an open refugee camp. In their case it was because of health problems. Women and girls are generally sent to open camps.

After about two weeks we organized a protest against our deportation and for freedom.

It was after an incident, where they deported three Pakistanis that had been there for four months. The same happened to a group of Senegalese. It was without reason. A while after we heard that one of them had died in Serbia where they had no place to stay. He froze to death, sleeping outside in the Serbian forests.

Almost everyone participated in the protest. We stood outside in the yard, holding up signs with slogans like "no deportations". It was a tense atmosphere, people were annoyed, standing up, protesting, shouting, but everything remained peaceful. Our action was invisible to the ‘outer world’– it was directed at the authorities of the detention camp. The managers and staff of the camp came out, and they told us that they couldn’t do anything. They said that they are like prison keepers. The orders come from Budapest, and our protest wouldn’t change anything. They even suggested that we give up our claims to asylum and leave Hungary. They told us that our fingerprints would then only be registered in Hungary, and we could apply for asylum in another EU country. [This was most likely a downright deliberate lie on their part, as it would be breaching the Dublin Convention]. Even though we were peaceful, many cops came with dogs and stayed inside the camp until 3 a.m. I remember the police commissioner of Békéscsaba city saying that if he were in our position, he would do the same.

We refused to give our names to the camp authorities and the police when they requested a list of the refugees who had participated in the protest. The eight hunger strikers had done this before, and we knew what had happened to them. During this protest there was no media present. So how could we address the public with our demands?

On the 11 th of November another three people were informed they would be deported.

I know it was a Monday. They reacted very angrily. The majority of refugees in Békéscsaba were standing behind them. It was too much this time. Everything happened quickly. There

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was a meeting, and after lunch the riot started: Things inside the prison were destroyed, glass broke, people were breaking the surveillance cameras and one of the buildings was set on fire.

All the time, everybody was saying ‘we need freedom’. I don’t know exactly, I guess around 200 people from many different countries participated in the uprising. Two people escaped at that time.

All the staff from the camp ran away, even the security guards. The reason why the asylum seekers did not run was that the detention center authorities kept all our belongings and money. Also, the camp is far from the city. Some of us tried to break the gate to get out, so people outside could see us and hear our demands, simply make our feelings heard, but after an hour the police came. They kept people from leaving. I saw many, many cops, completely armed, entering, with dogs, shouting that everybody should stop.

The same day, the police transferred all of us to other closed camps all over Hungary, saying that the camp was no longer secure. Some of us were not even allowed to pack our personal belongings. After one week, we were brought back to Békéscsaba. In the meantime, one of the buildings had been renovated. When we came back, the security guards were behaving much stricter than before: conditions had not improved, they had gotten worse. Now they no longer tell people in advance that they are facing deportation. Before the riot, a person would be informed the same day about the upcoming forceful deportation, but now they just come, pick the asylum seekers up, and deport them.

For some time, it seemed as if they would treat us better, maybe to prevent another protest. The milk in the morning was now served warm, no longer cold. But the situation inside the detention camp is still very bad. They even forbid you to take a second helping of food if you are still hungry."

These events took place without media attention. The riot and its revolutionary potential didn’t leave the walls of the asylum prison. The few reports that did appear focused on ‘the good work of the Hungarian firefighters’, reproducing racist views on the migration issue without contextualizing the refugee riot as a collective and self-organized step to fight the border system. The border can be anywhere for illegalized people in a cruel system that

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divides people into those that have papers and those who don’t, leaving the latter completely marginalized. But a dehumanized society is a society that harms everyone. The fact that asylum seekers are kept in closed detention centers needs more critical attention.

Scandalizing the bad conditions alone is not enough.

H. decided to stay in the detention center, but he - like many other refugees arriving in Hungary - didn’t get the chance of a fair asylum procedure. He was expelled illegally from the country by the Hungarian police without having received a final, negative asylum verdict.

H.’s initial has been changed to preserve his anonymity.

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translation page 112

Syreres kamp for beskyttelse i Danmark En gruppe syriske migranter aktionerede for en human behandling af alle syriske flygtninge i Danmark i forbindelse med Flygtningenævnets praksisændring i september 2013.

Det blev et absurd møde med et system, der blindt insisterede på praksisændringen som "positiv."

Af Mette Lundsfryd

"Oh spinning world, if my little heart, as small as a lump of coal, is wider than your borders, I know how narrow you are!" Samar Yazbek, 15. april 2011, Damaskus Syrere bosat i asylcentre i hele Danmark kom fredag før efterårsferien til København for at ytre deres legitime krav til Danmarks sidste instans i asylproceduren, nemlig Flygtningenævnet. Planen var, at de ikke ville forlade Flygtningenævnet før kravet om asyl til alle syrere var imødekommet. Men døren til Flygtningenævnet var låst. "I har ikke noget at gøre her", sagde en mand, der stod i døren. Hvis afviste syrere, der endnu ikke har hørt noget fra Flygtningenævnet siden praksisændringen og derved står i et juridisk vakuum, ikke har noget at gøre i Flygtningenævnet, hvem har så?

Syrernes krav Flygtningenævnet ændrede den 18. september 2013 praksis i forhold til personer, der er flygtet fra Syrien. Praksisændringen givere syrere, der kan bevise, at de er fra særligt farlige områder i Syrien, mulighed for midlertidig opholdstilladelse.

Nævnet synes, at det er meget positivt. Syrerne synes, det er absurd, fordi nogle er fra områder, der ikke anerkendes af Danmark som farlige nok. Andre har selvsagt ikke mulighed for at tage tilbage til Syrien for at finde beviser for, at de er personligt forfulgt, og at de er fra særligt farlige områder. Mange af dem, der mødte op, havde ikke hørt fra Flygtningenævnet og vidste ikke, om de var købt eller solgt

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Gruppen bestod både af syrere, der ankom til Danmark for tre måneder siden, nogle der har været i Danmark i et års tid og andre igen, som har været i Danmark i op til 10 år og boet lige så længe på asylcentre her i landet - også i lang tid efter at være blevet afvist. I Danmark har de været fastlåst, dels på grund af loven i FN’s Flygtningekonvention om non-refoulement, i.e. at man ikke må hjemsende et menneske til et land, hvor denne risikerer dødsstraf eller tortur og dels på grund af Dublin-konventionen, der fastholder en asylansøger i det europæiske land, hvor vedkommende først har fået taget fingeraftryk.

Syrere med dansk statsborgerskab deltog også i aktionen for at vise deres solidaritet. Efter forhandlinger fik fem syrere, en tolk og undertegnede lov til at komme med ind og tale med en repræsentant fra Flygtningenævnets sekretariat.

Syrerne havde skrevet et dokument med deres krav til systemet og indsamlet underskrifter, som blev overleveret til manden fra sekretariatet.

Kravene er: • Anerkend alle syrere som flygtninge og giv dem permanent ophold.

• Anerkend hele Syrien som farligt territorium og drop ’område-strategien’, der indebærer, at en person, der er flygtet fra Syrien skal bevise, at hun er fra et særligt farligt område i Syrien eller skal gennem et sådant for at komme hjem. Den danske stat anerkender derved ikke hele Syrien som farligt område og forsøger på denne absurde måde at begrænse antallet af opholdstilladelser.

• Giv syrere med familier i andre europæiske lande mulighed for at blive familiesammenført, så familierne ikke skal leve splittet.

• Drop sager, der betegnes som Dublin-sager, i.e. sager, hvor en person har sat sine fingeraftryk i et andet europæisk land før ankomst til Danmark. Ifølge Dublin-konventionen kan en person kun søge asyl i det første europæiske land, vedkommende ankommer til.

• Tag del i byrdedelingen mellem europæiske lande, sådan som Danmark også har skrevet under på at gøre via FN’s Flygtningekonvention.

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Mødet med systemet Vi blev inviteret ind i et lille lokale placeret midt i et lyst rum som en glasmontre. Systemet blev nu til et menneske, der sad for enden af et sort bord. Denne repræsentant fra Flygtningenævnets sekretariat personificerede systemets snæverhed. Lokalets vinduesparti vender direkte ud mod Adelgade, og vinduerne er blændet af tætte, sorte tremmelignende lister, der dækker hele bygningens facade. Forsamlingen ude på gaden kunne knap nok se ind. Indefra havde vi udsigt til alle dem udenfor. De bekymrede blikke, utålmodige bevægelser og dybe stemmer, som fordrejedes gennem ruden, kunne tydeligt ses og høres i glasmontren. Systemets mand bekendtgjorde, at han ikke var fra Flygtningenævnet, men en del af Flygtningenævnets sekretariat. Blandt de fem syrere, der var kommet med indenfor, var en ældre kvinde, som fortalte om sine to sønner og datter, der var blevet dræbt i Syrien, om sit hus der var brændt ned og om livet i et asylcenter, når man har været udsat for alt det, mens man kæmper mod kræft, har fået to afslag på asyl, og ens tilbageværende søn skal deporteres til Italien. Så var der en midaldrende mand i et fint, sort jakkesæt med et kurdisk flag som nål i kraven, som fortalte om sine tre afslag på asyl; afslag, han havde fået trods den ændrede, danske praksis. En ung mand, som ikke sagde noget, men blot stod og lyttede til tolken og en høj rank mand, som kunne fortælle, at han har boet 10 år i Danmark på asylcentre og ikke kan vende tilbage til Syrien, men også har fået afslag trods den ændrede praksis. Endelig var der en ung familiefar, som var kommet til Danmark med sin kone og to små børn, men som på trods af at have præsenteret nye beviser i sin sag for over et år siden stadig ikke har fået noget svar fra Nævnet.

Systemets mand fortalte om konsekvenserne af den ændrede praksis, og han blev ved med at understrege, hvor positivt det hele var, mens han tydeligvis blev følelsesmæssigt påvirket af fortællingerne fra de fem personer, og af to børn - den unge familiefars - hvis hænder var små nok til at nå ind mellem de sorte tremmer og slå på ruden til lokalet. Det fik et smil frem på hans læber.

"Kun folk fra særligt farlige områder kan få ophold" Under samtalen ridsede systemets mand de nye regler for syrere i Danmark op og beskrev situationen i Syrien for dem, der netop er kommet til Danmark derfra: "For det første er konflikten i Syrien ikke lige intens over hele landet. Derfor kan alle syrere ikke bare få opholdstilladelse i Danmark med henvisning til situationen i Syrien."

De fem syrere svarede nærmest enstemmigt: "Alle steder er farlige. Der er krig" Han fortsatte, "For det andet; Kun folk fra de områder, hvor der er væbnede kampe og angreb mod civile, vil kunne få opholdstilladelse alene fordi, de kommer derfra. Eksempelvis har Nævnet givet tilladelse til to fra Yarmouk-lejren i Damaskus (en flygtningelejr for palæstinensiske flygtninge). For det tredje, hvis man kommer fra et mere roligt område, men skal rejse igennem et af de farlige områder for at komme hjem, kan man få en tilladelse". Han fortsatte: "Hvis man er syrisk statsborger og har fået afslag før konflikten i Syrien brød ud, har man også mulighed for at få sin sag genoptaget. Man kan altid skrive til Nævnet og indsende nye oplysninger."

Denne forvirrende udredning skabte undren i gruppen: "Men hvordan skal

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vi finde nye oplysninger, når vores huse og byer er brændt ned?", spurgte den ældre dame.

"Jeg har fået nye oplysninger om, at jeg ikke har noget hus længere. Jeg afleverede oplysninger for et år siden og har ikke hørt noget", sagde den unge familiefar.

"Enten må I give mig opholdstilladelse eller sende mig tilbage. Jeg har været her i 10 år. Jeg dør langsomt."

Systemets mand flyttede sig utålmodigt på stolen og svarede: "Det kan jeg jo ikke hjælpe med. Det jeg kan sige er, at man gennemgår alle sager for at se, hvem der skal have opholdstilladelse. Og det skal dem fra de områder, hvor der er kampe eller overgreb mod civile."

Den ældre kvinde sagde stille: "Lyt til mig. Jeg er syg. Jeg har fået fem operationer. Min mand er også syg. Jeg har mistet alt, også helbredet. Vi vil bede om hjælp".

Manden fra sekretariatet svarede tynget: " Ja… Jeg kan jo ikke love nogen noget.

Den beslutning, nævnet har taget, er positiv. Rigtig mange, der har fået afslag, er meget tættere på en tilladelse end hidtil. I er velkomne til at gå hjem og finde yderligere oplysninger om jeres sager."

Det var tydeligt, at alle fem syrere opfattede ordet hjem som Syrien og ikke som asylcentrene i Danmark. Derfor forstod de ikke, hvordan de skulle kunne ’tage hjem’ og finde nye oplysninger, når deres land er i krig.

Vente eller gå hjem Systemets mand ville virkelig gerne have mødet afsluttet, hvad hans kropssprog afslørede ved, at han rejste sig og hvilede knæet på stolen. Den midaldrende mand spurgte: "Skal vi vente her eller gå hjem?"

"Det giver jo ikke mening", svarede systemets mand. "Flygtningenævnet arbejder som en domstol og lader sig ikke påvirke af, at I er her. Husk først og fremmest, at ingen bliver tvangsudsendt til Syrien. Jeg kan godt forstå, at rigtig mange af jer befinder sig i en utrolig presset situation, og det har været et langvarigt ophold her i Danmark. Og situationen i jeres hjemland er skrækkelig. Men jeg kan ikke love, at I alle sammen får en tilladelse, når I går herfra. I skal vide, at den beslutning, som Flygtningenævnet har truffet den 18. september, generelt er meget positiv i forhold til jeres situation."

Den ældre dame svarede: "Min søn skal deporteres til Italien. Så det er jo ikke rigtigt, at I ikke udsender tvangsmæssigt."

"Jeg kan ikke gøre noget ved det. Justitsministeriet er klagemyndigheden", svarede systemets mand.

Personligt har jeg svært ved at se noget positivt ved den måde, syrerene kategorisk afvises på. En søn skal deporteres til Italien, men i systemets øjne er det ikke en deportation. En familie er splittet, men i systemets øjne er det en sag for en anden myndighed. En mands liv er i ruiner efter 10 års ophold i danske asylcentre og nu skal han bevise, at han er fra et bestemt, særligt farligt område i Syrien, for at kunne få opholdstilladelse. Det er Danmarks indenrigspolitiske svar på uhyrlighederne i Syrien. Intet er positivt.

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Vaskede hænder Netop som vi i oktober 2013 mindedes 70-året for jødernes flugt fra Danmark til Sverige, står vi i en situation, hvor mennesker på flugt fra et repressivt regime ville ønske, at de var nået til netop Sverige i stedet for Danmark. Sverige har siden 2011 givet syrere 3 års opholdstilladelse ved ankomst, og i august 2013 ændrede Sverige praksis og giver nu alle syrere ubegrænset opholdstilladelse. Kan vi om 70 år mindes de syrere, der i deres flugt fra en diktator strandede i et juridisk vakuum i Danmark?

Den fremmedfjendske diskurs genlyder i Flygtningenævnets retorik.

Ekskluderende og ignorant lyder det fra Nævnet: "Flygtningenævnet finder fortsat ikke, at situationen i Syrien er sådan, at alle, der kommer fra Syrien, ved en tilbagevenden til landet risikerer overgreb omfattet af Den Europæiske Menneskerettighedskonventions artikel 3 og derfor vil skulle meddeles asyl."

På min vej ud fra Flygtningenævnet trak ’systemets mand’ mig til side, gav mig hånden og sagde, "Du må virkelig forklare dem, hvor positiv, den ændrede praksis er. Det er som om, de ikke forstår det. Hvor taler du i øvrigt godt arabisk. Tak fordi du holdt god ro og orden på dem i dag."

Jeg væmmedes ved, at han talte til mig, som om jeg er mere værd end de mennesker, han lige havde siddet overfor, og som havde fortalt ham deres hjerteskærende, personlige historier. Jeg ved, at han ’bare’ er systemets budbringer. Hans hænder er vaskede ved embedsmandens håndvask, men hans hænder opretholder også den kolde bureaukratiske jernlov, der gør verden så snæver.

FAKTABOKS

Dags dato arbejder Flygtningenævnet fortsat med samme praksis, som blev indført 18. September 2013. Et notat fra november 2013 fra Udenrigsministeriet understreger dog, at den farlige situation i Syrien i stigende grad gælder alle områder i Syrien, samt at 40 % af den syriske befolkning nu har behov for humanitær hjælp. Desuden betegnes situationen i Syrien af FN som den største humanitære krise siden Anden Verdenskrig. Nogle af de syrere, som deltog i aktionen, har fået genåbnet deres sager. To af dem, der kom med ind til Nævnet fredag før efterårsferien, har 17. januar 2014 fået meddelelse om asyl. Resten venter stadig på svar, og en stor gruppe af statsløse kurdere fra det nordlige Syrien har fortsat fået afslag fra Nævnet og venter i uvished.

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A PRISON IS A PRISON IS A PRISON Are you for a positive community development through the possible establishment of business entities in Vordernberg, [...] the creation of around 150 jobs in Vordernberg […] in connection with the construction of a detention center, yes or no? (Referendum, 2009) Report from Vordernberg, Austria - 15th of January 2014

By Katarzyna Winiecka, Photos By Louis Reumann

70 percent of the citizens of the village Vordernberg voted for the construction of a modern prison for migrants and refugees.

The Viennese office SUE won the bid to build the deportation center. They style themselves as progressive reformers. For them the detention prison is "a hostel, where people will temporarily live". A three-story building for offices governing asylum law, police and administration hides the fence system surrounding the backyard. The street windows allow for curious citizens to look inside. To "preserve the dignity of the self-determined human being" gym and sports facilities, green terraces and a library were added to the design.

The Austrian Ministry of Interior has signed a 15-year contract with the global private security company Group 4 Securicor. This is the first time that the Austrian State has outsourced prison infrastructure in this way and on this scale.

Hundreds of citizens, amounting to more than half of the population of the area, came to the inaugural "open door" event on the afternoon of the 15th of january, queuing for hours outside the entrance. The goulash served by the local fire brigade was accompanied by racist comments and disappointment amongst the guests that no detainees were on display yet.

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Throughout the day the event was met by protest actions. Refugee Protest Vienna was there to demand freedom of movement for all and an immediate stop to the prison and deportation system.

The question now is: What possibilities are there for the activist community to gain knowledge and offer support to the people caught in this system? An airport is now being planned in connection with the remote deportation center. If constructed, the airport will make the lives and future of the isolated migrants more precarious as well as the work of human rights and activist groups more difficult.

Illustration by Yildiz Arslan

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"Be careful in the camp, be careful outside"

Rachel has experienced the multiple challenges of being a lesbian asylum seeker from Uganda in Denmark. In the organization LGBT Asylum, together with other migrants and Danish citizens, she fights for the rights of LGBT asylum seekers and attempts to break the isolation.

By Lise Olivarius AND Mia Mone Johansen • Illustration by Yildiz Arslan

"At least I can talk now," says Rachel. "During my first interview with the immigration service in Denmark, I couldn’t speak. The first time I talked to Julie, I couldn’t speak either.

Today is the first time I’m able to tell my story without crying. I’m gaining strength, from Julie and from myself."

Rachel is twenty-seven years old, from Uganda, and seeking asylum in Denmark. Julie is a Danish citizen and her contact person in LGBT Asylum, a group of people working for the rights of LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) asylum applicants in Denmark.

"When I began to realize that I was a lesbian, I didn’t tell anyone," says Rachel. "It was just between me and my girlfriend. I was twelve. When I was fifteen, my father found out I was a lesbian, and he was really angry with me. After some time, he decided to tell me that he would teach me what a woman is supposed to be." Rachel pauses and breathes deeply. "’It’s not supposed to be woman with woman; it’s supposed to be woman with man’, he said."

While her father has abused her sexually and physically for more than eleven years, Rachel is the one being charged with "sexual misconduct".

In Uganda, homosexuality is a criminal offence. A bill toughening the anti-gay laws, imposing a life sentence for "homosexual acts", and furthermore making it a criminal offence not to report LGBT people to the police has recently passed through the Ugandan parliament. Although the bill in January 2014 was surprisingly blocked by the president, who

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refused to sign on the grounds that there are better ways of curing gay people of their "abnormality", Uganda remains famous for its harsh, almost unparalleled anti-gay laws.

Proposing death penalty for homosexuality has been under consideration regularly. But in spite of that, and despite Danish law in principle granting asylum to people facing persecution for belonging to a particular social group – and people with non-normative gender identities or sexual orientations constitute such a group – Rachel has been denied asylum twice in Denmark. The reason?

The Danish authorities simply don’t believe that she is a lesbian.

Her case is far from unique. The outcome of an asylum case in Denmark stands or falls with the first interview with the immigration service. If the asylum seeker doesn’t tell a coherent and accurate story during this first – often hour-long interview – s/he is deemed "untrustworthy", which often has an immediate negative effect on the case. Getting their story straight is a challenge to most asylum seekers. Many are traumatized, suffer from partial memory loss, or just general confusion, and many are on guard against the police and the authorities and apprehensive about what to tell them. That is not least true with LGBT asylum seekers. Considering that they in many cases have had to hide their sexuality or gender identity their whole life, and that they are often fleeing from persecution because of the very same, it is understandable that many – like Rachel – don’t just voluntarily out themselves to the foreign authorities, as they are unaware that emphasizing their sexual orientation or gender identity actually would crucially affect their asylum case in a positive direction.

"They don’t know if it’s safe to tell, or if it’s even legal," Julie explains. "And how would they? No one tells them. That’s why we try to reach people before their first interview."

Even if an asylum seeker does identify as an LGBT person in their first interview, there is no guarantee that the authorities

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will believe them. The burden of proof lies upon the asylum seeker. "And how do you prove that you’re gay," Julie asks rhetorically.

That is just one example of the Danish asylum system’s complete lack of understanding of the needs of LGBT people. A system with little, if any, room for LGBT people and their needs, at best acknowledging LGBT asylum seekers by demanding that they be gay or transgendered in ways that are visible, verifiable, and recognizable according to Western norms.

In LGBT Asylum, migrants and Danish citizens work together on raising awareness about the rights and needs of LGBT asylum seekers. Most of the energy of the group is poured into specific asylum cases, mainly of people from countries where homosexuality and transgenderism is criminalized. Rachel and Julie are currently working on the difficult and challenging task of reopening Rachel’s case after it has been closed. The organization is also a social network for LGBT people without and with Danish citizenship. "A family", as Julie puts it.

Forced to leave home "The first time I got pregnant, I had no one to turn to," Rachel continues her story. "My father forced me to get an abortion. When I was seventeen, I gave birth to a little girl.

Things were not good, but I had nowhere to go. Then when I talked to my girlfriend, she said we should try to raise some money so I could go somewhere safe."

For more than five years, Rachel and her girlfriend worked to save enough money to pay a human smuggler to get Rachel to Europe. Meanwhile, she got pregnant again – this time with twins. She couldn’t report her father for abusing her for fear that he in return would report her for being gay. She only confided in her girlfriend.

When the two of them finally scraped together enough money, Rachel planned to flee the country and leave her children in the care of her sister. The night before she was supposed to leave, her father accused

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her of turning him in, and beat her. The next morning he didn’t wake up. He was dead.

When Rachel was interrogated by the police, she told them about the abuse. As she couldn’t explain why she never had gone to the police, they suspected her of killing her father.

"When I called my girlfriend and told her what had happened, she said, ’Now you have every reason to leave. Now the police are going to find out that you’re a lesbian.’"

The next day, Rachel managed to escape, and a couple of days later, she arrived in Denmark.

"You can’t feel safe in the camps" "When I came to Denmark, life was also hard. First I had to run away from the man who brought me here. Because he also wanted to use me. I didn’t know anything about the asylum system. I stayed underground for like one month. Then I was caught in a train by the police. They told me, ’There are two options: We put you in prison or you seek asylum.’ So I applied for asylum, and they said no. I applied again, and they said no. After the second interview, I learned about LGBT Asylum."

The group meets the last Friday of every month to work and socialize together. For the asylum seekers, it’s a welcome opportunity to get out of the camps that in many ways are particularly unsuited and uncomfortable for LGBT people – and, for that matter, for women.

"You can’t feel safe in the camps," as Rachel puts it, "with women and men mixed together, and the majority being men.

Sometimes I’m even afraid to go out and get something to eat."

Julie elaborates: "It’s hard to have any privacy in the camps, especially for LGBT people, if you want to be open about your sexuality, if you want to have some literature about LGBT stuff. Especially for people with a background of sexual violence, it feels really, really unsafe."

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We meet Rachel the night before she is moving from the camp Avnstrup. With the help of LGBT Asylum, she is being transferred to Kongelunden, a camp that has a separate center for women.

"I don’t know what’s there, but I know it’s a women’s center. At least that gives me hope that I’ll be safe," says Rachel.

Breaking the double isolation Like most LGBT asylum seekers, Rachel has fought the double isolation of falling outside of both the national and the sexual norm.

"As an LGBT asylum seeker, you’re really isolated," Julie explains. "A lot of other asylum seekers have diasporic communities among people from the same country, and maybe someone else, but it’s harder when you’re an LGBT person, and you don’t know if you can be open about yourself."

Rachel: "When I was in the camp, life was really hard. Because I had no one to talk to. The only person who used to call me was my pastor. I couldn’t be open with him or his wife, even though they were so friendly. So life was just like this. I met some Ugandan ladies, but I could not be open with them, because I didn’t know who they were. I didn’t know what would happen if I told them that I’m a lesbian. But then I met one of them at the Pride. Now we talk like sisters."

"You just have to be careful most of the time. Especially in the camp. Then you have to know fast, ’is she a homosexual?’ before you can say, ’I’m a person like you.’ That is the situation. Be careful in the camp, be careful outside."

Though Rachel feels like an outsider in the asylum system because of her sexual identity, paradoxically, the same system deemed her not gay enough to be included in the protection of the Danish nation.

LGBT Asylum provides a safe space and a sanctuary from both the camp and surrounding society. The organization offers legal aid and social work to specific asylum

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cases, and the last Friday in every month, people gather from camps all over Denmark for the monthly meeting. People share experiences and resources, arrange collections of warm clothes for the winter, or help each other out with translating and understanding official letters from the immigration authorities – which always are in Danish, as Rachel explains with an exasperated laugh.

"After the dinner, we hang out," says Rachel. "Sometimes we go to the movies together, and sometimes we go to a bar. That’s what we do the last Friday of the month."

Julie: "For example, we went to the Women’s House, and also Vela and some other gay bars."

People from the network also often go together to events such as Copenhagen Pride or MIX Film Festival, the annual LGBT Film Festival in Copenhagen.

The right to live openly Apart from the many LGBT asylum seekers who, like Rachel, are outright persecuted in their home countries, LGBT Asylum also attempts to safeguard rights of another group: people whose LGBT identity might not be known to their local authorities, but who apply for asylum on the ground that they cannot openly prac-

tice their sexuality or gender identity in their home country, where homosexuality or transgenderism is criminalized. LGBT Asylum advocates for the rights of both groups, arguing that everyone should not only have the right to security, but also to express their sexual or gender identity without fearing criminal charges.

"In January 2013, an Afghan homosexual man was granted asylum in Denmark.

Not because he was wanted by the police, but simply because he was gay. And that meant that for further cases, they couldn’t just tell a person to go back and be discrete about their sexuality and hide and be in the closet, like they used to," tells Julie and points out that this case ought to set a precedent.

Unfortunately, the Afghan verdict won’t have much impact on Rachel’s case, which closed before January 2013. However, after Rachel and Julie have presented new evidence to the Refugee Appeals Board, there is still hope – albeit faint – that the case will be reopened.

"Sometimes you live in a combat," says Rachel. "With my friends in LGBT Asylum, at least I have found peace to know who I am and feel comfortable to talk to people who can understand me."

Factbox

If you are an LGBT asylum applicant in Denmark, the organization LGBT Asylum can help you with support and counseling in relation to your asylum case. The earlier you contact the group, the better chance they have to assist you. You can also contact the group if you are interested in getting to know other LGBT asylum applicants. You can be completely anonymous if you wish.

Contact: Tel. +45 71 52 33 97 E-mail: lgbtasylumdk@gmail.com Website: www.lgbtasylum.dk

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WHERE ARE WE NOW? One year of the Refugee Protest Camp in Vienna

By Abdullah Akbarjan

On November 11th, 2012, we, a group of refugees from the Traiskirchen camp (the largest asylum camp in Austria), marched together with allies to Vienna and started our camp in Votivpark. At that time, we were about 200 people. Our demands at that time were: 1 better translators, 2 access to the administrative court and more legal aid, 3 stop all deportations, 4 better medical care, 5 no transfers to remote rural areas, 6 German lessons and vocational training for asylum seekers, 7 regular schooling of children in the camp of Traiskirchen, 8 better food, 9 clean and good clothes and shoes, 10 better conditions and higher payments for work in Traiskirchen, 11 free tickets for public transport, 12 more pocket money, 13 internet access and satellite TV.

Occupation of the Votivkirche 65 of our people then decided to occupy the Votivkirche church and to start a hunger strike. At this time, we also revised our demands: "(1) Grundversorgung (basic support) for all asylum seekers as long as they reside in Austria, irrespective of their legal status, (2) free choice of their location of residence

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in Austria and access to public housing for all asylum seekers residing in Austria – no transfers against the wishes of the people concerned, (3) access to employment, educational institutions and social security for all migrants residing in Austria, (4) stop all deportations to Hungary – stop all deportations associated with the Dublin Regulation II, (5) establishment of an independent authority for substantive review and appeal of all negative replies to asylum applications, (6) recognition of socio-economic motives in addition to the previously recognized escape reasons.

If you don’t want to meet our demands, then please delete our fingerprints from your data bases and let us move on. We are entitled to our future."

The other refugees remained in the park and also spent some time at the university.

They were frequently controlled by the police, and many of them decided to leave the protest. Finally, the camp was brutally removed by the police at the end of December.

Our hunger strike lasted for one month, then the Caritas (the Catholic organization in charge of basic services for asylum seekers in Austria) and some politicians promised us a good legal solution for all involved people within ten days. But after we had ended the hunger strike, nobody was willing to talk to us. Therefore, we continued the hunger strike for another 17 days. After that, Cardinal Schönborn (the archbishop

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of Vienna and a cardinal of the Catholic Church) and the Caritas promised us a house for our protest and protection by the church. Cardinal Schönborn wrote in a letter to us that we would be protected against attacks from the police and that we would get good lawyers.

Move to the Servitenkloster Again, we believed his promises and moved to the monastery Servitenkloster. But after the move, there was no more contact with the cardinal, and frequent police controls took place. Many people received negative verdicts in their asylum procedures. By the end of July, 20 people were obligated to report to the police daily. A couple of days later, eight of these people were detained and afterwards deported to Pakistan. Up until now, it has not been possible for us to make contact to any of them. We asked the Caritas for help, but they told us that they cannot do anything for us.

The police were continuously patrolling the monastery to find the other 12 people. Many left the monastery out of fear; some of them went to other EU countries, some went back to the camps. At the same time, the Ministry of Interior Affairs tried to criminalize us and arrested some people, accusing them of being part of an international human trafficking ring. These people are still in custody awaiting trial.

By the end of October, we had to leave the Servitenkloster, and we were only offered individual places in the camps. But we no longer believe that any official agency will protect us. We are scared and, therefore, we want to stay together. It is very easy to deport us when we are separate from each other.

Search for Protection at the Academy of Fine Arts The Caritas did not offer us a possibility for staying together, thus, we decided to search for protection at the Academy of Fine Arts.

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Some of the professors and many of the students support our protest and ensured us their solidarity – and also, the rector recorded a solidarity video for the refugee movement during the summer. Up until now, a banner against deportations is hanging at the Academy. At the first plenary in the Academy, the rector requested us to leave the building, but ensured at the same time that she would not call the police.

After some days, she requested us to leave the building on November the 4th; during the days we could use the aula if it was not needed for other purposes, but we were not allowed to stay overnight. We accepted the ultimatum and also don’t go back there for meetings. We no longer have a common space and must find a new solution for every meeting. We live in private lodgings but in most cases, we cannot stay there for a longer time.

Some days ago, we got the information that Pakistan has made an agreement with the EU with regard to further deportations; 170 people will be deported from Austria.

We have come to Europe because we cannot live in our own countries. This is partly due to interventions by the EU and the USA – their military has destroyed our houses, villages, and cities. People in Pakistan are constantly threatened by machine guns and drones, they have no possibility to live a normal life, they don’t receive education, they have no health care. We only want to live in a way that is normal for people in EU countries. We request the EU and the USA to reconstruct education and health institutions in our countries instead of delivering weapons and threatening us.

We did not start and neither do we continue this protest only for us – it is for all refugees in Europe, for everyone without possibilities here. We will continue this protest as long as we have the power to do it.

We need support. We are scared, many of us have been deported, many have received negative asylum verdicts. In our countries, our lives are threatened, we cannot go back.

Fight with us, let’s fight together.

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Visual Vocabulary for the Refugee Protest Vienna

By Katherine Ball, Katarzyna Winiecka, and Imayna Caceres with the Refugee Protest Vienna

DRONE attacks

Imprisonment

BOMBINGS

ILLEGALIZATIO

persecution

TARGETED KILLINGS

Torture

TRAUMA

Structural VIOLENCE

SURVEILLANCE

ACCUSATIONS

COERCED RETU

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deficie

ac

This series of pictograms was collaboratively designed with refugee activists of the Refugee Protest Vienna in autumn of 2013. Based on poison symbols, they are categorized through three color schemes.

Orange: Dangers refugees face in their home countries. Reasons why they left and what refugees face if deported Yellow: Serious deficiencies within the Austrian and EU Asylum Systems Blue: Demands of the Refugee Protest Vienna

The symbols are designed to have multiple uses.

They have been used as posters, banners, signs for demonstrations, and printed on T-shirts and bags.

They were also featured on a billboard exhibited in Sigmund Freud Park, a public space in Vienna that several hundred refugees occupied previously in the fall of 2012. The occupation occurred after a 35 km long protest march from Austria´s biggest asylum camp to speak up against the conditions they were facing there. The billboard explained the context of the protest, its history, and was part of a bigger project hosting a Transnational Forum on refugee and migrant struggles (wienwoche.org/2013/en/231/reemphasis). The forum brought together different

PROPER TRANSLATION

ERASE our FINGERPRINTS

FREEDOM of MOVEMENT

FREEDOM of SETTLEMENT

ATION

EQUALITY

ASYLUM

INDEPENDENT REVIEW

UPDATE COUNTRY DOCS

ON

TO EDUCATION, SOCIAL SERVICES, LABOR MARKET

PROTECTION

EXPAND VALID REASONS

ACCESS

ems

OF THOSE WHO SPEAK UP ABOUT HUMAN RIGHTS

FOR ESCAPE

INCLUSION

OF REFUGES AS EXPERTS ON REFUGEE POLICY

Demands of the Refugee Protest Vienna 38

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NGS

re

TIONS

ntries

refugee movements from within the EU to share and discuss strategies for campaigning towards the EU parliamentary elections in May 2014.

The symbols are free to use for supporting refugee struggles. Downloadable files are available at: katherineball.com/Refugee-Protest Support the Refugee Protest Vienna: refugeecampvienna.noblogs.org facebook.com/RefugeeCampVienna

ILLEGALIZATION

SURVEILLANCE

BORDER CONTROL

OUR

TRAUMA

DEPORTATION

COERCED RETURN

DETENTION

PASSIVIZATION

EQ

GUILTY

DOMINATION

EXCLUSION

deficiencies within the Austrian and EU Asylum Systems 2014 • visAvis №9

PROPER

LIVES

CRIMINALIZATION

CITIZEN

eurodac

39

A

TO EDUCATION, SOC

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Oversættelse side 101

Migration and Cinema

by Mark Le Fanu

Cinema, as everyone knows, was started by migrants. The moguls who founded the studios – Laemmle, Fox, Meyer, Cohn, the Warner Brothers and so on – hailed from the Old World, where, a generation or so had fled from the pogroms.

Silent for its first thirty years, apart from a universal piano accompaniment, the 20th century’s innovative art-form was particularly suited to an audience of incomers – Jews, Italians, Scandinavians – that was only slowly adjusting to literacy in a new language. Gesture, in language’s absence, meant everything – as one can see by looking at any of the old Chaplin films. (Chaplin made a famous movie called The Immigrant in 1917: our hero observed as an alien, heading for the Land of the Free.) Later, the pathos of exile and homecoming was accorded the full epic treatment in big budget movies such as Exodus (Otto Preminger, 1960), The Emigrants (Jan Troell, 1971) and – perhaps supremely – in Elia Kazan’s masterpiece America, America (1963). Later still we have Titanic (James Cameron, 1999) which contains at least a sub-theme of emigration. And Hollywood continues to treat the subject today. James Gray, who delved so intelligently into the lives of Russians transplanted to New Jersey in the thriller Little Odessa (1994), has just signed a new film, The Immigrant (I haven’t seen it yet: unlike Chaplin’s film of the same title, it is unlikely to be a comedy!); while Terrence Malick’s latest offering, To the Wonder, takes as its subject-matter (in so far as a subject can actually be discerned: critics were divided on this matter) the agony of a self-exiled Russian woman who can’t reconcile herself, mentally, to settling with her lover in America.

These are, for the most part, American movies, but naturally there are other filmmaking cultures to consider – just as there are other destinations to aim for besides the Statue of Liberty. The great Edgar Reitz, whose Heimat series thrilled television audiences in the eighties and nineties has recently come up with an additional block to the saga Die andere Heimat (2013) showing the emigration of rural Germans to Brazil in the mid-19th century. The grimness of port cities – as stepping stones to potential freedom – is imaginatively explored in the British film Last Resort (Pawel Pawlikowski, 2000), and (though in a very different register) in Aki Kaurismäki’s Le Havre (2012). The field of possible enquiry, in short, is a large one and no single essay can or should hope to be exhaustive. Still, it is interesting to try to trace the flight-path of various contemporary journeyings in all their peril and fragility. We live in a globalised world, so the matter is perhaps best treated geographically.

Eastern Europe to Western Europe Films get forgotten rather easily, and it is a long time since I have seen Gianni Amelio’s Lamerica which tells the story of a large-scale emigration from Albania

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in the wake of the country’s liberation from communism in the early 1990s. The movie came out in 1994, and what I remember most about it is the realism of the scenes on board and ship: the sunburned, lived-in faces of the emigrants, and the vast rusty old ship itself, its deck-space pullulating with hopeful humanity.

This is emigration considered on a massive scale, as if the entire Albanian nation, depleted and ruined after years of misrule, had decided en masse to pack up and leave. Needless to say there are illusions at issue here: the passengers – at least some of them – think they are sailing to America (the name of their ship implies as much) whereas in fact their country of destination is Italy. Still, anywhere seems to be better than where they have come from, and the film paints the hopes of these peasant protagonists vividly, with humane and unsentimental brush-strokes.

Rather more fresh in my mind is another story of Albanian exodus, on a smaller scale this time, brought to the screen by the Serbian director Goran Paskaljević. Honeymoons (2010) in fact tells two tales of would-be emigration. In the first, a young couple from Tirana flee from family pressures by (as in Amelio’s film) heading off for Italy. In the second story, marginally yet subtly connected to the first (through the sub-theme of political disturbance in Kosovo) a celloplaying boy from Belgrade is stopped at the Austrian border with his girlfriend as he attempts to journey to Vienna in order to take up a post he has been offered with a symphony orchestra. Will he (or they) get through? Paskaljević, in my opinion, is one of the great modern European directors (you may have seen an earlier film of his, Powder Keg, also known as Balkan Cabaret), and what is so good about this movie, as about all of his work, is its observational astuteness, its refusal of deterministic cliché, its abiding sense that things could always go "either way", and that there are human surprises in store for us in the midst of even the grimmest predicament.

Latin America to the United States The perils of this particular journey – across Mexico on top of a train, subject to ambush and robbery at any moment – were first chronicled in their modern form as long ago as 1984 in Gregory Nava’s brilliant film El Norte, recently reissued on DVD by Criterion, and thoroughly recommended both for the beauty of its imagery and the sobriety of the acting of its young protagonists, a brother and sister making their tragic journey from Guatemala. If the journey is terrible, the crossing of the border is the worst and most dangerous part of it, a hazard, or obstacle, dramatized powerfully in two more recent films that (coincidentally) bear more than a passing resemblance to each other – both of them at any event emphasising the youth and vulnerability of the pilgrims. Sin Nombre (Cary Fukunaga, 2010) made a splash when it came out through the vivid depiction it gives of Mexican gang culture, played out on either side of the railway tracks. It is perhaps a more melodramatic film than The Golden Dream/La Jaula de Oro (Diego Quemada-Diaz, 2013). Yet both movies in the end are unflinching; at the border Death awaits the travellers (at least, in each case, it awaits one of them).

Yet in each case too the other of the pair – we may see Hope here if we wish – survives to bear witness, and to send back his news from America.

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Pakistan to the United Kingdom A journey following this itinerary is recorded in Michael Winterbottom’s neo-realist film In This World, released in 2002. In fact the fictional protagonists Jamal and his older cousin Enayat are Afghans who have been displaced into Pakistan as refugees and put into contact with the usual dodgy people smugglers. Their journey, through Iran, Turkey, across to Trieste locked up in a freight container (Enayat alas fails to survive this episode), thence to the notorious Sangatte reception centre in Calais, is filmed by Winterbottom using a digital camera with exemplary attention to detail: the sheer danger and discomfort of such a trip have probably never been better dramatized. This is one of those films where the texture is so raw, and the detail so convincing, that you think you are watching a documentary.

Perhaps it is important to mention, as more than a mere passing remark, that real documentaries do get to be made on the subject we are discussing. The detail of such dramas is "convincing" ipso facto. Kaveh Bakhtiari’s Stop-Over/L’Escale (2013), recently nominated for Best European Documentary of the Year, places us in a safe house in Athens, where six Iranians are planning separate journeys into Europe on forged papers. All that is required, at the airport, is that they successfully negotiate security control and passport inspection – though failure to do so will lead to prison, disgrace and deportation. The suspense, in other words, is inbuilt, and skilfully manipulated by the filmmaker who (presumably) knew no more at the time than did the men concerned, whether or not they would be successful. Luck hugely comes into such matters: for some of the men it will seem easy in retrospect, whereas for others – Mohsen, the group’s likable extrovert; Hamid, their "trainer", who horrifyingly goes on hunger strike by sewing up his lips – nothing could be more metaphysically impossible than to make this fatal last step of their journey. A tragic and sombre film, then, that captures brilliantly the specific agony of waiting that is as much part of the immigrant’s world as the complementary experience of easing forward.

Central Asia to Western Europe (via Moscow) A recent film that has come out of Kyrgyzstan could be mentioned at this point.

Pustoy Dom/The Empty Home (written by Ekaterina Tirdatova and directed by Nurbek Egen, 2012) tells the story of a beautiful and resourceful, but perhaps not quite impeccably moral young woman who is determined to escape from the surrounding patriarchy: it is a kind of boredom more than anything else that compels her to desert her good-looking but dangerously vindictive husband, and head out for Moscow to take her chances. In the capital she meets up in due course with a young French woman who is travelling with her mother: together, the pair of them (who seem not quite mentally stable) persuade our heroine to accompany them back to France where, as a surrogate mother, she will look after the younger woman’s baby. The escapade ends in pitiable tragedy, the details of which needn’t detain us. What is incredibly well shown is the arbitrariness of the initial "migratory gesture." Objectively, the girl would be far better off staying in her homeland; yet this fails to come to pass, and one can understand why.

Across the world there are thousands – perhaps millions – of women like Ascel (Maral Koichukaraeva – a brilliant performance) dissatisfied by their peasant background, and tempted by the lure of the new.

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Africa They make their way to the sandy edge of the continent for so many different reasons. Some of them are "genuine refugees," fleeing war and conflict; others, including children and young people, have been rounded up by middlemen and are in the process of being trafficked as commodities; others still, clinging to their freedom, seek opportunities for employment abroad as a way out of grim domestic poverty. These migrations are perennial and we hear about them only when the vessels the passengers are sailing in founder in rough waters anywhere from the coast of Sicily to far out in the Atlantic Ocean. The drama of such voyages is the subject of several fine recent films, most notably La Pirogue (2012) by the Senegalese director Moussa Tour. (A pirogue is a large ocean-going barque of handsome design, normally used for fishing, but here adapted for longer oceangoing journeys.) Excellently depicted in this film of sober and classical craftsmanship is the sense of the sea itself as protagonist, sustaining on the one hand, on the other hand threatening with imminent peril the cargo of 30 or so African men as they make their way, under the open sky, to the dreamt-of safety of the Spanish shoreline.

Yet before one even arrives within sight of the ocean, and the start of one’s sea journey, there may have been epic trackings to make across desert and mountain.

The saga we have here of internal migration is captured very beautifully in the Belgian-financed movie Si le vent souleve la sable/Sounds of the Sand, directed by Marian Hänsel in 2006. It starts with a family and their goats. We are somewhere in sub-Saharan Africa. Water is scarce; they will make a journey to a region in the north where they have heard there is a more plentiful supply. On the way to their destination they come up against the harsh reality of modern militarised Africa – roaming bands of uniformed militiamen (regular soldiers or "rebels", it makes no difference) who rob them of their chattels and finally, tragically (in the case of two of the children), their lives. The film is as grim as can be and yet extraordinarily gentle and affecting: it is hard to describe its particular humane quality. Conceived of by a European production team, one doesn’t however feel that its perspective is anything other than as it should be: "Poverty causes unrest; unrest leads to violence; and violence destroys infrastructure." Of course there is no need to remind ourselves that it is human beings – innocent men, women and children – who are the ultimate victims of this cycle.

China China, it is well-known, is on the move. But here again, as with the Africa of Sounds of the Sand, it is internal migration that is as compelling as any external exodus. Many film-makers have attempted to evoke this modern sociology of drift, none more successfully perhaps than Jia Zhang-ke, China’s pre-eminent modern cineaste and an artist equally at home in the genres of documentary and feature film. (In fact, in Jia’s work, the two are almost always combined.) An early film of his, XiaoWu/Pickpocket (1997), showed the movement from countryside to provincial city through the eyes of a petty criminal (sympathetically portrayed – unusual for China at this epoch). Still Life (2006) shows the comings and goings of different characters whose lives have been thrown into confusion by the destruction of the ancient city of Fengjie on account of the Three Gorges project. Travel, by ferry, rail, motorbike and long-distance coach, is an under-

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lying element, too, of Jia’s most recent film, A Touch of Sin (2013), which takes the viewer, over the course of four separate but linked episodes, from Shanxi province in the North down to Guangzhou city in the southernmost part of the country, just next to Hong Kong. Through these multiple journeyings Jia weaves a critique of modern China’s soullessness – and its latent violence too, underreported in the West, but a menacing recurring element in the lives of the new industrial proletariat.

Turkey, the Middle East – and music The displacement of populations caused by the so-called Arab Spring has not yet translated itself into feature film activity, though I have no doubt this will happen before long. The porous borders of Turkey, Syria and Libya contain heart-breaking stories by the thousands, when we know where to look. Jordan and Lebanon currently do their best to cope with the influx of refugees from neighbouring territories, but who could be blamed for fearing that the burden may eventually prove too much for them. In the earlier phase of a conflict that stretches westward from Afghanistan across the entire Islamic world, there have been many important and memorable filmic responses. Movies like Samira Makhmalbaf’s Blackboards (2000) and the same director’s At Five in the Afternoon (2002) (where is Samira now? In exile!); or else that fine study of smuggling and displacement, A Time for Drunken Horses (Bahman Ghobadi, 2000).

These are harsh films by definition, for all their beauty. Yet maybe we should end this brief survey on a lighter note. The migration of peoples is always and everywhere also a migration of cultures. One of the finest films on migration that I know of is the Romany documentary Latcho Drom (Tony Gatlif, 1993) which, extravagantly and creatively, traces the movement of the gypsy peoples starting in India and moving laterally through Europe and North Africa to a culmination in Spain. Evoking solely their music and song, this is one of the most joyous and colourful films I have ever come across. And similarly with a single work by another fine director: Fatih Akin, a second generation ethnic Turk brought up and educated in Hamburg. In films like Head-On (2004) and The Edge of Heaven (2007) he has given contemporary audiences fierce and unsentimental insight into the mentality of that generation whose parents or grandparents came into Germany – and stayed there – as Gastarbeiter. However, in an intermediary film, Crossing the Bridge: The Sound of Istanbul (2005) Akin too turns to music to show a different species of coming and going, one that is not so much characterised by conflict and poverty, as by harmony, plenitude and welcome. It is a marvellous mix he has concocted for us. In a café in Istanbul, the two different traditions of Romany and Turkish music share dual billing. Under the aegis of equal but complementary matchings, we are free to make our choice. It is said that Romany music makes you want to dance, while Turkish music makes you want to listen.

The audience (my audience anyway) wants to dance and listen! And this is of course how it should be.

10 December 2013

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translation page 104

Kaninland Følgende er et uddrag fra en roman af Ursula Scavenius, som fortæller historen om flygtningepigen Fabiana, og hendes kamp for tilværelsen i udkanten af København, hvor hun sælger kaniner og drømmer om et bedre liv sammen med Simon, den statsløse. Uddraget består af flere kapitler eller dele af kapitler fra forskellige steder i romanen og giver os et indblik i Fabianas baggrund og miljø samt hendes forhold til Simon, den kunstneriske, ironiske karakter, som alle pigerne er forelsket i. En mørk bygning, en fugtig vask fyldt med kaninunger, en bortløben hest, Rimbaud og et blødende modersmærke.

AMAGER STRAND Af Ursula Scavenius • illustration af Olga HOHrajn Serdarević

Kapitel 1 Hun har så tit siddet om natten i det bad og følt sig død. Hvad om hun var død allerede uden at vide det? Hun forestiller sig, at hun og Simon er døde. At de ikke ved det. At de for længst er blevet henrettet af den danske stat og kastet ned i en fælles grav og nu bader i evigheden, i helvede, fordi de ikke var tålmodige nok til at blive statsborgere, og at de nu sidder som en sammensmeltet skikkelse i badekarret, mand med langt hår, bryster og pik. Hvem ved? Hvilket køn er hun egentlig selv, når hun sidder og stirrer gennem hallen og tæller rørene, men opgiver, fordi de snor sig om sig selv og hinanden?

Så er det anderledes, når hun tjekker ind efter arbejde og går alle rummene efter for fremmede. Og er der ingen, sørger hun for at trykke på alle de rigtige knapper; først de grønne på vej ind og så de røde bag hende, så der ikke kan komme nogen ubudne

46

gæster. For ganske vist er lejen uofficiel, men det betyder ikke, at hun ønsker at blive overfaldet og bagbundet og kørt med en lastbil som sexslave til Sverige.

Bag hende drypper vandhanen, kaninerne sover, klokken er otte, ingen kan se hende gennem de mange døre, og alligevel føler hun sig begloet, som hun sidder på madrassen og ser indlægssedlen igennem. Og så tager hun en kuglepen og skriver på bagsiden af indlægssedlen. Først bare cirkler, så ord. Hun overvejer at skrive et afskedsbrev til Simon og tænker, at det vil få ham til at elske hende endnu mere, for evigt, måske, selv hvis han flytter til Paris. Men ingen vil alligevel finde det, når hun brænder det hele ned, og Simon vil måske aldrig modtage det; hvis hun vil sige farvel, må hun først få en afgørelse; blive og få statsborgerskab og giftes med Simon, eller miste retten til at blive; rejse til Paris, hvor han tager hen, når han kan. Fabiana ser sig rundt og

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kommer til at grine af at forestille sig, hvor fornærmet Simon ville blive, hvis de skulle sove her sammen.

Han elsker orden; nye kuglepenne, rene blokke, et ryddet skrivebord. "Dette var det eneste rum, jeg kunne få til tusind kroner under bordet, " forestiller hun sig, at hun forsvarer sig. Ulovlig leje, og dog en start til at blive selvforsørgende for den ringe løn af firetusind kroner for dyrepasningen hist og her. Får hun stemmeret, brænder hun det ikke ned. Får hun den ikke, vil hun hoppe ud af samfundet. (…)

Kapitel 2 Det er "realpolitikken, der styrer afgørelsen." Det ved alle, og Simon er kommet i klemme i systemet. Han er femogtredive og har skrevet om religionsfrihed og menneskerettigheder i Rusland, indtil han blev eksporteret og slap fri og kom til Danmark og blev statsløs og ikke længere nogensinde kan komme hjem og ikke har noget hjem, heller ikke Danmark, for han får ikke det statsborgerskab, han er "fugleskræmsel, skræmmebillede for andre asylansøgere", han har ventet siden han var tyve år, nu er han blevet kunstner og er ironisk. Hun ser ham for sig hviske med dramatisk underspillet alvor: "Mit hjerte er dødt!"

Den humor, der gør, at alle pigerne er forelskede i ham, mens han håner dem alle, når de ikke er der. Til Fabiana siger han: "Hun er for tyk, kan du ikke se det? Hendes bryster er for store." Eller: "Hun er falsk." "Hun spiller hellig." "Hun ligner en dreng."

Men én gang da han blev inviteret til at filme for en gruppe danskere, der kortvarigt havde ondt af asylansøgerne og deres kummerlige forhold og derfor meldte sig som frivillige, inden de forsvandt igen, blev Simon forelsket i en de sydamerikanske piger, der hjalp til, hun var journalist, og så blev de kærester, og hun kom jævnligt forbi centret og lavede kaffe og skiftede sengetøj og legede med børnene og snakkede med

48

mændene, for kvinderne undgik hende.

Men en dag fandt hun en dansker og slog op med Simon, og ingen har siden set hende som frivillig. Simon går sjældent ud efter det, han hænger ud i opholdsstuen, og hans værelse ligner lort, desuden er hans syge, mindre brødre derinde og den bedende familiefar, der har mistet sine børn, og en ung fyr, der altid vil se fjernsyn på værelset, så det er som at være på en "en syg, larmende fremtidsplanet," har Simon sagt. Alligevel har han ikke ville have en ny kæreste efter den sydamerikanske pige. Fabiana kunne rive hovedet af den pige, der har låst Simon fast i en stædig troskab. Han vil ikke have Fabiana, og alligevel holder han om hende og trygler grædende om omsorg; det er den søster, han savner, vel, i Sibirien.

Alligevel kan hun ikke stoppe trangen til at ringe. Det er som et sår, der bryder op igen og igen, og det skal lappes af et telefonopkald. Bare det at høre hans stemmes varme kan gøre det. Såret størkner, hun bliver rolig et par timer. Hendes hænder ryster, da hun ringer ham op fra telefonboksen. En lille kurdisk pige fra børnehavens legeplads gav hende en tyvekrone for en kaninunge.

"Kommer du og besøger mig, hvis jeg siger, hvor jeg er?"

"Selvfølgelig, jeg har bare lidt travlt."

"Så du kommer ikke?"

"Måske ikke. Jeg har ret travlt."

"Der er ikke andre end mig. Og dyrene."

"Hvilke dyr?"

"Mine kaniner. Og min hest. Kommer du så, eller hvad? Du kan få nogle penge."

"Selvfølgelig kommer jeg, hvis jeg får lige så mange penge som dig. Jeg har ikke fået nogen arbejdstilladelse!"

"Jeg elsker dig, Simon."

"Kan du ringe igen? Jeg har som sagt lidt travlt."

"Kommer du?"

"Jeg har det der med ørerne igen. Der er kommet et nyt fjernsyn. Du kan også komme her?"

"Nej. Det er lige meget så."

Fabiana lægger røret på, tager en saks frem fra lommen og klipper i snoren, men

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den vil ikke knække. Hun klipper hårdt til, men ingenting sker. Så tager hun saksen og kaster den ud over parkeringspladsen. I det samme gør en hund vredt og kommer farende ud af busken. Fabiana løber. Imens tænker hun på sin bror. Hun har ikke set ham, siden han blev indlagt med en stofpsykose. Nu vil hun besøge ham. (…)

Kapitel 5 Hun mærker straks en forandring i køkkenet og løfter trøjen fra kloakhullet.

Kaninerne er væk. Hun hiver madrassen op og stiller den op ad væggen; de gemmer sig ikke i dynen; hun hører skridt fra gangen, farer op og griber ud efter den store lommelygte, parat til at møde det fremmede.

"Du troede nok, du havde fundet et skjulested!?" griner Simon og træder ind i lyset.

Det gibber i hende. Synet af ham. Lyset flakker udenfor. Et fly tordner over himlen.

Simon virker endnu højere og hans øjne mørkere end sidst. Hans pande er glat og hvid, der er en lille krølle i hans hår, der er blevet lysere.

"Skal jeg gå?" spørger han. Hun kan stadig ikke sige noget. "Jeg kommer også bare med dine kaniner. De var løbet helt ud til mig."

En for en kommer kaninerne løbende ind i kontoret og finder deres kroge og pladser.

"Jeg elsker dig for meget," mærker hun sig selv hviske hæst dybt nede i struben, men der kommer ikke et ord frem.

"Okay, nej, jeg ringede til hende Bente, vi taler godt sammen, og hun sagde, hvor du gemte dig," siger Simon.

"Bente. Taler du godt med hende?" spørger Fabiana.

"Ja. Sød dame."

"Hun ligner en død kat," siger Fabiana.

Simon griner ustyrligt og lader sig falde ned på hendes madras.

"Du har skrevet mit navn i væggen. Hvad har du brugt?"

"En kniv," hvisker Fabiana og kan kun

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tænke på, at hun har lyst til at dø, fordi Simon er her, men snart går igen, fordi Simon har kneppet med Bente og med Mira og Julia og Radi. Hun er ved at græde.

Simon rejser sig og tager hendes hænder og holder om hende. Hun kan lugte, at han har røget pot.

"Jeg elsker dig," lyder det igen i hendes strube. Så hoster hun og må vende sig.

Simon forsvinder ud af døren til bilværkstedet.

"Nå... her er din hest!" udbryder han.

"Er der andre, der har set den?"

"Nej," råber hun. "Kun dig. Det er kun dig, der har set den!" (…)

Kapitel 25 Fabrikken ligner et hus i snevejret, sneskyerne ligger som et bjerg bag den. I det ene vindue er der lys. Hun går hen og kigger ind i bilværkstedet, hvor Simon står og er ved at binde hesten fast til jernpælen i hendes røde sweater.

Hun hiver døren op og løber ind. Simon giver et udbrud fra sig: "Nå, der er du? Du passer virkelig godt på dine dyr. Det må jeg sige. Det var lige før, politiet kom."

"Det var da dig, der gik i biografen?"

"Mig? Jeg spurgte, om du ville med, og det ville du ikke, og når jeg kommer hjem, ser jeg, at hesten står og kreperer ude i sneen.

Har du overvejet at snakke med en læge?"

"Jeg har snakket med en læge. Jeg har været på hospitalet hele dagen."

Hun lægger hånden på hestens manke, og den vrinsker: "Den elsker mig i det mindste," siger hun. "Åh, stakkels lille dig. Hesten elsker dig.

Hvor er det godt, at du kan få dyrene til at elske dig."

Simon griner, slår hende på skulderen og går ud i køkkenet. Hun hører ham sætte elkedlen i gang; så står hun sådan og stirrer frem for sig og kan ikke stoppe, sneen er gået i blikket på hende, og den vil ikke lade sig glemme. Sne, sne, sne.

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"Danskerne deporterede en libaneser i dag," råber hun, "han har en familie i Danmark. Hans datter er hos en gammel mand, der hedder Aksel, som gerne vil kneppe hende, det er så klamt."

Simon mumler et eller andet inde fra køkkenet, og: "så er der kaffe."

"Hører du slet ikke, hvad jeg siger?" siger hun. "Jeg har mødt en libanesisk pige, og der er en gammel danskergris, der prøver at få hende med i seng. Vi må gøre noget."

"Måske vil hun også gerne selv kneppe ham," griner Simon.

"Hun vil have hans hus og hans penge, det er det, hun vil. Han ligner et lig, der er ved at gå i opløsning."

"Måske trænger hun så meget til noget, at det er bedre end ingenting. Her, tag en kaffe.

Du skulle hellere have set efter din hest, vi kan ikke redde hele verden, vel? Vi bor selv i nattens asyl."

"Nattens asyl."

"Rimbaud."

"Min mor er syg."

"Selvfølgelig er hun det."

"Rigtig syg. Hun dør nok snart."

"Alt er tidløst. Det siger sufierne."

Simon sætter sig på madrassen op ad væggen med kaffen i hånden. Hun gør det samme, sætter sig op ad væggen med kaffen og kigger på Simon, hun kan ikke lade være at se på ham, hans hud er helt lys og hans øjne sorte. Men det store modermærke på hans kind forstyrrer hendes blik.

Kapitel 26 Hun venter, til han sover, før hun klipper det af. Simon vågner med et skrig og slår ud efter hende. Som han skriger og skriger.

Fabiana holder sig for ørerne.

"Gør dog noget!" skriger han.

Men hun rører sig ikke. Efter et stykke tid sidder Simon og stirrer ud i mørket med en klud på kinden.

"Hvad er der galt med dig?"

Og hun siger undskyld i en uendelighed, men han vil ikke holde om hende.

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Det bløder stadig fra hans kind, og hun har fornemmelsen af, at modermærket ligger i hendes mund. Den følelse af at klippe i det store, tykke modermærke giver hende kvalme. Hun hiver kaninerne op en for en og lægger dem på gulvet. Og så kaster hun op i vasken, mens kaninerne samler sig om hendes fødder og piber efter mad. Hun tørrer sin mund og lægger kluden fra sig. Der er et helt salathoved tilbage. Hun skærer det op i fire store dele og lægger dem på gulvet.

Så må de selv bide det i stykker.

Da hun lægger sig under tæppet, begynder Simon at hulke og har sit hoved på hendes bryster. Hun stryger ham over håret: "Hvad er det, min elskede?"

Han siger hende ikke imod, siger bare: "Det er det med min mor. Alle ved det.

Men alligevel. Der er jo ikke nogen, der så hendes ansigt, efter det var sket, vel. Men jeg har set det."

Fabiana prøver at forestille sig et ansigt opløst af syre. Et ansigt, der stadig fungerer, kan tale, grine, tænke, råbe, men er afsyret, uden hud: "Din mor har sørget for, at du fik det her ansigt i gave," siger hun. (…)

Hesten er ved dårligt mod, den sparker mod stålpladen og vrinsker hylende. Fabiana ved, hvad der skal til. Hun sætter sig ved siden af den og venter på mørket.

Klokken otte går strømmen som sædvanlig. Nogen står stadig for betaling af lyset, som Fabiana bruger, nogen, hun aldrig kommer til at tale med, og som aldrig kommer til at tale med hende, heller ikke hvis det hele brænder en dag. Hun venter. Ti minutter over otte løsner hun hesten og trækker den med udenfor. Simon står og ryger.

"Flyt dig lige," siger hun, " jeg skal ride en tur."

"Du kan da ikke ride," siger han. "Nej, jeg kan ej, men hesten trænger til det."

"Jeg kan ride," siger Simon. "Lad mig gøre det." "Vil du virkelig gøre det?" "Ja, da. Men hvor skal jeg ride hen?" "Til stranden. Gå efter mig."

Stierne til stranden er plørede og omringede af højhuse. Et langt stykke går forbi

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en bådeudlejning og lystbådehavn. Siden vandrer de forbi endeløse rækker af skibe, der er stablet oven på hinanden. Hesten går med sænket hoved og er tavs.

"Hvor fandt du den?" spørger Simon. Hun kan se hans grønne iris selv i mørket.

"Det var en pige på stranden. Hun faldt.

Hun var helt alene, og så hjalp jeg hende op af vandet. Hesten red bare længere og længere ud i vandet. Pigen begyndte at løbe, og så gik jeg efter hesten."

"Er der slet ikke nogen, der leder efter den?" "De tror vel, den er død." "Hvorfor skulle de tro det?"

"Jeg hjalp dem med at tro det, selvfølgelig."

"Hvor er du smart. Skal du have en joint?"

"Jeg tager ikke det lort mere."

"Fint. Nej, jeg mener det. Men hvad gjorde du?"

"Jeg ringede til kommunen og sagde, jeg havde fundet en død hest på stranden."

"Hvad gjorde de så?"

"De sagde, at jeg skulle ringe til politiet.

Det gjorde jeg så. De skrev det ned og sagde, de ville undersøge sagen. Så ringede jeg til

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BT og sagde, at nogen havde fundet en død hest på stranden, men at politiet dækkede over dyremishandling."

"Du er et geni, Fabiana." Han kysser hende.

"Hvad kalder du den?"

"Alexander," siger hun.

"Men det er en pige."

"Hvordan kan du se det?"

Simon griner og kan ikke stoppe: "Du skal kalde hende for Herta Müller i stedet."

"Herta Müller. Hvem er det?"

"Ikke nogen," siger Simon og skodder jointen.

"Det var den sidste," siger han. "Jeg vil hjælpe dig med Herta fra nu af."

Fabiana lader sig falde ned over sandet og lægger hånden hårdt ind mellem benene, presser fingrene op i skridtet, græder lidt og griner imens.

Hun ser hesten stejle og vrinske, da Simon sætter sig op på den. Han rider i galop hen ad den mørke strand, og hendes bukser er drivvåde.

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WE ARE HERE Text by Andrea Meng and Johannes Hein of the Bon Courage network Photos by Baykar, Lusen, Mehran, Elisavet, Antonia, Vasiliki, Zarema, Muslim, Amenallah, Abdul, Dominik, Jakub, Denisa and Erik.

The photos on the following pages are part of the project 'Wir sind hier' ('We Are Here'). The project was initiated and is run by Andrea Meng and Johannes Hein. 'Wir sind hier' took place in the Freizeitzentrum (leisure center) in Borna, from September through November 2013 in collaboration with the Bon Courage network, and was funded by the local association of visual artists (Bund der Bildenden Künstler Leipzig). All participants are between 9 and 17 years old and come from a migration background. Some are currently in the process of applying for asylum in Germany, and live in centers for asylum seekers in the county of Leipzig. Six of the children and their families have been deported since the beginning of the project. As this text is being written, three more are in danger of being deported.

A picture is worth a thousand words. No matter what language we speak we understand that: a tree is a tree, a bird is a bird, and a human being is a human being.

The children that have been part of this project come from every corner of the world. With their families they have left everything behind and made their way to Germany. The children have to make a new life for themselves here and learn a new language at this young age. During this project they have proved that it is possible to meet, talk and learn from one another without knowing the same language and the same words for tree, bird and human being.

The small part of the project that we would like to present here consists of photos taken by the children relating to the themes: Asylum center – Family – Everyday life – School – Borna and Germany.

'I am a stranger' does not mean 'I don't belong here.' It means 'I am learning how to understand.' (http://www.boncourage.de/)

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Fra mudder og himmel Af Ina Serdarević

Det simrer og bobler i mudderet under os vi er uvidende omkring de ting, der rør sig i mørket

Tænk at kunne, sådan som fuglene kan, bare slå sig ned, løsrive sig lade sig flytte af to støjende håndflader.

Kom så! Så er der afgang!

det mærkes i karunklen og i knoens folder det anes i fødderne og når vi flytter os fra hinanden i trafikken

Fugle i flokke, fugle i flugt med vind i vingen og viljens frihed ud af flokke og ind i mønstre, der er usynlige på kort

det smælder imod dit skind, indefra det brister i ordene og giver sig i talen det svirrer, det koger over det lægger sig i mudderet og lossepladsen, som er usynlig fordi den findes overalt

Et næb, der åbner sig for at befri et skrig Et skrig, der slippes for at indfri en bøn

det flytter sig i laviner bølges op over tagene hvor det er muligt at drukne hvis man glemmer at ånde *** Alt det skidt, man fik skovlet væk alle de heste, der trampede jorden flad alle de klapsalver, der skræmte fuglene bort, der ryddede træerne og befriede tagene, og sendte dem afsted til andre egne

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En flok vrælende fugleunger, en flok kurrende duer, tudende ugler En skade, to skader, tre skader, hvad mere Vrælende, kurrende, tudende mærker vi det onde i at blive her, det onde i at vedblive med at være os selv, men at forlade alt dette, i flugt og ad himmelhøje svævebaner, er os ikke forundt

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Oversættelse side 115

The Human Condition Da jeg kom hjem fra børnefødselsdagen, er jeg blevet fortalt, var min ene hånd knyttet i en lille næve, helt stram og med neglene dybt inde i håndfladen. Og sådan gik jeg rundt i en rum tid, gjorde hvad jeg gjorde, talte, så, akkurat som jeg plejer, lige indtil jeg fik besked på at åbne hånden.Og da jeg omsider lod min fembladede fingerblomst folde sig ud, forsigtigt og lidt modvilligt, næsten som om musklerne lod sig forkrampe af en usynlig modstand, kom en afgnavet pølse til syne, stumpet og mast ud i min glinsende håndhule, hvorefter mine forældre, som forældre nu gør, sluttede, at jeg havde fået stukket pølsen i hånden sådan dér og så havde jeg spist først-fra-den-ene-ende og-så-fra-den-anden-ende indtil jeg ikke længere kunne bide for den lukkede næve.

Jeg havde gnasket mig vej ind til fingrene og ikke længere, jeg havde prøvet at liste tungen ind i sprækken, som en myresluger på jagt efter termitter, den bløde kødmasse, som blev mere blød og mere udtværet, havde jeg prøvet at suge ud som en italianer, der suger marven ud af kalvekskankens marvhule.

Det var aldrig faldet mig ind at prøve at nå ind til indholdet på anden vis. Hvorfor skulle jeg også flytte på pølsen, når jeg nu havde fået den i hånden sådan dér i første omgang?

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Writers, Painters, Photographers, Creatives – with or without citizenship.

Get your words, thoughts & stories out!

Contact us at visavis.contact@gmail.com is a magazine on asylum and migration, the movement of people across borders and the challenges connected to this. We work to improve the debate on asylum and migration, among other things by publishing texts that people seeking asylum want to share. visAvis is an activist project where people with and without citizenship in Denmark meet to create an alternative public space and debate.

Skyttegade 3 · DK-2200 · København N · Danmark 58

www.visavis.dk · visavis.contact@gmail.com

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A view of Ma'arrat al-Numan in liberated Syria

Oversættelse side 86

BY IDA RUMP, PHOTOS BY IDA RUMP AND ADAM QVIST

Street view of Ma’arrat al-Numan Ma’arrat al-Numan is a town in Syria’s Idlib province, right on the AleppoDimashq highway. In the autumn of 2012 Ma’arrat al-Numan was liberated from the regime and subsequently became the target of intense air-bombardments and heavy shelling. The Syrian regime is positioned just southeast of the town in the area of Wadi al-Deif. And from these military positions, snipers and artillery are still pounding and leveling buildings in the city.

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View from the city mosque towards the military stronghold of the Syrian regime In the past Ma’arra´s inhabitants numbered well over 100,000, but due to the heavy shelling in December 2012, only 5000 people remained in the city. Most families moved to the surrounding villages where the bombing was less intense.

For several months they lived in private homes or in schools accommodated for internal refugees. Though the bombing has continued, many families have returned and currently the town hosts around half of its original population.

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60% of the city has been destroyed, most families that have returned live in friends’ or relatives’ houses.

Still, Ma'arra has emerged as one of many great examples of what normal citizens are able to put into action in the vacuum of the Syrian regime's retreat and the collapse of government authority. Ma’arra was left without any basic infrastructure or access to water, food or electricity. Roads, schools, shops and hospitals were shut down. Now everything is coordinated on a voluntary basis from the fixing of electricity lines to the staffing of the field hospital.

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Volunteer driven school and kindergarten for kids between 4-11 years The local council of Ma’arrat al-Numan consists of four local relief and development organisations. One of the organisations, called Basmet Amal coordinate relief, runs a volunteer-driven school for young children and initiates self-sustainable projects such as a satellite mast providing free internet; a non-profit shop that secures low prices encountering an inflation at more than 400%; a small-scale factory that produces cheap soap; and a small factory to export dresses to the Gulf.

All projects target the core side effects of the violent situation, such as children’s lost schooling, poverty and possibilities of communication.

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Dress factory in Ma’arra Basmat Amal is a local relief and development organisation that was founded in the fall of 2012 and is a part of the local coordinating council. Their aim is to build self-sustainable projects, and by this counter how aid in Syria is being misused in order to win people's support.

Witness Syria is a solidarity network between activists in Syria and activists in Europe.

Since the beginning of 2012, Witness Syria has sent a handful of small delegations to Syria to meet, witness, and organize together with Syrian activists and civil societies.

Learn more about, support, or contact Basmet Amal or Witness Syria here: Basmet Amal Facebook: facebook.com/JmaetBsmtAml Witness Syria: witnesssyria@gmail.com

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translation page 108

Fra Kalaallit Nunaat til København En grønlænder – på grønlandsk kalaallit – skal rejse 4000 kilometer med sit danske pas for at komme til København.

For grønlændere er retsmæssigt ligestillet med danskere, men samtidig en overset gruppe migranter. De får hverken tilbudt tilpasset hjælp eller integrationsprojekter som andre migranter, selvom mange grønlændere også får problemer med bureaukrati, fordomme og sprogbarrierer i mødet med Danmark. af Linea Kornum Rask, illustration AF Peter OG Linea KORNUM RASK

"Du kan ikke overse Grønland på et verdenskort, det er stort og hvidt, men det er ikke en del af danskernes bevidsthed", siger Nivi Christensen med et smil.

Hun er en ung grønlandsk kvinde, som arbejder i informationsafdelingen på Det Grønlandske Hus i København. Hun fortæller, at der er to ting, hun ville ønske, at danskerne i det mindste vidste om Grønland. 1) At der er lige så langt fra Nordgrønland til Sydgrønland som fra Danmark til Afrika, og 2) At der i Grønland, som er 52 gange større end Danmark, kun bor ca. 56.000 personer, hvoraf størstedelen bor i bare 17 byer. Disse simple kendsgerninger illustrerer, hvor store geografiske forskelle der er på de to medlemmer af rigsfællesskabet.

Det burde, ifølge Nivi Christensen, vække en nysgerrighed hos danskerne, som kunne være med til at nedbryde den mur af uvidenhed og fordomme, mange grønlændere møder i Danmark.

Nivi Christensen er en del af den store gruppe unge, som rejser fra Grønland til Danmark for at studere, som taler perfekt dansk og føler sig hjemme i begge lande. En anden stor gruppe grønlændere kommer til Danmark for at arbejde eller som pensionister. Der bor mellem 14,000 og 18,000 grønlændere i Danmark, og omkring 6 til 20 procent af dem lever som hjemløse og misbrugere, vurderer Rådet For Socialt Udsatte (Rådet For Socialt Udsatte 2014:6). Men selvom Nivi Christensen er en del af en på mange måder privilegeret gruppe, har hun haft større problemer som tilflytter end de praktiske med sygesikringskort, NemID og "Du kan ikke overse SU. Den stigmatisering, som grønlænGrønland på et verdenskort dere møder i Danmark, er også en del af hendes liv. Nivi Christensen oplever [...] men det er ikke en del af danskernes bevidsthed" f.eks., at folk får ondt af hende, når de hører, hun er fra Grønland, fordi de tror, (Nivi Christensen) hun har haft en dårlig barndom. Andre har svært ved at tro, at hun er grønlæn-

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der, fordi hun er så "velfungerende". Netop problemet med stigmatisering og diskrimination af grønlændere i Danmark har Institut for Menneskerettigheder sat fokus på i deres statusrapport fra 2013. Her kan man læse, at selvom langt de fleste grønlændere klarer sig godt i Danmark, oplever gruppen at blive diskrimineret på grund af stereotyper om bl.a. grønlænderen som social taber. Dette sker især i socialt samvær, ved jobsøgning, på uddannelsen og i kontakten med sociale myndigheder (IFM 2013: 27).

Et hullet system For mange grønlændere begynder problemerne allerede ved det første møde med det danske bureaukrati. Grønlændere er danske statsborgere, så de har lige rettigheder og kan frit flytte til Danmark. Men der er en del grønlændere, som ikke kan finde vej i systemet og bliver overvældet af praktiske problemer, allerede når de skal registrere sig i Danmark, fortæller Mille Schiermacher. Hun er projektleder for en mentorordning på Det Grønlandske Hus i København og medlem af Rådet For Socialt Udsatte. "Det problematiske ved rigsfællesskabet er, at der er mange ting, der fungerer på samme måde i Grønland og Danmark, men der er endnu flere ting, som ikke gør det", forklarer Mille Schiermacher. Hun uddyber: "Det bliver enormt "... hvis man i forvejen vanskeligt at navigere og vide, hvornår man skal har sociale eller psykiske være på vagt. På den måde kan det næsten være problemer, kan det få nemmere at komme fra et land, hvor man ved, at ingenting er det samme". Projektlederen forklarer, store konsekvenser at at mange grønlændere ikke ved, hvor svært det er starte så skævt", at få adgang til de danske ydelser, og at ydelserne (Mille Schiermacher) ikke automatisk overføres til det danske system.

Så selvom man f.eks. får kontanthjælp eller førtidspension i Grønland, er man ikke nødvendigvis berettiget til det i Danmark.

Man skal ansøge igen, når man er ankommet. Det skaber en masse problemer, ifølge Mille Schiermacher, fordi man nemt kan risikere at stå uden indtægt i en periode. Især hvis man har svært ved at finde et sted at bo, hvor man kan registrere sig i folkeregistret.

Det kræver altså rigtigt mange ressourcer og meget overskud at finde vejen gennem systemet, og hvis man ikke selv kan presse på for at finde en løsning, kan der gå rigtig lang tid, før man overhovedet bliver registreret i Danmark. Det har projektlederen oplevet gang på gang i sit arbejde med udsatte grønlændere.

"Det er i sig selv svært, når man lige er flyttet 4.000 kilometer væk, og hvis man i forvejen har sociale eller psykiske problemer, kan det få store konsekvenser at starte så skævt", fortæller hun og peger på dette som en medvirkende faktor til, at cirka 6 procent af alle hjemløse i Danmark har grønlandsk baggrund. I Grønland er der generelt set relativt store sociale problemer, høj arbejdsløshed og boligmangel i byerne, så det kan virke som en rigtigt god løsning at tage til Danmark.

Men der mangler information fra grønlandsk side til fraflytterne om, at der også er en svær job- og boligsituation i Danmark, siger Mille Schiermacher. Et andet problem er, at en del ikke er godt nok forberedt, når de rejser til Danmark, og f.eks. mangler de mange dokumenter, man skal bruge som dokumentation i det danske system.

Hvis man har dårlig økonomi, kan det være et yderligere benspænd, at når

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man har råd til et depositum til en lejlighed, har man typisk for mange penge til at få kontanthjælp, siger projektlederen. "Så bliver man nødt til at vente, til folk nærmest ender på gaden, før man kan hjælpe dem. Det er selvfølgeligt alt for sent, fordi det er svært at bryde ud af gruppen, der bor på gaden, og ofte også har store problemer med f.eks. alkohol og hashmisbrug", uddyber hun.

Det danske system er ganske enkelt ikke bygget til at tage imod de grønlandske tilflyttere, konkluderer Mille Schiermacher. For det er de samme problematikker, der gentager sig igen og igen. Men derfor kan man også, med rimeligt enkle metoder, forbedre systemet. For selvom det er en talmæssigt lille gruppe grønlændere, der ender som hjemløse, er det dyrt både menneskeligt og økonomisk for samfundet at vente til menneskene ’går tabt’, før de får tilbudt tilpasset hjælp, mener hun. "Groft sagt er det sådan, at så længe de klarer sig, er de danskere, og når de ikke kan, så kommer de ind i kategorien udsatte grønlændere.

Der er ingen mellemting i dag", forklarer Mille Schiermacher.

Sprogbarrieren De fleste danskere går ud fra, at alle grønlændere taler dansk. Det gør størstedelen også, men de grønlændere, som ikke kan sproget, er ifølge Mille Schiermacher i ekstra stor fare for at blive isolerede og diskriminerede. I dag er der mange forskellige grader af danskkundskab på Grønland. Det afhænger i høj grad af, hvilken politisk periode man er vokset op i og hvor i Grønland - en lille bygd eller en større by. Da Grønland ophørte med at være en koloni og blev et amt i Danmark i 1953, startede danskerne en stor, nogle vil mene voldsom, proces for at ’fordanske’ det grønlandske samfund.

Dansk blev hovedprioriteten i folkeskolerne, "Groft sagt er det sådan, at og mange børn og unge blev også sendt på så længe de klarer sig, er de et års skoleophold i Danmark. Dette medførte, at mange glemte deres grønlandske danskere, og når de ikke kan, modersmål, eller talte det dårligt. Men efter så kommer de ind i kategohjemmestyreloven i 1979 gennemførtes der reformer, som gjorde grønlandsk til hoved- rien udsatte grønlændere. Der sproget. Dette medførte, at mange fra de gener ingen mellemting i dag". erationer ikke har lært så meget dansk (Stork (Mille Schiermacher) og Thomsen 2007: 12).

Derfor mangler der i dag gratis sproghold målrettet grønlændere, ligesom der er tilbud til migranter fra alle andre lande, mener Mille Schiermacher. Grønlænderne har i dag mulighed for at få danskundervisning sammen med andre migranter, hvis deres kommune vil betale.

Men erfaringen viser, at de fleste dropper ud af sprogundervisningen, fordi deres situation er så anderledes. Nogle taler f.eks. flydende dansk, men skriver meget dårligt, uddyber hun.

Institut for Menneskerettigheder har også fokus på, hvordan sprogbarrierer mellem grønlændere og de ansatte i det sociale system, der skal hjælpe dem i Danmark, kan føre til diskrimination. Det sker ofte fordi mange grønlændere, der har problemer med dansk, ikke ved, at de har ret til tolkebistand og ikke får den tilbudt (IFM 2013: 28).

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En overset gruppe Grønlænderne er i det hele taget en overset gruppe, som sociologen Lise Togeby var en af de første til at sætte fokus på med bogen ’Grønlændere i Danmark – en overset minoritet’ fra 2002. Og der er stadig for lidt fokus på statsborgerskabets bagsider for udsatte grønlændere, mener Mille Schiermacher: "Det er en politisk beslutning, at grønlænderne skal have de samme rettigheder og pligter. Men en ting er, om det fungerer ideologisk. Det fungerer ikke praktisk. Der er nogle specielle problemstillinger, som gør, at nogle klarer sig dårligt, hvis de ikke får tilbudt målrettet hjælp". Det har man fravalgt indtil for nylig, men nu er man dog langsomt begyndt at tænke det anderledes, fortæller hun.

Institut for Menneskerettigheder anbefaler også for første gang i deres netop udgivne statusrapport, at man "tilbyder et integrationsforløb til grønlændere, der bosætter sig i Danmark, i lighed med tilbuddet til andre etniske minoriteter, der sikrer adgang til sundhedsundersøgelser ved ankomst, vaccination, tolkning, sprogundervisning, tilbud om uddannelse og indslusning på arbejdsmarkedet" (IFM 2013: 25). Men selvom behovet har været kortlagt i mindst ti år, siden Lise Togebys bog og en stor statslig undersøgelse om udsatte grønlænderes vilkår blev lavet, lader permanente tiltag på nationalt niveau vente på sig. Også selvom der er gode lokale erfaringer med målrettet hjælp for grønlændere i f.eks. Aalborg.

Faktisk kan man, ifølge Mille Schiermacher, løse mange praktiske problemer ved at sørge for, at de social-, job- og borgerservicecentre, som møder grønlænderne først, har mere viden om det grønlandske samfund, og hvilke problemer grønlandske tilflyttere typisk har. Det kan gøres med en tjekliste, så man sikrer sig, at alle får en fair behandling. For i dag er det meget tilfældigt, hvilken hjælp man får. Til gengæld er der grønlandske huse i de største byer i Danmark, som tilbyder gratis rådgivning.

Mentorhjælp Det Grønlandske Hus i København er et af de steder som hjælper, bl.a. med mentorordningen som Mille Schiermacher startede i 2012. Mentorprojektet er baseret på grønlændere i Danmark eller danskere, der kender til Grønland, som har meldt sig frivilligt til at hjælpe nytilflyttede grønlændere. Det kan være med alt fra gode råd eller en tur på jobcentret, til en guidet cykeltur i København.

Ideen til projektet startede, da Mille Schiermacher arbejdede som antropolog med hjemløse og socialt udsatte grønlændere. Hun hørte mange fortælle, at det var problemerne i mødet med det danske system, som havde forværret – eller var en af de afgørende grunde til deres misbrug og hjemløshed. "Deres danske statsborgerskab burde være en positiv faktor og ikke en faldgrube, som det er nu. Det er det dilemma, vi prøver at arbejde med", fortæller hun. Indtil videre har projektet været en succes. De fleste af de nytilflyttede grønlændere, som har deltaget i projektet, har fået en meget bedre indgang til at begynde livet i Danmark med støtten fra mentoren og fokus på det enkelte menneskes situation.

"Dumme danskere" Men et fortsat og fundamentalt problem er de mange fordomme, som grønlænderne møder i Danmark. Danskernes manglende basisviden om Grønland og om Danmarks rolle som kolonimagt, især de mørke kapitler, er en god grobund for

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fordommene. Der har endnu ikke været et grundlæggende opgør med den danske selvforståelse som en godhjertet og civiliserende kolonimagt (Jensen, Lars 2012:194). Uvidenheden har ifølge Institut For Menneskerettigheder konsekvenser for ligestillingen: "Fordomme om grønlændere og den stereotype opfattelse af gruppen er forårsaget af et generelt lavt kendskab til Grønland og grønlændere som folk blandt danskerne, og dette vanskeliggør deltagelse i samfundet på lige fod" (IFM 2013: 28). En spørgeundersøgelse lavet i 2012 af Visit Greenland blandt over 1000 danskere bekræftede fordommenes omfang. Den viste bl.a., at over 40 procent af de udspurgte forbandt grønlændere med ting som druk, misbrug og sociale problemer, og at 42 procent tror, at hver tredje fanger i Grønland stadig tager på jagt i kajak (Information 2012). Mille Schiermacher forklarer, at Danmark er en større del af Grønland end omvendt: "I Grønland får man meget viden om Danmark fra undervisningen i folkeskolen. Danskernes viden er ofte fordomme om den smukke natur eller den sociale katastrofe. Der er alt for lidt viden om Grønland som et moderne samfund." Derfor er hun nu med i et projekt, der skal udarbejde nyt undervisningsmateriale om den grønlandske samtid for danske skolebørn. Hun håber på, at man ved at starte med børnene, kan begynde at bryde med fordommene om grønlændere og bane vejen for en mere reel ligestilling.

Kilder: Information. 2012: "Det mener vi om grønlænderne:" (http://www.information.dk/telegram/311963) Institut for Menneskerettigheder. 2013: "Etnisk oprindelse status 2013".

Jensen, Lars. 2012: "Danmark Rigsfælleskaber, tropekolonier og den postkoloniale arv. Hans Reitzels forlag.

Rådet For Socialt Udsatte. 2014: "I Grønland er jeg for dansk, og i Danmark er jeg ’bare’ grønlænder".

Stork, Naja Kleist og Thomsen, Ole. 2007: "Danskundervisning for socialt udsatte". Styrelsen for Specialrådgivning og Social Service Udsatteenheden, Socialministeriet.

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Translation page 111

"De sagde, jeg ikke eksisterer" Da Peter kom fra Nuuk til København, blev hans forventninger til rigsfællesskabet vendt til en dyb frustration over et hullet system uden forståelse for den grønlandske situation. Han har levet sine første måneder i Danmark som hjemløs og har svært ved at forestille sig, hvordan det ville være gået ham uden hjælp fra en frivillig mentorordning.

Af Linea Kornum Rask

Fra turist til hjemløs

Det er en kold, våd aften i starten af januar og skyerne hænger tungt i Christiana, kun Pusher Street er oplyst af grønt lys og olietøndebål. Peter hilser med et stort smil, da vi sætter os ved de blomsterdugdækkede borde for at drikke billig kaffe på en lille café. Han skutter sig lidt i dynejakken. Han er vokset op i Nordgrønland med temperaturer minus 40 grader, men denne snigende, fugtige danske kulde, der omfavner én som en våd dyne, er noget helt andet, forklarer han. Peter fortæller, at han altid har været glad for Christiania, siden han kom her på ferie første gang i 1980’erne: sammenholdet og den frie, afslappede stemning. Men han forestillede sig ikke, at det en dag skulle blive et af de eneste steder, han har mulighed for at opholde sig i København. For Peter har levet meget af tiden, siden han kom til Danmark i august, som uregistreret hjemløs og bor rundt omkring hos venner og bekendte.

"Du kan godt skrive, at man kan mærke, at mange grønlændere flytter med håbet om et bedre liv, og jeg er en af dem", siger Peter. Når vi snakker om Grønland, kan man mærke hans dybe engagement i landets situation. Peter er født i 1968 og voksede op hos sine bedsteforældre i en mindre by i Nordgrønland, fordi hans forældre tog til Danmark for at arbejde og studere. Peter viser mig en halskæde med et lille glat isbjørnehoved udskåret i narhvaltand. Den bærer han for at mindes sin bedstemor. Han genkalder sig, hvordan hun sad på gulvet i barndomshjemmet og syede kamikker, sang salmer og fortalte ham om livets mening.

"Det, hun har lært mig, har altid været i mit hjerte. Hun lærte mig at hjælpe andre og hun har givet mig den bedste opdragelse, ellers havde jeg nok været meget værre, end jeg er", siger Peter med et grin. Han fortæller, at han kender mange, der forlader Grønland, fordi de er trætte af det grønlandske system.

Det kan han godt forstå. Systemet fungerer dårligt, og der bliver taget for lidt hånd om folk, der har det svært, mener Peter. Den grønlandske udvikling og livskvalitet får tre ud af ti stjerner, hvis man spørger ham,

"Mange grønlændere flytter med håbet om et bedre liv, og jeg er en af dem." Peter

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for bolignøden er meget slem i de større "De sagde, du eksisterer ikke i vores byer, for de fattige især, og der er meget arbejdsløshed. Peter har dog aldrig system, så tænker man, vi har sgu’ da haft problemer med at finde arbejde. rigsfællesskab, hvad betyder det så?"

Han har arbejdet stort set uafbrudt, siPeter den han kom i lære som VVS-mand i et dansk firma i 1985. Men i sommer fik han problemer med sin arbejdsgiver og menneske, men som et hul i folkeregistret: sagde sit job i Grønland op. Så kom han til "Jeg var lidt bange. Det var ligesom i Danmark i august for at besøge sine venner, Grønland, hvis man er ude og sejle, og der og måske udleve sin gamle drøm om at blive pludselig bliver tåget, så ved man ikke, hvor boende: "Jeg kom som turist for at snuse til man skal sejle hen og kan fare vild". det danske land, skal jeg blive eller ej?", siger Peter.

Peters første tanke var at tage hjem, men han besluttede sig til sidst for at blive efter En hjælpende mentor-hånd at have holdt ferie nogle måneder. Han taler Til Peters held hørte han fra en ven, at man flydende dansk, har mange venner her, og kunne få hjælp i Det Grønlandske Hus. Her med hans opsparing kunne han klare sig, fik han straks kontakt til et mentorprotil han fandt et arbejde. Det viste dig dog at jekt og fik tilknyttet en grønlandsk menvære meget sværere end forventet at starte et tor, der kendte til det danske system og nyt liv i Danmark: kunne ledsage ham. Med mentorens hjælp "Jeg tog den vej mine venner også gjorde, blev Peter bevidst om sine rettigheder og fik at blive her selvom det er lidt barskt. Jeg ved ansøgt om akuthjælp ved at blive registreikke, hvad fremtiden bringer, og jeg kender ret som hjemløs. Det burde tage to dage at kun det danske system en lille smule, men hente hans oplysninger fra Grønland, men det så ud som om, der var muligheder her, så der gik halvanden måned, før han blev rehvorfor ikke?", siger Peter og tilføjer: gistreret. Da Peter efter en uge stadig ikke "Men det er nok rigtigt, at vi mangler havde hørt fra sagsbehandleren, ringede mere information om, hvor meget man skal han, men fik at vide, at de ville sende et brev, forberede sig, før man rejser fra Grønland.

Jeg har venner her, som har boet i Danmark "Jeg er ret glad for, at jeg fik i rigtig mange år, som aldrig er blevet reghjælp, ellers ved jeg ikke, hvor istreret".

Velkommen på dansk Da Peter besluttede sig for at blive, gik han i begyndelsen af december ned på jobcentret på Vesterbro for at registrere sig og begynde jobsøgningen. Men han fik en nedslående besked: "De sagde, du eksisterer ikke i vores system, så tænker man, vi har sgu’ da rigsfællesskab, hvad betyder det så?", siger Peter forarget. Han prøvede at registrere sig med adresse hos sin ven, men fik at vide, at vennens boligforening ikke tillod det. Så Peter gik fra jobcentret uden nogen løsning og med en følelse af ikke at blive mødt som et

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jeg havde stået i dag. Men det er også svært at henvende sig, når man har været vant til at klare sig rimeligt godt selv hele livet", Peter

når ansøgningen var godkendt, selvom han forklarede, at han ikke havde nogen adresse.

"Så tænkte jeg, ah de vågner nok op og kigger på sagen og ringer tilbage senere. Så skal det nok lykkes at få hjælp, men der skete ikke noget", fortæller Peter. Han synes, at han har klaret sig okay, med hjælp fra sine venner og sin mentor. "Men i slutningen af

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december eksisterede jeg stadigvæk ikke.

Det har været hårdt, men jeg vil alligevel ikke brokke mig for meget, for det er min egen beslutning", siger Peter. Midt i januar blev hans situation endelig bedre, han blev registreret som hjemløs og fik tildelt overlevelseshjælp og derefter kontanthjælp. Men usikkerheden og den passive ventepositionen har været hård:

"Jeg var lidt bange. Det var ligesom i Grønland, hvis man er ude og sejle, og der pludselig bliver tåget, så ved man ikke, hvor man skal sejle hen og kan fare vild", siger Peter.

"Jeg er ret glad for, at jeg fik hjælp, ellers ved jeg ikke, hvor jeg havde stået i dag. Men det er også svært at henvende sig, når man har været vant til at klare sig rimeligt godt selv hele livet", siger Peter.

Stadig kun halvt hjemme

Selvom det har været svært at blive en del af det danske system, er Peter glad for at være i København. Han føler ikke, at han har mødt nogle særlige fordomme hos danskerne endnu, udover den uvidenhed han har mødt i bureaukratiet. Han fortæller i stedet: "Jeg kender godt til fordomme. Jeg ved, at da jeg var ung, tænkte jeg ’dumme danskere’, fordi vi havde en slags mindreværdskompleks. Vi følte os dårligere end dem, men uligheden var også meget værre, da jeg voksede op".

Han refererer til dengang i 1950’erne- og 60’erne, da Grønland blev ’lyn-moderniseret’ og en hær af danske håndværkere kom for at bygge nyt, uden at de grønlandske ar-

bejdere fik deres del af opgaverne. Samtidig er Peter i dag taknemmelig for, at han har lært sit håndværk og lært dansk, med sin danske arbejdsgiver. Han ville have haft det meget svært med sit minimale skole-dansk, selvom han på de grønlandske stamsteder i Christiania helt kan glemme, at han ikke er hjemme. Peter har accepteret sin situation, selvom han er ærgerlig over måden, han flyttede på: "Jeg havde ikke planlagt det godt nok at flytte til Danmark. Det kan drive mig til vanvid at tænke på, at jeg kunne have startet på den gode måde, men jeg har altid godt kunne lide at være sammen med de mennesker, som er lavest i samfundet, hvorfor ikke prøve at gå deres vej?", spørger han. Men Peter understreger samtidig, at han ville ønske, at situationen var bedre i Grønland, så der ikke var så mange, der ville flytte. Nu vil han prøve at finde et aktiveringsjob til at starte med, og han har bibeholdt sin optimisme gennem det første kaotiske halvår: "Jeg har en forhåbning om, at det nok skal gå. Jeg taler godt dansk, og jeg har meget arbejdserfaring. Det eneste jeg mangler for at kunne passe et arbejde er et ordentligt sted at bo. Jeg håber, det snart kan lykkes", siger Peter. Så skodder han den sidste rulle-cigaret, før han fortsætter ud i den fugtige aften til et sted, han stadig ikke kan kalde hjem.

Navnet Peter er opdigtet, da kilden ønsker at være anonym af hensyn til sin familie.

Kildens identitet er redaktionen bekendt.

Fotografierne er fra Peters Facebookalbum: Rejsebilleder fra Danmark, barndomsbilleder fra Grønland og fotografier, han ændrer til små, farverige kunstværker på computeren.

Hvis du har brug for hjælp: Det Grønlandske Hus i København: Man kan komme lige ind fra gaden og få rådgivning på stedet.

Rådgivningskontoret for det sociale arbejde og Mentorordningen ILIK. Addresse: Løvstræde 6, 1152 København K. Tlf: 0045 33 91 12 12

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Comics from the Refugee Protest Camp in Berlin Comic by Yahya Hamdan

For more information about the project see visAvis No. 8 - 2013

1: "I am at the bus stop on my way to find work."

2: He: "Hello my friend, how are you? Do you want to talk a bit?" She: "Hello, I am well. No I am sorry."

3: Taxi stop. He: "Where do I find work?"

4: He: "Miss, where do I find the bus stop?"

She: "Just walk straight ahead." He: "Thank you."

5: The bus stop. He: "Why is the bus delayed?" She: "I do not know."

1: The kitchen. "I don't know what to

3: -

think of those queues." "I have stopped

4: Sleeping tent.

eating."

5: The information

2: Sleeping tent.

Oversættelse side 101

The Promise

By Hassina Burgan

Photo: Nadjib Yussufi

This is me, Hassina, with my Mum Asifa.

We are from Afghanistan, a country that has no access to the sea.

In the winter of 1983 we left our home in the middle of the night, travelling first by taxi, then by tractor and finally on foot over the mountains. We thought we would return home after a few months, maybe a year, but this was not to be.

After a short time in Pakistan, we travelled to Europe to seek asylum in Germany. We lived with other refugees in former military barracks on the edge of the city. Slowly we got used to the foreign language, strange

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food and unfamiliar customs. It was not home, but we were safe.

Three years later I travelled with a friend to France. It was my very first holiday and also the first time away from my family. I was 23 years old.

We arrived at the hotel late at night after a long journey. In the morning my friend said he had a surprise for me, told me to shut my eyes and take his hand. He took me outside.

The wind was stronger than in the city and then I heard another sound that terrified and excited me. As the sound grew stronger he took his hands away from my eyes and told me to open them.

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Photo: Julian Ruddock

It was then that I saw it for the first time in my life.

Cold, blue and immense. Not just the sea, but the ocean, the Atlantic Ocean.

I screamed and laughed and cried. I was too scared to jump in the waves but just sat on the beach for hours. Eventually my friend had to drag me back to the hotel, wet, exhausted but happy.

When I returned to Germany I told my mother about all the colours, the smells, the different fishes and beautiful shells; the white sands and endless beaches. Eyes wide open like a child, she listened to my every

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word and asked at the end, if one day we could go together to the sea. I promised her that we would, but like many other things, this was not to be.

My mother died without ever seeing the sea.

She is buried in Berlin, far inland.

Since then I have always lived close to the coast.

[In memory of my mother Asifa: born Kabul 1930; died Berlin, January 19th 2006]

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Oversættelse side 98

Do you want to know who I am?

By Kourosh Farzin and Lise Olivarius • illustration BY Marie Northroup

Do you want to know who I am?

You want to talk about who you are?

Yes. Okay.

My name is Kourosh. I’m from Iran. I’m 28 years old. Now, it’s four years since I left Iran. I’ve been living in Europe.

Actually, it’s a long story. It started so many years ago. So many people have fought for this – it hasn’t only happened to me. The people in Iran are fighting for freedom, because we don’t have so much normal freedom. It’s a very strange and difficult life.

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Four years ago, there was an election. In 2009. One of the candidates – his name is Mousavi – was talking about freedom. If he became president, he said he would change so many things. He would bring democracy.

So everybody voted for him. Including me.

But on the day of the election, Ahmadinejad became president. It was fraud. You know, in the TV, they said that Ahmadinejad was elected, and nobody believed it. Because everybody had voted for Mousavi. When I heard that Ahmadinejad became president, I really got shocked. It was unbelievable.

The next day, so many people were in the streets demonstrating. Also me – I walked with the people, with my friends, my cousins. Everybody was demonstrating just to say "Give me back my vote."

After ten days, the leader of the country, Khamenei, went on TV and told people to stop the demonstrations. The next day, the police started to shoot at people. So many people died, and so many people got arrested by the police. Then I stopped going to the demonstrations. I don’t want to die for freedom. I’m looking for freedom; I’m not looking for death.

My cousin was campaigning for Mousavi. He had an office for this. Every night, he was there, and we had meetings, planning demonstrations and so on. I wasn’t as active as my cousin, but I was a part of the movement.

Slowly, people stopped the demonstrations. Nobody went anymore. But after some days, the police began to arrest people again. They also came to arrest my cousin.

It was twelve o’clock in the night. That night, when I was home, one of my friends called me and said that his car was broken and asked if I could help him. I’m a car mechanic. I went there to help him. It was something like one and a half hour away from the city. Then, while I was working on the car, my aunt called me. She was crying. She said that the police had come to their house and arrested my cousin. I said, "I’ll come to your place."

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I worked on the car for another half an hour. Then my brother called me. He said, "Hey brother, do you want to come and eat dinner together?" When he said that, I became terrified. We had already had dinner together hours before. My brother was actually clever to ask me that question. He called me, because the police forced him to. They wanted to arrest me too, so they were trying to trap me. I called my neighbor. I asked him to go and check my house. Ten minutes later, I called him, and his phone was out. Then I got so stressed. I turned off my phone. While I fixed the car, I thought about what to do. I talked with my friend – the one with the car, who was with me. He said, "Kourosh, you were in the demonstrations.

You shouldn’t go back. So many people have been arrested. It will be bad for you." So I didn’t go home. I slept in the car with my friend. The next day, I called my mom and asked what had happened. She was crying.

She said, "My son, what have you done?

The police were looking for you. They came to arrest you, and then they arrested your brother."

I was so confused. My friend advised me to go to my father’s village to stay there for some time. So I went to my father’s village. But my uncle said that the police would find me there. He said, "Here it’s not safe for you. You should go to Turkey."

My uncle and his friends helped me to go to Turkey. To Istanbul. For three days, I was there. But there were so many Iranian people in Istanbul. Everybody said that if the police arrested me in Turkey, they’d deport me to Iran. Everyone without a passport would be deported immediately. I didn’t have a passport, because I hadn’t had a chance to go home and get it before I fled.

Some of the Iranians in Istanbul said, "You should go to Greece. It’s safer there.

You won’t get deported so easily." Then I went to Greece.

I was in Greece for something like three, three and half years. Not in a camp, but not exactly underground either. I was living

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out in the open, I rented a house like normal people, and I was working sometimes.

I tried to seek asylum, but there were too many people. So many refugees. This was in Athens. There are so many refugees that the authorities can’t respond to all the asylum requests. I was there like so many other people, sleeping in the streets. The police know that we’re there, they can see us, but they can’t do anything. When the police arrests one of us, they just keep us in prison for six days, and then they say, "You have to leave the country." And then we just don’t.

Tell me about your life in Greece.

In the beginning it was really difficult. I didn’t have any friends, and I didn’t know anybody there and the language was difficult for me. But I speak it now. It was also difficult, because I didn’t have any money.

For two months I was sleeping in parks. I have slept in every park in Athens. I was lucky, because it was summer. Sometimes I also had problems finding food. I found a church where they gave free food to people. Every day I was there, waiting in line for maybe one and a half hour just to eat.

After two months, I made some Iranian friends. They showed me an Iranian market, an Iranian coffee shop, an Iranian internet café. So I went there and made more friends. One of them took me to his place and let me stay there for some time. It was a small place with one room, and there were nine people sleeping there. For a month, I lived there with them. It was difficult.

Then I found work in the Iranian coffee shop. When I had the money, I rented a place. I shared it with some Iranian friends.

But this was not a good life, because in the streets, we had so many problems with the police. We were always afraid. When the police arrested someone, they would ask if you were from Iran, and if you said yes, you would go to jail for six months. So I always said I was from Afghanistan. But we always felt stress in the streets.

Sometimes, there were demonstrations against refugees. Racist people made those

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demonstrations. Sometimes, the racist people attacked the refugee people in the streets.

So there were so many different problems.

In the coffee shop where I worked, some people were making fake passports, ID cards, visas. I got into this to help people.

Because it’s difficult for refugee people to get the documents they need. And I made some money on it too. But only so I could pay for food and rent.

I’ve made so many friends. Not only in Greece, but all over Europe. Because everybody travels everywhere. In the coffee shop, new refugees came every day. People were travelling every day. New people came from Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, everywhere. From Africa, also. So many people.

After three years the police tried to stop all the people working with fake passports.

So many of my friends got arrested. So I stopped working with passports. I had no work anymore, and every day I was afraid of the police, and I said to myself that I had to leave. I decided to seek asylum in another European country. It didn’t matter which country. All of them were the same to me.

But I decided to go to England. People said that it was easier to get asylum there.

From Greece I went to Italy by car. I had a fake passport, and I was with a girl from Afghanistan. It’s much easier to cross a border if you’re with a girl. Sometimes. The girl from Afghanistan wanted to cross the border, but she didn’t have any money. I told her that I could take her to Italy. I did it as much for my own sake as for hers. It’s almost impossible to go to another EU country from Greece. I had tried several times from airports. I have been arrested in all the airports.

In Thessaloniki, in Athens, in Kerkyra. And also in the ports, when I tried to leave by boat. In Patras and in Igoumenitsa.

I didn’t want any money from the Afghani girl. She was really happy that she was able to cross the border for free.

Otherwise, it’s really expensive for refugee people to travel. Some people pay like 4000 euro, 5000 euro. Getting the documents is also expensive. I made two passports, one

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for me and one for her. Then we left for Italy.

It was so stressful. I’ll never forget that night. But we made it.

I had been told that there was a lot of control of the cars on the highways, and that it was dangerous for me to travel by car in Italy, so I just left the car in the street and went by train to France.

In France, I went to Calais to go to England from there. For four months, I was in Calais. It’s really difficult to go to England. Every day, there are problems with police. Because so many refugee people are trying to cross the channel. There is so much control.

But I actually did go to England one time, for one day, to Dover. I was in a truck.

That’s the only way to go there. You have to go to a parking lot with trucks going to England, and you have to jump on board in the back without the driver noticing you. If the driver sees you, they’ll tell the police.

Because it’s also dangerous for the drivers.

They could be charged with human trafficking.

In Dover, on the same day, the English police deported me back to France. They didn’t ask me anything. Not my name, not where I was from. They just said, "Get on this ship and go back. "I was so sad.

Tell me about life in Calais.

It was such a bad life. We were always sleeping in the forest, in tents, under a bridge. But I made friends there from everywhere. They came from all over the world. Sometimes we would squat old houses that nobody was using. But after a couple of days, the police would always find us and throw us out.

We also used Salaam. Salaam is a place in Calais, where they give free food to people. Sometimes we also slept there. Here we also met a lot of No Border people from all over Europe. They helped me a lot.

After four months in Calais, I decided to stop trying to go to England. I was so tired. Every day the rain, the cold, no place to stay. Every day the same clothes.

Something like going to the toilet was also

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difficult. Everything was difficult. It took us two hours to walk to the parking lot where the trucks were. And then two hours to go back.

I decided to go to any other country.

Anywhere in Europe. I talked with some friends from the No Border group, and I decided on Denmark. So I applied for asylum in Denmark, and I was sent to Sandholm and then to Auderød. For three months I stayed there. Then they sent me to another camp, Holmegaard on Langeland.

Life in the camps was not good, because I was only waiting. But in Auderød, I had a job fixing bikes, and I liked that. It was nice work, and there were nice people. In Holmegaard, I was also fixing bikes.

After nine months, I got negative. I was so sad about that. I left the camp and went underground. It’s so bad to live underground. It’s worse than anything else that has happened to me. It’s very difficult to find work. I’m not studying. I don’t have anything to do. I’m only hanging out with friends, that’s all. I feel like life has stopped for me. Time has stopped. I’m getting older, nothing else moves. That’s it. That’s the story I want to tell.

I hope to live a normal life like everybody else. To get positive. To get an identity.

To get documents. I hope to live like you, like European people. Free. I hope to stop being afraid all the time. I’d like so much to sleep one night without stress. I miss so much to sleep without thinking.

Kourosh´s name have been changed in order to protect his identity.

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Comic by Jimmy

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Indhold / Content Oversættelser / Translations

†₨Ǻ[\]S ĽAtIØNŞ 86 87 92 94 95 97 98 101 101 104 108 111 112 115 116 116

Udsigt over Ma'arrat al-Numan i det befriede Syrien – Adam Qvist og Ida Rump The Health Maze – Hannah Lutz and Mia Mone Johansen "Vær forsigtig i lejren, vær forsigtig udenfor" – Lise Olivarius og Mia Mone Johansen Vi er her – Tekst af Andrea Meng og Johannes Hein fra Bon Courage-netværket Flygtningeopstand i Békéscsaba – H. og aktivister fra NO BORDER Serbien-netværket Hvor er vi nu? – Abdullah Akbarjan Vil du vide hvem jeg er? – Kourosh Farzin og Lise Olivarius Løftet – Hassina Burgan Migration og film – Mark Le Fanu Rabbit Land – Ursula Scavenius From Kalaallit Nunaat to Copenhagen – Linea Kornum Rask "They told me that I don’t exist" – Linea Kornum Rask Syrians fight for protection in Denmark – Mette Lundsfryd The Human Condition – Ina Serdarević Et fængsel er et fængsel er et fængsel – Katarzyna Winiecka og Louis Reumann Et visuelt ordforråd til Refugee Protest Vienna – Katherine Ball , Katarzyna Winiecka og Imayna Caceres

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Udsigt over Ma'arrat al-Numan i det befriede Syrien Af Ida Rump Fotos: Ida Rump og Adam Qvist Ma’arrat al-Numan er en by i den syriske Idlib provins, som ligger lige ved Alepp-Dimashq hovedvejen. I efteråret 2012 blev Ma’arrat al-Numan befriet fra regimet, hvorefter byen blev mål for intensive flybombardementer og tung beskydning. Det syriske regime har positioneret sig sydøst for byen i Wadi al-Deif-området. Fra disse militære positioner beskyder og destruerer snigskytter og artilleri stadig bygninger i byen.

Tidligere var Ma’arra´s indbyggertal et godt stykke over 100.000, men på grund af den tunge beskydning i december 2012 blev kun 5000 personer tilbage i byen. De fleste familier flyttede til omkringliggende landsbyer hvor bombardementerne var mindre intensive. I flere måneder boede de i private hjem eller i skoler, der indkvarterede interne flygtninge. Selvom bombardementerne fortsætter, er mange familier taget tilbage og for øjeblikket bor halvdelen af den oprindelige befolkning i byen.

På trods af dette har Ma'arra vist sig som et af mange fantastiske eksempler på, hvad almindelige borgere er i stand til at gøre i tomrummet efter det syriske regimes retræte og de offentlige myndigheders sammenbrud. Ma'arra stod tilbage uden nogen grundlæggende infrastruktur eller adgang til vand, mad og elektricitet. Veje, skoler, butikker og hospitaler var lukket ned. Nu er alt fra arbejdet med elektricitet til bemandingen af felthospitalet koordineret på frivillig basis.

Det lokale råd for Ma’arrat al-Numan består af fire lokale nødhjælps- og udviklingsorganisationer. En

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af organisationerne, Basmat Amal, koordinerer nødhjælp, kører en frivilligt drevet skole for yngre børn og iværksætter bæredygtige projekter såsom en satellitmast, der leverer gratis internet, en nonprofit butik, der sikrer lave priser i en situation, hvor inflationen er på mere end 400%; en mindre fabrik, der producerer billig sæbe, og en lille fabrik der eksporterer kjoler til Golfstaterne. Alle projekter er rettet imod den voldelige situations værste konsekvenser, herunder børns tabte skolegang, samt fattigdom og problemer med kommunikation.

Basmat Amal er en lokal nødhjælps- og udviklingsorganisation, der blev grundlagt i efteråret 2012 og er del af det lokale koordinerende råd. Deres mål er at etablere selvkørende bæredygtige projekter og gennem dette modvirke, at bistand i Syrien misbruges for at vinde folks opbakning.

Witness Syria er et solidaritetsnetværk mellem aktivister i Syrien og aktivister i Europa. Siden begyndelsen af 2012 har Witness Syria sendt en håndfuld små delegationer til Syrien for at møde med, bevidne og organisere sammen med syriske aktivister og civilsamfundet.

Lær mere om, støt og kontakt Basmat Amal og Witness Syria her: Basmat Amal Facebook: facebook.com/ JmaetBsmtAml Witness Syria: witnesssyria@gmail.com Se fotos side 59-63

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The Health Maze

BY Hannah Lutz and Mia Mone Johansen The Danish health insurance card is the yellow key to the Danish public healthcare system. But how does the right to health services look for people residing in Denmark without a personal identification number (CPR-number)? The rights you have depend on the ‘status’ ascribed to you – ‘asylum seeker’, ‘undocumented migrant’ etc., and while there are significant discrepancies in the granting of rights, there can also be certain challenges connected with the actual access to health services for asylum seekers and people living in Denmark without documents and residence permit. The disparity between formal rights and the actual access to Danish health services gave rise to the initiatives ‘Sundhed for Alle, IMCC’ (‘Health for All, IMCC’) and the ‘Trampoline House Health Group’ and their work. In the first part of visAvis’ series of articles on this subject, we have met representatives from the two groups to talk about rights and challenges connected with access to health.

Consultations in the Trampoline House

Two years ago, the physician Jacob Antonsen started setting up consultations for asylum seekers in the Trampoline House in Nørrebro. ‘Trampoline House Health Group’ (THHG) emerged from an interest in and concerns about the asylum seekers’ actual access to treatment within the public healthcare system. Most consultations are used for giving advice and currently the group also holds health-related workshops. Consultations take place in the House every Friday before the weekly house meeting and dinner for its users, simply because the group then expects a large number of people to be present. On a monthly basis, about 20-30 people attend the consultations. In addition to the weekly consultations, a medical student from the group is present every second Saturday at the Trampoline House Women’s Club.

According to Jacob, the consultations serve to create a space of confidence and trust, where people can safely present their problems and concerns.

"They generally come with the same things as you would see in a normal Danish medical practice: back pain, sore throat. In addition to this, there are of course a lot of other things related to being stuck in an asylum system for many years, seeing family and friends being sent back, or having escaped without one's family. Coming from a situation that is not very nice to a situation that is not necessarily

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nicer. So they come with a lot of normal things, but with the added dimension of the problem of being an asylum seeker."

Jacob emphasises that the consultations are not likely to help those asylum seekers with the most severe health problems. "The people that come and see us in the Trampoline House are active and relatively resourceful. We probably do not see the ones suffering the most, the ones that lie at home being very depressed or seriously ill." For this reason, the group has previously attempted an outreach approach in Avnstruplejren in order to make contact with some of the people that are more isolated.

Currently, however, all their activities take place in the Trampoline House.

Educating about rights

‘Sundhed For Alle’ (SFA) is an initiative formed by the student organisation ‘International Medical Cooperation Committee’ (IMCC), organising health promoting activities both in Denmark and internationally. In SFA, students in health sciences work with and for undocumented migrants’ rights to public healthcare in Denmark. The group started in 2010, and their activities consist of educational work, advocacy, presentations and workshops primarily directed towards other students of health sciences.

The SFA activists taught at the Department of Nursing at the Metropolitan University College.

Among other things, they worked to have a module on the rights and challenges related to undocumented persons’ access to the healthcare system incorporated in the curriculum. The group puts special emphasis on newly qualified nurses and doctors, as they, according to SFA, need a better introduction to the reality they will encounter in the hospitals. Ida Buhl, member of SFA since 2010, explains: "I believe several of us think that it is a bigger problem at the start of our careers than after we have become accustomed to a certain procedure.

We have approached the issue from how it is experienced by health professionals – an angle that is easily accessible for us. Another approach could be practically assisting undocumented migrants in using the healthcare system."

In November 2012, the group held an international conference titled ‘Pregnancy Examination

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in the Lunch Break? – Public Healthcare for Undocumented Migrants’. The conference focused on the extent to which treatment of undocumented migrants could be improved under public management and why this is important. The conference was the first of its kind and was held in collaboration with a broad range of associations of medical professionals and interest groups working with and for asylumseekers, refugees and undocumented migrants residing in Denmark. It was a very positive experience, Ida says. "Attracting more than 150 guests, we experienced the day as a great success. Creating a space for this discussion was exciting and powerful, and I had the impression that many of us were ready to change the public debate, now having the courage to facilitate a discussion about how we act as health professionals in relation to this diverse, mixed and fragile group of people."

Furthermore, a short movie was made about this conference and screened in the Trampoline House.

SFA was originally formed by medical student activists who worked towards ensuring medical assistance to the Iraqis, threatened with expulsion, who sought refuge in Brorson’s Church in 2009. "The idea behind this group was to create a forum for health professional students who had an opinion about this issue. In case that something similar to Brorson’s Church happened again, as well as to say that it is a problem that a lot of people can’t receive medical treatment," says Helle B. Krogh, active in SFA since 2010. The activists behind both initiatives, SFA and THHG, were also part of a discussion about the need for establishing a health clinic for undocumented migrants and refugees.

While several more established clinics for migrants and refugees without documents already exist in Sweden and Norway, there are currently only two clinics in Denmark. In 2011, the Danish Medical Association, the Danish Refugee Council and the Danish Red Cross opened ‘Sundhedsklinikken’ (‘The Health Clinic’) in Vesterbro, close to Copenhagen Central Station. It is privately funded and was the first clinic in Denmark to offer non-acute treatments to people without documents. These treatments are private and anonymous. The clinic offers ‘normal’ medical treatment as well as physiotherapy, acute dental treatment, midwife consultations and sessions with psychologists. The voluntary health personnel are present in the clinic three days a week. On their website, Red Cross writes that the clinic has had almost 4000 visitors during the first two years. Due to the considerable need for medical assistance, a similar clinic was opened in Aarhus in December 2013.

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Formal rights

All persons residing in Denmark have the right to acute hospital treatment. This applies to everyone, without consideration to legal status. For persons residing in the country without documents, acute treatments are the only health services provided by the public sector. Persons registered in asylum centres furthermore have the right to other ‘necessary’ treatment, that is, treatment considered to be ‘urgent and pain-relieving’ based on a medical assessment. Thus, they are not covered by the healthcare system to the same extent as Danish citizens or persons with residence permit. Based on the consultations in the Trampoline House, Jacob has acquired practical knowledge about the limitations people encounter in what he calls a parallel healthcare system. "In theory, asylum seekers are entitled to about the same as people with permanent residence permit or citizenship. Children under the age of 18 have the right to everything. For adults it is a bit more complicated."

According to Jacob, there is for example a limit to the amount of specialist visits you are entitled to as an asylum seeking person. In this respect, he does not think that the legislation is up to date with the reality in the camps. "You have the right to be seen by a specialist a certain amount of times, in addition to this, you have the right to dental care, but there is a financial limit of about 3000-5000 Danish kroner. This functions really well considering that refugees and asylum seekers are scheduled to stay in a camp for no longer than 12 months. But it is not sufficient when they stay there for eight or nine years." On paper, there are no such limitations to the number of specialist consultations, consultations with midwifes or general practitioners. But there is in relation to consultations with psychologists and psychiatrists. A year ago, it was decided that health personnel in the asylum centres could initiate ‘necessary’ dental treatments without any preceding approval by The Danish Immigration Service. Considering Jacob’s experiences, the question remains whether the patients in practice feel any impact of this law reform?

Undocumented migrants and undocumented refugees are among the groups that have the fewest formal rights in the Danish society in relation to health care. That is why SFA chose to focus on them. Persons without documents, as established, have the right to acute treatment but this right is complicated by the fact that the term ‘acute’ is not accurately defined in the law. It is therefore up to the health professional in question to decide if an illness or injury is acute. Ida, however, stresses that it is clearly illegal not to offer treatment in the cases that are considered acute: "You are obliged to of-

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fer acute help, and you break the law if you do not help people."

Ida, Helle and Jacob all find that access to formal rights is often filled with obstacles. "Are they actually getting what they are entitled to get?" Jacob asks, thereby formulating a concern shared by SFA and THHG. The formal rights cannot stand alone, and that is the most important reason for the groups’ existence.

From formal rights to practice – follow-up and personal identification number registration

Presently, Ida and Helle believe that the biggest problem for persons without documents is that they have no right to follow-up treatments in hospitals and at general practitioners. "The problem is that we cannot have a longer course of treatment.

Someone may have the need to come by several times and perhaps get some tests. In these cases, there is nothing much we can do," Helle explains.

And although the Red Cross Clinic has more liberty of action than the public hospitals, there is no collaboration between these agents. "Right now, there is no connecting line between the clinic with the practising doctors and the hospitals. There are also physiotherapists and other staff employed by the clinic. It would thus be optimal if the patient could be discharged to the clinic that could then do the follow-ups."

While persons living in Denmark without documents have a formal right to acute treatment, the access to hospitals comes with certain challenges.

Some people may, out of fear of the authorities, choose to stay away. But there are also certain administrative challenges, Helle and Ida mention, when a patient does not have a personal identification number. "If I am admitted, discharged and then admitted somewhere else, it is possible to trace my treatments via my personal identification number. But they receive a new personal identification number every time, so it is impossible to know what has happened before, which often leads to overtreatment or improper treatment", Ida says. These temporary personal identification numbers are not saved in the system, putting the patient as well as the medical professional in a difficult and potentially unsafe situation.

There can also be considerable challenges connected with medical consultations and treatment for asylum seeking persons. In the Trampoline House consultations, Jacob and his colleagues encounter people who have not received the treatment they need. Jacob emphasises dental care as a particularly ailing area of treatment. Having limited resources

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for expensive procedures, his experiences indicate that dentists often use the cheapest method. "Then you have this young, fancy Afghani boy sitting there with nicely styled hair, with the right clothes and sunglasses, and you tell him that his teeth will be pulled out and he will have to run around looking like an old man." Jacob adds that the standard of the treatments can be part of the problem: "A lot of people have received awful dental treatments." In the case of dental care, it is particularly difficult for THHG to help, as dental treatments often are very expensive. "We are in contact with dentists that are willing to help in acute cases." Jacob narrates. "But often they say that you have to pay for the equipment yourself, otherwise they rarely do it." The asylum seekers are not able to pay for the treatment themselves, as they are not allowed to work while their case is being considered and they have not yet been granted residence permits.

Insecurity

Another reason why people seeking asylum in Denmark come to the Trampoline House consultations is, according to Jacob, that they feel the need for a ‘second opinion’ after having visited a general practitioner in the camps. The Red Cross is responsible for the health clinics in the asylum centres and as it requires trust and confidence to turn to a physician with your physical and mental problems, Jacob considers this potentially problematic.

As the health clinic in Vesterbro equally is administered and run by the Red Cross, some people may feel uncomfortable visiting the clinic. "Red Cross is the organisation that, from the point of view of some asylum seekers, keeps them in the camp. Red Cross determines how much money they can get.

Red Cross appears to be in charge of them, and why would they then go to them with their problems?

Some people said that we should close ourselves down because we should not go against the Red Cross system. But we all have the right to a second opinion, and if you do not trust your healthcare system you are very welcome here", Jacob stresses.

He does, however, emphasise the collaboration between THHG and the Red Cross Clinic in Vesterbro as successful in many respects. "In nine out of ten cases we completely agree with the treatment offered by the Red Cross, they are our colleagues and we follow the same code of ethics. Most of us in the Trampoline House are newly qualified medical doctors, while the Red Cross doctors have many years of experience with this type of patients. But sometimes I feel like the patients in the Trampoline House need to hear it from someone they trust, and they trust us because we are part of the Trampoline House – their own organisation."

Lack of confidence in the authorities can, as men-

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tioned, equally stand in the way for undocumented migrants’ willingness to go to the hospital, even in cases of acute illness or injury. This can be due to an informational lack about rights as well as fear of state institutions such as hospitals. How can one trust that they will not contact the police? The fear of being turned down or even arrested means that some people may try to borrow a health insurance card when going to the hospital. Helle told us about their meeting with an acute physician that almost gave a patient the wrong treatment on the basis of someone else’s medical record. "He told us about someone in the ward for infectious medicine who almost died because it stated in his records that he suffered from diabetes. It turned out to be his cousin’s health insurance." Ida and Helle want to leave the message, that it is better not to bring a health insurance card. "It is a misunderstanding that a health insurance card is prerequisite to receiving treatment. This is something we need to educate people about." Helle says. "And maybe it would also be useful for people to know that what they tell us during consultations is confidential," Ida adds.

Difficult to reach women

According to Jacob, it seems that women applying for asylum or residing as undocumented migrants in Denmark are less likely to ask for medical assistance – another tendency that makes it difficult to put the formal rights into practice.

Correspondingly, the majority of the users of the Trampoline House - and thus the users of THHG are male. "Statistically, women constitute the most exposed group in the Danish society as well as in many other societies, and from a health perspective this is equally the case for immigrants and refugees." Jacob says. The THHG thus considered communication with women in the asylum centres extremely important, encouraging them to come forward with questions and worries. This lead to the group arranging their first workshop for women in Avnstrup, however the outreach work had to end due to administrative obstacles at the time. Jacob explains: "We would also very much like to work in Kongelunden, a centre that is housing single parents, single women and disabled. But Red Cross is a major organisation, and everything has to be done by the book. They were restructuring and were not able to allow us to come back."

As THHG have not accessed other asylum centres, most of the workshops take place in the Trampoline House. This leaves them to face the same challenge again: they can facilitate workshops for women in the Trampoline House, but will the ones that are most vulnerable and challenged show up?

Ambitions and hopes

Since the conference in 2012, the SFA activists have

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been discussing where their focus should be. One of the challenges they find interesting is to help make it easier for people to visit hospitals and receive the right treatment. "We have considered the possibility of assisting in organising and formalising the procedures. Guidelines are available in a few places, for instance the hospital intranets. In this context, it would be useful to create guidelines for helping patients without personal identification numbers, " Ida elaborates. Members of SFA and THHG all think that physicians should show extra consideration and print the medical records for the patient to take with him after the treatment.

According to Helle, this would make it much easier for the health professionals to gain insight into previous treatment and avoid future improper treatment.

In addition to this, SFA would like to continue educating about current rights, but the central question as discussed during the 2012 conference continues to be the limitations to the public healthcare system as experienced by undocumented migrants and refugees. In the longer term SFA plans to work towards changing this. The health clinic in Vesterbro is privately funded, and Helle and Ida are critical towards this creation of a parallel system, instead of solving the problem under public management or allowing the hospitals to treat undocumented migrants and refugees. But Jacob, Helle and Ida share the experience that the problem does not lie with the physicians and the nurses: "All research shows that doctors and nurses are willing to bend the rules a bit," Jacob says. "We often wear blinkers in relation to systems. In the situations where you are not sure what the rules are, you should always act in favour of the patient – it is always a subjective assessment. Generally, I recognise a lot of willingness to treat. This is my understanding of, or hope for, my profession." Jacob thinks that the problem rather lies in the administration of the hospitals where small, but critical challenges may occur in relation to computer systems. "You have to put in a code in order to put people in a certain box, and then continue to the next page." It can thus be a challenge for people without personal identification numbers to even get to the practitioner.

Ida has, however, recently seen an example of a small gesture, making it a little bit easier to navigate the bureaucratic health care system for people living as undocumented migrants in Denmark: "In a hospital in Copenhagen I happened to pass by where the emergency doctors reside; the doctors that deal with the ordinary stuff, before you are sent to the casualty department. And there was a sign saying: ‘If you do not have a Danish health insurance card then go directly to the reception in-

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stead of taking a seat.’ This is primarily for practical reasons, but it is still an example of what we would like to see happen - that we try to be extra considerate."

In the next articles of this series, we will talk to people who have experienced the Danish healthcare system as asylum seeking persons and undocumented refugees and migrants. We would also like to talk to representatives from the Red Cross Health Clinic.

Bibliography

Natasja Koitzsch Jensen, Signe Smith Nielsen og Allan Krasnik: Migrantstatus og adgang til sundhedsydelser i Danmark, 2011. I Ugeskrift for Læger.

Rune Aabenhus & Peter Hallas: Sundhedsloven og sundhedsydelser hos udokumenterede migranter, 2012. I Ugeskrift for Læger.

Sundhedsloven, § 80 om adgang til akut behandling for personer uden bopæl i landet.

Dansk Røde Kors’ Sundhedsklinikker: https:// www.rodekors.dk/det-goer-vi/sundhedsklinik Retningslinjer for bevilling af sundhedsbehandling til voksne asylansøgere mv. 2013, Udlændingeloven.

Retningslinjer for bevilling af tandbehandling til voksne asylansøgere mv. 2013, Udlændingeloven.

Fact box If you are residing in Denmark without documents and you need help in case of life threatening, acute illness or injury, call 112. If you need other emergency medical assistance, contact Lægevagten (www.lægevagten.dk). Du you reside in the Capital Region of Denmark, call 1813. In Zealand you can visit one of the following hospitals in case of acute illness or injury Hvidovre Hospital, Kettegård Allé 30, 2650 Hvidovre. The hospital has Denmark’s largest maternity ward – you can call the Danish Red Cross Clinic some time before you are due.

Amager Hospital, Italiensvej 1, 2300 København S. Bispebjerg Hospital, Bispebjerg Bakke 23, 2400 København NV. Herlev Hospital, Herlev Ringvej 75, 2730 Herlev.

Køge Sygehus, Alléen 15, 4180 Sorø.

Nordsjællands Hospital, Dyrehavevej 29, 3400 Hillerød.

Roskilde Sygehus, Køgevej 7-13, 4000 Roskilde. This hospital has a psychiatric emergency service.

NB. Rigshospitalet, Blegdamsvej 9, 2100 Kbh. Ø. This hospital has no emergency service that you can go to yourself.

If you are in Copenhagen or Aarhus without papers and you need non-acute medical help, contact project manager Vibeke Lenskjold for more information, opening times and addresses (The Danish Red Cross Clinics): Phone: 3171 6164, vilen@rodekors.dk There is also a dentist and a midwife, and they are very helpful.

If you would like to know more about Sundhed for Alle: http://imcc.dk/aktiviteter/sundhed-for-alle-imcc/http://imcc.dk/aktiviteter/sundhed-for-alleimcc/ If you would like to know more about the Trampoline House: http://trampolinehouse.dk Contact the Trampoline House Health Group: jacobantonsen@gmail.com Contact Sundhed for alle: sundhedforalle@imcc.dk

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"Vær forsigtig i lejren, vær forsigtig udenfor" Rachel har oplevet de mange udfordringer ved at være lesbisk asylansøger fra Uganda i Danmark. I organisationen LGBT Asylum kæmper hun sammen med andre migranter og danske statsborgere for LGBT-asylansøgeres rettigheder og forsøger at bryde isolationen.

Af Lise Olivarius og Mia Mone Johansen "Nu kan jeg i det mindste tale," siger Rachel. "Under mit første interview med Udlændingestyrelsen i Danmark kunne jeg ikke sige noget. Første gang jeg mødte Julie, kunne jeg heller ikke sige noget.

I dag er det første gang, jeg kan fortælle min historie uden at græde. Jeg finder styrke hos Julie og i mig selv."

Rachel er syvogtyve år gammel, fra Uganda og asylansøger i Danmark. Julie er dansk statsborger og Rachels kontaktperson i LGBT Asylum, en gruppe mennesker, der arbejder for LGBT(Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender)-asylansøgeres rettigheder.

"Da det begyndte at gå op for mig, at jeg er lesbisk, sagde jeg det ikke til nogen," fortæller Rachel.

"Det var kun mellem mig og min kæreste. Jeg var tolv. Da jeg var femten, fandt min far ud af, at jeg er lesbisk, og han blev virkelig vred på mig. Efter noget tid besluttede han, at han skulle lære mig, hvordan det er meningen, en kvinde skal være."

Rachel standser og trækker vejret dybt. "’Kvinder skal ikke være sammen med kvinder; kvinder skal være sammen med mænd’, sagde han."

Mens hendes far har slået og misbrugt hende seksuelt gennem mere end elleve år, er det Rachel, der er anklaget for "seksuelt utilladelige forhold".

I Uganda er homoseksualitet strafbart. Et lovforslag, der skærper strafferammen for homoseksualitet ved blandt andet at indføre livstidsdomme for ´homoseksuelle handlinger´, samt gør det strafbart ikke at anmelde LGBT-personer, er for nyligt blevet vedtaget af det ugandiske parlament. Selv om forslaget i januar 2014 overraskende nok blev blokeret af præsidenten, der nægtede at skrive under med den begrundelse, at der er bedre måder at helbrede homoseksuelles "abnormitet" på, vedbliver Uganda med at være berygtet for sine uhørt strenge love mod homoseksualitet. Det har flere gange været på tale at indføre dødsstraf for homoseksualitet. Men på trods af det, og på trods af at dansk lov i princippet giver asyl til folk, der er forfulgt på

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grund af tilhørsforhold til særlige, sociale grupper – og personer med ikke-normative kønsidentiteter og seksuelle orienteringer udgør en sådan gruppe – har Rachel to gange fået afslag på asyl i Danmark.

Grunden? De danske myndigheder tror ikke på, at hun er lesbisk.

Hendes sag er langt fra enestående. Resultatet af en asylsag i Danmark står og falder med det første interview hos politiet. Hvis asylansøgeren ikke fortæller en sammenhængende og nøjagtig historie under dette første, ofte timelange interview, bliver hun anset for at være "utroværdig", hvad der ofte har en omgående negativ virkning på sagen. At fortælle en tilfredsstillende historie er en udfordring for de fleste asylansøgere. Mange er traumatiserede, lider af delvis hukommelsestab eller bare generel forvirring, og mange er på vagt over for politiet og myndighederne og usikre på, hvad de kan fortælle dem. Det er ikke mindst tilfældet med LGBT-asylansøgere. I betragting af at de i mange tilfælde har måttet skjule deres seksualitet eller kønsidentitet gennem hele deres liv, og at de ofte flygter fra forfølgelse netop af samme grund, er det forståeligt at mange – som Rachel – ikke bare frivilligt springer ud over for de fremmede myndigheder – uvidende om, at det at lægge vægt på deres seksuelle orientering eller kønsidentitet faktisk vil påvirke deres asylsag afgørende i en positiv retning.

"De ved ikke, om det er sikkert at fortælle, eller om det overhovedet er lovligt," som Julie forklarer.

"Og hvor skulle de vide det fra? Ingen fortæller dem det. Det er derfor, vi prøver at nå ud til folk inden deres første interview."

Men selv hvis en asylansøger identificerer sig som LGBT-person i sit første interview, er der ingen garanti for, at myndighederne tror på det.

Bevisbyrden hviler på asylansøgeren. "Og hvordan beviser man, at man er homoseksuel," spørger Julie retorisk.

Det er bare ét eksempel på den manglende forståelse for LGBT-personers behov, man møder i

№9 visAvis • 2014

det danske asylsystem. Et system, der i bedste fald anerkender LGBT-asylansøgere ved at kræve, at de skal gøre homoseksuel eller transkønnet på en måde, der er synlig, beviselig og genkendelig ifølge vestlige normer.

I LGBT Asylum arbejder migranter og danske statsborgere sammen om at skabe opmærksomhed omkring LGBT-asylansøgeres rettigheder og behov. Størstedelen af gruppens energi bruges på de specifikke asylsager, hovedsageligt vedrørende folk fra lande hvor homoseksualitet og transkønnethed er kriminaliseret. Rachel og Julie arbejder for tiden på den krævende opgave at genåbne Rachels sag, efter den er blevet lukket. Organisationen er desuden et socialt netværk for LGBT-personer med og uden dansk statsborgerskab. "En familie," som Julie udtrykker det.

Tvunget hjemmefra

"Første gang jeg blev gravid, havde jeg ingen at henvende mig til," fortsætter Rachel sin historie. "Min far tvang mig til at få en abort. Da jeg var sytten, fødte jeg en lille pige. Det gik ikke godt derhjemme, men jeg havde ingen steder at gå hen. Da jeg snakkede med min kæreste, sagde hun, at vi skulle prøve at tjene penge nok til, at jeg kunne et tage et sted hen, hvor der var sikkert."

I mere end fem år arbejdede Rachel og hendes kæreste på at spare sammen til at betale en menneskesmugler for at få Rachel til Europa. I mellemtiden blev hun gravid igen – denne gang med tvillinger. Hun kunne ikke gå til politiet og anmelde sin far for de seksuelle overgreb af frygt for, at han til gengæld ville anklage hende for at være lesbisk. Hun betroede sig kun til sin kæreste.

Da de endelig havde fået skrabet nok penge sammen, planlagde Rachel at flygte ud af landet og efterlade sine børn hos sin søster. Aftenen før hun skulle rejse, anklagede hendes far hende for at have meldt ham til politiet og bankede hende. Morgenen efter vågnede han ikke. Han var død.

Da Rachel blev afhørt af politiet, fortalte hun dem om overgrebene. Da hun ikke kunne forklare, hvorfor hun aldrig var gået til politiet, mistænkte de hende for at have slået sin far ihjel.

"Da jeg ringede til min kæreste og fortalte, hvad der var sket, sagde hun, ’Nu har du al mulig grund til at forlade landet. Nu finder politiet ud af, at du er lesbisk.’"

Dagen efter lykkedes det Rachel at flygte, og et par dage senere ankom hun til Danmark.

"Man kan ikke føle sig sikker i lejrene"

"Da jeg kom til Danmark, var livet også hårdt. Først måtte jeg stikke af fra den mand, der havde fået mig til landet. For han ville også udnytte mig. Jeg vidste ikke noget om asylsystemet. Jeg var under jorden i cirka en måned. Så blev jeg taget af politiet i et

2014 • visAvis №9

tog. De sagde: "Der er to muligheder: Vi sætter dig i fængsel, eller du søger asyl.’ Så jeg søgte om asyl, og de sagde nej. Jeg søgte igen, og de sagde nej. Efter mit andet interview hørte jeg om LGBT Asylum."

Gruppen mødes den sidste fredag i hver måned for at arbejde og hygge. For asylansøgerne er det en kærkommen anledning til at komme ud af lejrene, som på mange måder er særligt uegnede til og ubehagelige for LGBT-personer – og for den sags skyld for kvinder.

"Man kan ikke føle sig sikker i lejrene", som Rachel udtrykker det, "når kvinder og mænd er blandet sammen, og størstedelen er mænd. Nogen gange er jeg bange for bare at gå ud og tage noget at spise."

Julie uddyber: "Det er svært at have nogen form for privatliv i lejrene, især for LGBT-personer, hvis man vil være åben omkring sin seksualitet, hvis man vil have noget litteratur om LGBT-ting. Især for folk, der har oplevet seksuel vold, føles det rigtig, rigtig usikkert."

Vi møder Rachel aftenen inden hun flytter fra Avnstruplejren. Med hjælp fra LGBT Asylum bliver hun overflyttet til Kongelunden, en lejr med et separat kvindecenter.

"Jeg ved ikke, hvad det er, men jeg ved, at det er et kvindecenter. Det giver mig i det mindste håb om, at jeg vil være i sikkerhed," siger Rachel.

At bryde den dobbelte isolation

Som de fleste LGBT-asylansøgere har Rachel kæmpet mod den dobbelte isolation, der følger af at falde uden for både den nationale og den seksuelle norm.

"Som LGBT-asylansøger er man virkelig isoleret," forklarer Julie. "Mange andre asylansøgere har diasporiske fællesskaber blandt folk fra deres hjemland, og måske blandt andre, men det er sværere, når man er LGBT-person, og man ikke ved, om man kan være åben omkring sig selv."

Rachel: "I lejren var livet virkelig hårdt. For jeg havde ingen at snakke med. Den eneste, der ringede til mig, var min præst. Jeg kunne ikke være åben over for ham eller hans kone, selv om de var så venlige. Så det var bare sådan, livet var. Jeg mødte nogle ugandiske damer, men jeg kunne ikke være åben over for dem, for jeg vidste ikke, hvem de var.

Jeg vidste ikke, hvad der ville ske, hvis jeg fortalte dem, at jeg er lesbisk. Men så mødte jeg en af dem til Priden. Nu snakker vi sammen som søstre."

"Man bliver bare nødt til at være forsigtig det meste af tiden. Især i lejren. Man bliver nødt til hurtigt at vide, "er hun homoseksuel?", før man kan sige: ’Jeg er ligesom dig.’ Det er situationen. Vær forsigtig i lejren, vær forsigtig udenfor."

Selv om Rachel føler sig som en outsider i asylsystemet på grund af sin seksuelle identitet, har det samme system paradoksalt nok vurderet hende til

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ikke at være homoseksuel nok til at blive inkluderet i den danske nations beskyttelse.

LGBT Asylum udgør et fristed fra både lejren og det omgivende samfund. Organisationen tilbyder juridisk og social hjælp i de specifikke sager, og den sidste fredag i måneden samles folk fra lejre i hele Danmark til det månedlige møde i København.

Til mødet deler de erfaringer og ressourcer, arrangerer indsamlinger af varmt vintertøj, eller hjælper hinanden med at oversætte og forstå officielle breve fra immigrationsmyndighederne – der altid er på dansk, som Rachel forklarer med et opgivende grin.

"Efter middagen hænger vi ud," siger Rachel.

"Nogle gange går vi i biografen sammen, og nogle gange går vi på bar."

Julie: "For eksempel har vi været i Kvindehuset, og også på Vela og nogle andre homobarer."

Desuden følges folk fra netværket ofte til arrangementer som Copenhagen Pride eller MIX Film Festival, den årlige LGBT-filmfestival i København.

frygte at blive straffet.

"I januar 2013 fik en afghansk, homoseksuel mand asyl i Danmark. Ikke fordi han var eftersøgt af politiet, men simpelthen fordi han var bøsse. Det skulle gerne betyde, at i kommende sager burde man ikke bare kunne beordre folk til at tage tilbage til deres hjemlande og være diskrete omkring deres seksualitet og gemme sig i skabet, som de gjorde før", fortæller Julie og understreger, at denne sag bør danne præcedens.

Desværre kommer denne afgørelse ikke til at have den store betydning for Rachels sag, som blev lukket inden januar 2013. Men efter at Rachel og Julie har præsenteret nye beviser for Flygtningenævnet, er der håb – omend ikke meget - om, at sagen bliver genåbnet.

"Nogle gange lever man i en kamp," siger Rachel. "Hos mine venner i LGBT Asylum har jeg i hvert fald fundet fred til at vide, hvem jeg er og til at føle mig godt tilpas ved at tale med folk, der forstår mig."

Retten til at leve åbent

Hvis du er LGBT-asylansøger i Danmark, kan organisationen LGBT Asylum tilbyde støtte og rådgivning i forbindelse med din asylsag. Jo tidligere du kontakter gruppen, desto bedre mulighed har de for at hjælpe dig. Du kan også kontakte gruppen, hvis du er interesseret i at møde andre LGBT-asylansøgere.

Du kan være helt anonym, hvis du ønsker det.

Ud over de mange LGBT-asylansøgere, der – som Rachel – er decideret forfulgte i deres hjemlande, forsøger LGBT Asylum også at varetage en anden gruppes rettigheder: Personer, hvis LGBT-identitet måske ikke er kendt af deres lokale myndigheder, men som søger asyl, fordi de ikke åbent kan udleve deres seksualitet eller kønsidentitet i deres hjemland, hvor homoseksualitet eller transkønnethed er strafbart. LGBT Asylum værner om begge gruppers rettigheder og agiterer for, at alle burde ikke bare have ret til sikkerhed, men også til at udtrykke deres seksuelle eller kønsmæssige identitet uden at

Kontakt:

Tel. +45 71 52 33 97 E-mail lgbtasylumdk@gmail.com Hjemmeside: www.lgbtasylum.dk

Vi er her Tekst af Andrea Meng og Johannes Hein fra Bon Courage-netværket Fotografier af Baykar, Lusen, Mehran, Elisavet, Antonia, Vasiliki, Zarema, Muslim, Amenallah, Abdul, Noor, Dominik, Jakub, Denisa og Erik.

Fotografierne på de følgende sider er taget i forbindelse med projektet "Wir Sind Hier" ("Vi Er Her"). Projektet er initieret og faciliteret af Andrea Meng og Johannes Hein. "Wir Sind Hier" foregik i Bornas Freizeitzentrum (fritidscenter), fra september til og med november 2013 i samarbejde med Bon Courage-netværket og med økonomisk støtte fra den lokale sammenslutning af billedkunstnere Bund der Bildenden Künstler Leipzig. Alle deltagerne er mellem 9 og 17 år gamle og har migrationsbaggrund. Nogle er midt i processen med at søge om asyl i Tyskland, og bor derfor i centre for asylansøgere i Leipzig og omegn. Seks af børnene

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og deres familier er blevet deporteret siden projektet blev iværksat. I skrivende stund er yderligere tre i fare for at blive deporteret.

Et billede siger mere end tusind ord. Lige meget hvilket sprog vi taler, forstår vi at: et træ er et træ, en fugl er en fugl og et menneske er et menneske.

De børn, der har været med i projektet, kommer fra alle verdenshjørner. De har måttet efterlade alt for at nå Tyskland sammen med deres familier.

Børnene skal skabe et nyt liv for dem selv her og lære et nyt sprog i en ung alder. I løbet af dette pro-

visAvis № 9 • 2014

jekt har de bevist at det er muligt at mødes, tale sammen og lære af hinanden uden på forhånd at kunne det samme sprog og de samme ord for træ, fugl og menneske.

Den lille del af projektet vi ønsker at præsentere her, består af fotografier, som børnene har taget ud fra temaerne: Asylcenter, familie, hverdag, skole, Borna og Tyskland.

"Jeg er fremmed" betyder ikke "jeg hører ikke til her." Det betyder "jeg er i gang med at lære at forstå."

(http://www.boncourage.de/)

Flygtningeopstand i Békéscsaba I Ungarn sidder de fleste asylansøgere fængslet i lukkede lejre under konstant trussel om udvisning og uden chance for en fair asylproces. I november 2013 gjorde omkring 200 beboere i en af disse lejre oprør i protest mod deres uretfærdige tilbageholdelse, de umenneskelige forhold i lejrene og alle udvisninger. Denne artikel giver en kort introduktion til situationen i Ungarn efterfulgt af en øjenvidneberetning fra opstanden i Békéscsaba.

Af H. og aktivister fra NO BORDER Serbien-netværket De fleste asylansøgere i Ungarn sidder tilbageholdt i lukkede lejre, mens de afventer afgørelsen på deres asylansøgning. Nogle placeres i såkaldte ’åbne lejre’, eller ’ikke-sikrede faciliteter’, som de må forlade i op til 24 timer. Om en flygtning ender i en åben eller lukket lejr afhænger af hendes eller hans oprindelsesland. Da sagerne generaliseres på baggrund af nationalitet, indkvarteres flygtninge fra stater, der har bedre chance for at opnå asyl i Ungarn (såsom Eritrea, Afghanistan og andre lande), i åbne lejre, mens andre tilbageholdes i lukkede lejre på ubestemt tid. En praksis, der udgør en permanent overtrædelse af menneskerettigheder fra den ungarske stat og EU's side.

Efter at reglen om tilbageholdelse af asylansøgere som en generel standard i Ungarn blev midlertidigt afbrudt, blev den genetableret i 2013.

Nu er der to måder, hvorpå folk kan placeres i detentionscentre i Ungarn. For det første er der de mennesker, der er blevet arresteret i Ungarn efter at have krydset grænsen og derfor er tvunget til at søge om asyl i Ungarn. For det andet er der dem, som er blevet udvist til Ungarn fra andre EU-lande under Dublin II-forordningen, fordi de har deres fingeraftryk registreret i Ungarn.

I de fleste sager antages det, at flygtningene er rejst ind i Ungarn og dermed ind i EU gennem Serbien, som ikke er en del af EU, og hvor det overvejende dysfunktionelle asylsystem efterlader ringe håb om, at flygtninge vil få nogen form for ’beskyttelse’. På den måde er detentionscentrene i

2014 • visAvis № 9

Ungarn en intergreret del af den generelle undertrykkelse af bevægelsesfrihed i Europa på baggrund af Dublin II/III. Efter en sultestrejke blandt flygtninge i oktober 2013 samt en ny bølge af udvisninger startede en gruppe flygtninge en opstand i den lukkede lejr Békéscsaba i november 2013. Flertallet af beboerne i denne lejr var blevet taget ved grænsen mellem Serbien og Ungarn. Opstanden var en demonstration af beboernes frustration over at være tilbageholdt uden begrundelse i de umenneskelige forhold i lejren samt over den daglige frygt for pludselig udvisning til Serbien. Deres kamp mod at blive holdt som fanger, for muligheden for at leve uden truslen om udvisning og for bevægelsesfrihed, afspejler den stærke utilfredshed med det nuværende europæiske grænsesystem. H. er en af de 192 flygtninge, der deltog i protesten. Her er hans vidnesbyrd: "Vi har flere gange lavet små protester i lejren for at forbedre vores forhold derinde. For eksempel organiserede vi kollektivt at nægte at spise. Det startede alt sammen, da de førte os til den lukkede lejr. Vi blev ført derhen efter vores asylansøgning.

En domstol forlænger sager i mindst to måneder; så lader de os vente.

Den lukkede lejr er ligesom et fængsel. I Békéscsaba var der omkring 200 mennesker fordelt på to bygninger. Forholdene var dårlige. Vi kunne ikke selv bestemme, hvornår vi ville spise eller hvor meget. Det var også ofte dårlig eller kold mad.

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Vi hørte, at hvis vi blev i lejren i seks måneder, ville de sende os tilbage [til uden for EU eller Serbien].

Vi vidste ikke præcis, hvad der ville ske efter de to måneder, som vores sager var blevet forlænget med.

I denne periode så jeg, at de udviste folk, som havde været der i fire måneder (fra Pakistan, Algeriet og andre lande). De [opsynsmændene og politiet] kom bare lige pludselig, uden at informere dem på forhånd og udviste dem den samme nat eller tidligt om morgenen den følgende dag. Folk her var vrede over, at de bare sender os tilbage. Vi kom for at søge om asyl, og så sender de os bare tilbage til Serbien.

Nogle af de mennesker, der blev deporteret havde ikke engang fået officielt afslag på deres asylsag.

Vi talte om det og diskuterede, hvad der kunne gøres. Da nogle flygtninge ankom til lejren fra Mali, spurgte de os, hvad der foregik. Hvorfor vi bliver tilbageholdt; vi er ikke kriminelle, vi er flygtninge. Så begyndte de en sultestrejke for frihed. Det startede den 10. oktober 2013 og varede i otte dage. Den 14. oktober sluttede yderligere ca. 55 mennesker fra forskellige lande sig til sultestrejken. Ledelsen i lejren kom og sagde, at de øjeblikkeligt skulle stoppe sultestrejken. Lederen lovede, at hvis de stoppede deres sultestrejke, ville han fremskynde deres asylproces.

Men de stolede ikke på disse tomme løfter. Efter sultestrejkens ottende dag besvimede en af mændene.

Han kom på hospitalet. Jeg så også, at der var folk fra medierne, der prøvede at få adgang til lejren for at lave interview.

Derefter stoppede de sultestrejken.

Efter kun en uge fik syv af de otte malier, som havde startet sultestrejken i første omgang, meget overraskende afslag på asyl. Det var en direkte reaktion på deres protest. Hvis man får afslag på sin asylsag, har man tre dage til at appellere for at få sin sag prøvet ved en højere domstol. Det betyder, at man bliver nødt til at vente yderligere en måned i den lukkede lejr. Men mange af os ved det ikke. Kun én af de syv personer fra Mali appellerede, de seks andre blev udvist til Serbien fire dage senere.

Situationen var derefter den samme som før. Jeg hørte kun om to personer, som fik mulighed for at flytte fra fængselslejren til en åben flygtningelejr. I deres tilfælde var det på grund af helbredssproblemer. Kvinder og piger sendes generelt til åbne lejre.

Efter cirka to uger organiserede vi en protest mod vores udvisning og for frihed. Det var efter en episode, hvor de udviste tre pakistanere, som havde været der i fire måneder. Det samme skete for en gruppe senegalesere. Det var uden begrundelse. Lidt tid efter hørte vi, at en af dem var død i Serbien, hvor de ikke havde noget sted at bo. Han frøs ihjel, mens han sov udenfor i den serbiske skov.

Stort set alle deltog i protesten. Vi stod udenfor i gården og holdt skilte op med slogans som ’ingen udvisninger’. Stemningen var anspændt, folk var irriterede, protesterede, råbte, men alting forblev fre-

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deligt. Vores aktion var usynlig for den ’ydre verden’ – den var rettet mod ledelsen i lejren. Bestyreren og personalet i lejren kom ud, og de fortalte os, at de ikke kunne gøre noget. De sagde, at de var ligesom fængselsbetjente. Ordrene kom fra Budapest, og vores protest ville ikke ændre noget. De foreslog endda, at vi opgav vores krav om asyl og forlod Ungarn. De fortalte os, at vores fingeraftryk derefter kun ville være registreret i Ungarn, og at vi kunne ansøge om asyl i andre EU-lande. [Det var højst sandsynligt en fuldt overlagt løgn fra deres side, eftersom det ville overtræde Dublin-forordningen]. Selv om vi var fredelige, kom der mange betjente med hunde og blev inde i lejren indtil kl. tre om natten. Jeg husker, at politikommisæren fra Békéscsaba by sagde, at hvis han var i vores sted, ville han gøre det samme.

Vi nægtede at opgive vores navne til lejrledelsen og politiet, da de krævede en liste over de flygtninge, der havde deltaget i protesten. De otte sultestrejkende havde tidligere gjort det, og vi vidste, hvad der var sket med dem. Under denne protest var der ingen til stede fra medierne. Så hvordan kunne vi henvende os til offentligheden med vores krav?

Den 11. november blev yderligere tre mennesker informeret om, at de ville blive udvist. Jeg ved, det var en mandag. De reagerede med stor vrede.

Flertallet af flygtningene i Békéscsaba stod bag dem.

Denne gang var det for meget. Alting skete meget hurtigt. Der var et møde, og efter frokost startede opstanden: Ting blev ødelagt i fængslet, glas blev splintret, folk ødelagde overvågningskameraerne, og en af bygningerne blev sat i brand. Alle sagde, ’vi har brug for frihed’ hele tiden. Jeg ved det ikke helt præcist, jeg tror omkring 200 mennesker fra mange forskellige lande deltog i opstanden. To mennesker flygtede ved den lejlighed.

Alt personalet i lejren løb væk, selv sikkerhedsvagterne. Grunden til at asylansøgerne ikke løb var, at detentionscentrets ledelse havde alle vores ejendele og penge. Desuden er lejren langt væk fra byen. Nogle af os prøvede at bryde porten op, så folk udenfor kunne se os og høre vores krav, ganske enkelt lade vores følelser blive hørt, men efter en time kom politiet. De afholdt folk fra at tage af sted. Jeg så mange, mange betjente, fuldt bevæbnede, gå ind med hunde, mens de råbte, at alle skulle stoppe.

Den samme dag overførte politiet os alle sammen til andre lukkede lejre i Ungarn med den begrundelse, at lejren ikke længere var sikker. Nogle af os fik ikke engang lov til at pakke vores personlige ejendele. Efter en uge blev vi ført tilbage til Békéscsaba. I mellemtiden var en af bygningerne blevet renoveret. Da vi kom tilbage, opførte sikkerhedsvagterne sig meget mere strikst end tidligere: Forholdene havde ikke forbedret sig, de var blevet værre. Nu fortæller de ikke længere folk i forvejen, at de står til at blive udvist. Før opstanden ville man blive informeret den samme dag om en kommende

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tvangsudvisning, men nu kommer de bare, afhenter asylansøgerne og udviser dem.

I nogen tid så det ud til, at de ville behande os bedre, måske for at forhindre en ny protest. Mælken blev nu serveret varm om morgenen og ikke længere kold. Men situationen i lejren er stadig meget dårlig.

De forbyder os endda at tage en portion mad mere, hvis vi stadig er sultne".

Disse begivenheder fandt sted uden mediernes opmærksomhed. Opstanden og dets revolutionære potentiale forlod ikke asylfængslets mure.

Den knappe mediedækning, der trods alt var, fokuserede på ’det gode stykke arbejde, de ungarske brandmænd havde gjort’ og reproducerede dermed det racistiske syn på migration uden at sætte flygtningeopstanden ind i en kontekst som et kollektivt og selvorganiseret skridt mod at bekæmpe grænse-

systemet. Grænsen kan være overalt for illegaliserede mennesker i et modbydeligt system, der opdeler folk i dem, der har papirer, og dem, der ikke har, hvilket efterlader de sidstnævnte fuldstændig marginaliserede. Men et umenneskeliggjort samfund er et samfund, der skader alle. Det faktum, at asylansøgere gemmes i lukkede detentionsscentre kræver mere kritisk opmærksomhed. At skandalisere de dårlige forhold alene er ikke nok.

H. besluttede at blive i detentionscentret, men – ligesom mange andre flytgninge, der ankommer til Ungarn – fik han ikke chancen for en fair asylproces. Han blev udvist illegalt fra landet af det ungarske politi uden at have modtaget et endegyldigt afslag på asyl.

H.s forbogstav er ændret for at beskytte hans anonymitet.

Hvor er vi nu?

Et år i flygtningeprotestlejren i Wien Af Abdullah Akbarjan

11. november 2012 gik vi - en gruppe flygtninge fra Traiskirchen-lejren (den største flygtningelejr i Østrig) - sammen med vores allierede til fods til Wien, hvor vi slog lejr i Votivpark. På det tidspunkt var vi omkring 200 personer. Vores krav var dengang: "(1) bedre oversættere, (2) adgang til det administrative retsvæsen og større juridisk hjælp, (3) stop alle deportationer, (4) bedre sundhedspleje, (5) ingen forflyttelser til afsides landsområder, (6) tyskundervisning og uddannelse til asylansøgere, (7) undervisning af børn i Traiskirchen-lejren, (8) bedre mad, (9) rent og ordentligt tøj og fodtøj, (10) bedre arbejdsmiljø og højere løn for arbejde udført i Traiskirchen, (11) gratis offentlig transport, (12) flere lommepenge, (13) internetadgang og satellittv."

Besættelse af Votivkirken

65 personer fra bevægelsen besluttede sig for at besætte kirken Votivkirche og starte en sultestrejke. Samtidig reviderede vi også vores krav: "(1) Grundversorgung (grundlæggende understøttelse) til alle asylansøgere, så længe de opholder sig i Østrig uanset deres juridiske status, (2) frit valg af opholdssted i Østrig og adgang til offentligt støttede boliger for alle asylansøgere, der opholder sig i Østrig – ingen forflyttelser imod folks ønsker, (3) adgang til arbejde, uddannelsesinstitutioner og social sikkerhed for alle migranter, der opholder sig i Østrig, (4) stop alle deportationer til Ungarn – stop alle deportationer associereret med Dublin

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II forordningen, (5) etablering af en uafhængig instans for grundlæggende undersøgelse og appel af alle afslag på asylansøgninger, (6) anerkendelse af socioøkonomiske motiver i tilgift til allerede anerkendte grunde til at flygte.

Hvis I ikke ønsker at møde vores krav, så bedes I venligst slette vores fingeraftryk fra jeres databaser og lade os rejse videre. Vi har ret til vores fremtid."

De andre flygtninge blev i parken og brugte også en del tid på universitetet. De blev regelmæssigt kontrolleret af politiet, og mange af dem besluttede at forlade protestaktionen. Til sidst blev lejren brutalt fjernet af politiet i slutningen af december. Vores sultestrejke varede en måned, indtil Caritas (den katolske organisation, der tager sig af grundlæggende serviceydelser til asylansøgere i Østrig) og nogle politikere lovede os en god, juridisk løsning for alle involverede personer inden for ti dage. Men efter vi afsluttede sultestrejken, var der ingen, der var villige til at tale med os. Vi fortsatte derfor sultestrejken i yderligere 17 dage. Herefter lovede Kardinal Schönborn (Wiens ærkebiskop og kardinal i den katolske kirke) og Caritas os et sted til vores protest samt beskyttelse i kirken. Kardinal Schönborn skrev i et brev til os, at vi ville blive beskyttet mod politiangreb, og at vi ville få støtte fra gode advokater.

Flytning til Servitenkloster

Vi troede igen på hans løfter og flyttede til Servitenklosteret. Men efter flytningen var vi ikke længere i kontakt med kardinalen, og vi blev udsat

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for hyppig politikontrol. Mange mennesker fik afslag på asyl. Da juli gik på hæld, var tyve personer tvunget til dagligt at melde sig til politiet. Et par dage senere blev otte af disse personer tilbageholdt og efterfølgende deporteret til Pakistan. Det har indtil nu ikke været muligt for os at komme i kontakt med nogle af disse personer. Vi har bedt Caritas om hjælp, men de har fortalt os, at de ikke kan gøre noget for os.

Politiet patruljerede stadig klosteret for at finde de resterende 12 personer. Mange forlod klosteret af frygt; nogle af dem tog til andre EU-lande, andre tog tilbage til lejrene. Samtidig prøvede indenrigsministeriet at kriminalisere os og arresterede nogle, som de anklagede for at være del af et internationalt trafficking-netværk. Disse personer er stadig tilbageholdt og afventer en retssag.

I slutningen af oktober var vi nødt til at forlade Servitenklosteret, og vi blev kun tilbudt individuelle pladser i lejrene. Men vi troede ikke længere på, at vi ville blive beskyttet af nogen offentlige instanser. Vi er bange, og derfor bliver vi sammen.

Det er meget lettere at deportere os, hvis vi er adskilt fra hinanden.

Søger beskyttelse på Kunstakademiet

Caritas tilbød os ikke muligheden for at blive sammen, og derfor valgte vi at søge beskyttelse på Kunstakademiet. Nogle af professorerne og mange af de studerende støtter vores protest og forsikrede os om deres solidaritet. Deres rektor optog desuden en solidaritetsvideo for flygtningebevægelsen i løbet af sommeren. Der hænger stadig et banner mod deportationer på akademiet. På første plenarforsamling på akademiet krævede rektoren, at vi

skulle forlade bygningen, men understregede samtidig, at hun ikke ville ringe til politiet. Efter et par dage krævede hun, at vi forlod bygningen den 4. november. I løbet af dagen havde vi lov til at bruge deres aula, hvis den ikke blev brugt til andet, men vi måtte ikke overnatte. Vi accepterede dette ultimatum og går derfor ikke derhen for at afholde møder. Vi har ikke længere et fælles sted og må finde nye løsninger for hvert møde. Vi bor privat, men vi kan i de fleste tilfælde ikke blive det samme sted ret længe ad gangen.

For nogle dage siden modtog vi oplysninger om, at Pakistan har indgået en aftale med EU med henblik på flere deportationer. 170 mennesker vil blive deporteret fra Østrig. Vi er kommet til Europa, fordi vi ikke kan leve i vores egne lande. Det er til dels på grund af interventionerne fra EU og USA – deres militær har ødelagt vore huse, landsbyer og byer.

Folk i Pakistan er konstant truet af maskingeværer og droner, de har ingen chance for at leve et normalt liv, de modtager ikke undervisning, de har intet sundhedsvæsen. Vi ønsker bare at leve på en måde, der er normal for borgere i EU-lande. Vi kræver, at EU og USA genskaber uddannelses- og sundhedsvæsnet i vores lande i stedet for at levere våben og true os.

Vi begyndte ikke og fortsætter heller ikke denne protest kun for vores egen skyld – det er for alle flygtninge i Europa; for alle uden muligheder her. Vi vil fortsætte vores protest, så længe vi har kræfter til det. Vi er bange, mange af os er blevet deporteret, mange har fået afslag på asyl. I vores hjemlande er vores liv truede, vi kan ikke tage tilbage. Kæmp med os, lad os kæmpe sammen.

Vil du vide hvem jeg er?

Af Kourosh Farzin og Lise Olivarius

Vil du vide, hvem jeg er?

Vil du gerne tale om, hvem du er?

Ja. Okay.

Jeg hedder Kourosh. Jeg er fra Iran. Jeg er 28 år gammel. Nu er det fire år siden, jeg forlod Iran. Jeg har været i Europa siden da.

Det er faktisk en lang historie. Det begyndte for så mange år siden. Der er så mange mennesker, der har kæmpet for det – det er ikke kun sket for mig.

Folk i Iran kæmper for frihed, for vi har ikke så meget almindelig frihed. Det er et meget svært og mærkeligt liv.

For fire år siden var der valg. I 2009. En af kandidaterne – Mousavi, hed han – talte om frihed.

Hvis han blev præsident, sagde han, ville han æn-

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dre så mange ting. Han ville indføre demokrati. Så alle stemte på ham. Også mig.

Men på valgdagen var det Ahmadinejad, der blev præsident. Det var svindel. De sagde i fjernsynet, at Ahmadinejad var blevet valgt, og der var ikke nogen, der troede på det. For alle havde jo stemt på Mousavi. Da jeg hørte, at Ahmadinejad var blevet præsident, blev jeg virkelig chokeret. Det var ikke til at tro.

Dagen efter gik mange, mange mennesker på gaden for at demonstrere. Også mig – jeg gik sammen med folk, med mine venner, mine fætre.

Alle demonstrerede bare for at sige: "Giv mig min stemme tilbage."

Ti dage efter gik landets overhoved, Khamenei, på tv og sagde til folk, at de skulle holde op med

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at demonstrere. Den næste dag begyndte politiet at skyde på folk. Der var så mange, der døde eller blev arresteret af politiet. Så holdt jeg op med at gå til demonstrationer. Jeg vil ikke dø for friheden. Jeg ønsker mig frihed, ikke død.

Min fætter havde været med til at føre valgkamp for Mousavi. Han havde et kontor til det formål. Hver aften var han der, og vi holdt møder, planlagde demonstrationer og så videre. Jeg var ikke lige så aktiv som min fætter, men jeg var en del af bevægelsen.

Folk holdt lige så stille op med at demonstrere.

Ingen gik på gaden længere. Men et par dage senere begyndte politiet igen at arrestere folk. De kom også for at arrestere min fætter. Klokken var tolv om natten. Den aften var jeg hjemme, da en af mine venner ringede og sagde, at hans bil var i stykker, og han spurgte, om jeg kunne hjælpe ham. Jeg er bilmekaniker. Jeg tog over til ham. Han befandt sig cirka halvanden time væk fra byen. Og så, mens jeg arbejdede på bilen, ringede min tante. Hun græd.

Hun sagde, at politiet var kommet hjem til dem og havde arresteret min fætter. Jeg sagde, "Jeg kommer hjem til jer." Jeg arbejdede på bilen i en halv time til. Så ringede min bror. Han sagde, "Hey, bror, skal vi spise middag sammen?" Da han sagde det, blev jeg rædselsslagen. Vi havde allerede spist middag sammen for flere timer siden. Min bror var snedig, at han stillede mig det spørgsmål. Han ringede til mig, fordi politiet tvang ham til det. De ville arrestere mig, så de forsøgte at lokke mig i en fælde. Jeg ringede til min nabo. Jeg bad ham om at holde øje med, hvad der skete hjemme hos mig. Ti minutter senere ringede jeg igen til ham, og hans telefon var død. Så blev jeg helt vildt stresset. Jeg slukkede min telefon. Mens jeg reparerede bilen, tænkte jeg over, hvad jeg skulle gøre. Jeg snakkede med min ven – ham med bilen. Han sagde, "Kourosh, du har deltaget i demonstrationerne. Du skal ikke tage hjem.

Der er så mange, der er blevet arresteret. Det ville ikke ende godt for dig." Så jeg tog ikke hjem. Jeg sov i bilen sammen med min ven. Næste morgen ringede jeg til min mor for at høre, hvad der var sket. Hun græd. Hun sagde, "Min søn, hvad har du gjort? Politiet leder efter dig. De kom for at arrestere dig, og så arresterede de din bror."

Jeg var så forvirret. Min ven rådede mig til at tage til min fars landsby og blive der et stykke tid. Så jeg tog til min fars landsby. Men min onkel sagde, at politiet ville finde mig der: "Der er ikke sikkert for dig her. Du skulle tage til Tyrkiet."

Min onkel og hans venner hjalp mig med at tage til Tyrkiet. Til Istanbul. Jeg var der i tre dage.

Men der var så mange iranere i Istanbul. Alle sagde, at hvis politiet arresterede mig i Tyrkiet, ville de deportere mig til Iran. Alle uden pas ville omgående blive deporteret. Jeg havde ikke noget pas, fordi jeg ikke havde haft mulighed for at tage hjem og hente

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det, inden jeg flygtede.

Nogle af iranerne i Istanbul sagde, "Du skulle tage til Grækenland. Det er sikrere der. Du bliver ikke så let deporteret." Så tog jeg til Grækenland.

Jeg var i Grækenland i omkring tre, tre et halvt år. Ikke i en lejr, men heller ikke ligefrem under jorden. Jeg levede åbent, jeg lejede et sted at bo som almindelige mennesker, og nogen gange havde jeg arbejde. Jeg prøvede at søge asyl, men der var alt for mange mennesker. Så mange flygtninge. Det var i Athen. Der er så mange flygtninge, at myndighederne ikke kan behandle alle asylansøgningerne. Jeg var der som så mange andre mennesker, der sover i gaderne. Politiet ved, at vi er der; de kan jo se os, men de kan ikke gøre noget. Når politiet arresterer en af os, fængsler de os bare i seks dage, og så siger de: "Du skal forlade landet." Og så lader vi bare være.

Fortæl mig om dit liv i Grækenland.

I begyndelsen var det virkelig svært, for jeg havde ikke nogen venner, og jeg kendte ikke nogen. Og sproget var svært for mig. Men jeg taler det nu. Det var også svært, fordi jeg ikke havde nogen penge. I to måneder sov jeg i parker. Der er ikke den park i Athen, jeg ikke har sovet i. Jeg var heldig, at det var sommer. Nogen gange havde jeg også svært ved at finde mad. Jeg fandt en kirke, hvor de uddelte gratis mad til folk. Hver dag kom jeg der og stod i kø i måske halvanden time bare for at spise.

Efter to måneder fik jeg nogle iranske venner.

De viste mig et iransk supermarked, en iransk kaffebar, en iransk internetcafé. Så tog jeg derhen og fik nogle flere venner. En af dem tog mig med hjem og lod mig blive der et stykke tid. Det var en lille etværelses lejlighed, og vi var ni mennesker, der sov der. I en måned boede jeg der sammen med dem.

Det var svært.

Så fandt jeg arbejde i den iranske kaffebar. Da jeg havde penge nok, lejede jeg en lejlighed. Jeg delte den med nogle iranske venner. Men det var ikke et godt liv, for på gaden havde vi så mange problemer med politiet. Vi var altid bange. Når politiet arresterede en, spurgte de, om man var fra Iran, og hvis man sagde ja, kom man i fængsel i seks måneder.

Så jeg sagde altid, at jeg var fra Afghanistan. Men vi var altid bange for at gå på gaden.

Nogen gange var der demonstrationer mod flygtninge. Racistiske mennesker demonstrerede.

Nogen gange angreb racisterne flygtninge på gaden. Så der var mange forskellige problemer.

I kaffebaren, hvor jeg arbejdede, var der nogen, der lavede falske pas, ID, visa. Jeg blev involveret i det for at hjælpe folk. For det er svært for flygtninge af få fat i de papirer, de har brug for. Jeg tjente også penge på det. Men bare så jeg kunne betale for mad og husleje.

Jeg har fået så mange venner. Ikke bare fra Grækenland, men fra hele Europa. For alle rejser

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over alt. I kaffebaren kom der nye flygtinge hver dag. Folk rejste hver dag. Nye mennesker kom fra Iran, Afghanistan, Irak, allevegne. Også fra Afrika.

Så mange mennesker.

Efter tre år forsøgte politiet at slå ned på alle, der arbejdede med falske pas. Mange af mine venner blev arresteret. Så jeg holdt op med at arbejde med pas. Jeg havde ikke noget arbejde længere, og hver dag var jeg bange for politiet, så jeg sagde til mig selv, at jeg blev nødt til at rejse. Jeg besluttede mig til at søge asyl i et andet europæisk land.

Det var ligemeget hvilket. De var alle sammen ens for mig. Men jeg besluttede mig for England. Folk sagde, at det var lettere at få asyl der.

Fra Grækenland tog jeg til Italien i bil. Jeg havde et falsk pas, og jeg var sammen med en pige fra Afghanistan. Det er meget lettere at krydse en grænse, hvis man er sammen med en pige. Nogen gange. Pigen fra Afghanistan ville krydse grænsen, men hun havde ikke nogen penge. Jeg fortalte hende, at jeg kunne få hende til Italien. Jeg gjorde det lige så meget for min egen skyld som for hendes.

Det er næsten umuligt at tage fra Grækenland til et andet EU-land. Jeg havde prøvet adskillige gange med fly. Jeg har været arresteret i alle lufthavnene. I Thessaloniki, i Athen, på Korfu. Og også i havnene, når jeg har prøvet at sejle derfra. I Patras og i Igoumenitsa.

Jeg ville ikke have nogen penge fra den afghanske pige. Hun var bare glad for at kunne krydse grænsen gratis. Ellers er det virkelig dyrt for flygtninge at rejse. Nogle betaler i retning af 4.000 €, 5000€. Det er også dyrt at få fat i de papirer, man skal bruge. Jeg lavede to pas, et til mig og et til hende. Så tog vi af sted til Italien.

Det var så stressende. Jeg glemmer aldrig den nat. Men vi klarede det.

Jeg havde hørt, at der er meget kontrol af biler på motorvejene, og at det ville være farligt for mig at køre i bil i Italien, så jeg efterlod bare bilen på vejen og tog toget til Frankrig.

I Frankrig tog jeg til Calais for at tage til England derfra. Jeg var i Calais i fire måneder. Det er virkelig svært at komme til England. Hver dag er der problemer med politiet. For der er så mange flygtninge, der forsøger at krydse kanalen. Der er så meget kontrol.

Men det lykkedes mig faktisk at komme til England – i én dag. Til Dover. Jeg kom med lastbil.

Det er den eneste måde at gøre det på. Man skal finde en parkeringsplads med lastbiler, der skal til England, og så må man hoppe op på ladet uden at chaufføren opdager det. Hvis chaufførerne ser én, siger de det til politiet. For det er også farligt for chaufførerne; de kan blive anklaget for menneskesmugling.

Den samme dag i Dover deporterede det engelske politi mig tilbage til Frankrig. De spurgte

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mig ikke om noget. Ikke om mit navn, ikke hvor jeg kom fra. De sagde bare: "Tag tilbage med båden her." Jeg var så ked af det.

Fortæl mig om livet i Calais.

Det var ikke noget godt liv. Vi sov altid i skoven, i telte, under broer. Men jeg fik venner fra mange forskellige steder. De kom fra hele verden. Nogen gange besatte vi gamle huse, som ingen brugte.

Men efter et par dage blev vi altid opdaget af politiet og smidt ud.

Vi brugte også Salaam. Salaam er et sted i Calais, hvor de giver gratis mad til folk. Nogen gange sov vi der også. Her mødte vi også en masse No Border-folk fra hele Europa. De har hjulpet mig meget.

Efter fire måneder i Calais besluttede jeg at holde op med at prøve at tage til England. Jeg var så træt. Hver dag: Regnen, kulden, ingen steder at være. Hver dag det samme tøj. Bare sådan noget som at gå på toilettet var svært. Alting var svært.

Det tog os to timer at gå til parkeringspladsen, hvor lastbilerne holdt. Og så to timer at gå tilbage.

Jeg besluttede at tage til et andet land. Hvor som helst i Europa. Jeg snakkede med nogle venner fra No Border-gruppen, og jeg bestemte mig for Danmark. Så søgte jeg asyl i Danmark, og jeg blev sendt til Sandholm og derefter til Auderød. I tre måneder blev jeg der. Så sendte de mig til en anden lejr: Holmegaard på Langeland.

Livet i lejrene var ikke godt, for jeg lavede ikke andet end at vente. Men i Auderød arbejdede jeg med at reparere cykler. Det var rart arbejde, og der var søde mennesker. I Holmegaard reparerede jeg også cykler.

Ni måneder senere fik jeg afslag på asyl. Jeg var så ked af det. Jeg forlod lejren og gik under jorden.

Det er slemt at leve under jorden. Det er værre end noget andet, jeg har oplevet. Det er meget svært at finde arbejde. Jeg studerer ikke. Jeg har ikke noget at lave. Jeg hænger kun ud med venner, ikke andet.

Jeg har det som om, mit liv er gået i stå. Tiden er gået i stå. Jeg bliver ældre, men der er ikke andet, der bevæger sig. Det er alt. Det er den historie, jeg vil fortælle.

Jeg håber på at kunne leve et almindeligt liv som alle andre. At blive godkendt. At få en identitet. At få papirer. Jeg håber på at leve som dig, som europæiske mennesker. Frit. Jeg håber på at holde op med at være bange hele tiden. Jeg ville så gerne kunne sove en nat uden stress. Jeg savner sådan at sove uden at tænke.

Kourosh Farzin er et opdigtet navn, da kilden ønsker at være anonym. Kildens identitet er redaktionen bekendt.

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Løftet

Af Hassina Burgan Det her er mig sammen med min mor, Asifa. Vi er fra Afghanistan, et land som ikke har adgang til havet.

I vinteren 1983 forlod vi vores hjem midt om natten, hvor vi først kørte med taxa, derefter med traktor og til sidst gik til fods over bjergene. Vi troede, at vi kunne vende hjem efter nogle få måneder, måske et år, men sådan skulle det ikke være.

Efter at have været i Pakistan i et kort stykke tid rejste vi til Europa for at søge asyl i Tyskland. Vi boede sammen med andre flygtninge i en tidligere miltærbarak på kanten af byen. Vi vænnede os langsomt til det fremmede sprog, den mærkelige mad og de ukendte skikke. Det var ikke som at være hjemme, men vi var trygge.

Tre år senere rejste jeg med en ven til Frankrig.

Det var min allerførste ferie og også første gang, jeg var væk fra min familie. Jeg var 23 år gammel.

Vi ankom til hotellet sent om aftenen efter en lang rejse. Om morgenen sagde min ven, at han havde en overraskelse til mig og bad mig om at lukke øjnene og tage hans hånd. Han tog mig med udenfor. Vinden var stærkere end i byen, og så hørte jeg en anden lyd, som både skræmte og begejstrede mig. Idet lyden blev højere, tog han sine hænder væk fra mine øjne og bad mig om at åbne

dem.

Da var det, at jeg så det for første gang i mit liv.

Koldt, blåt og umådeligt stort. Ikke bare havet, men et ocean – det Atlantiske Ocean.

Jeg skreg og lo og græd. Jeg var for bange til at hoppe i bølgerne, så jeg sad bare på stranden i timevis. Til sidst var min ven nødt til at slæbe mig tilbage til hotellet, våd og udmattet, men glad.

Da jeg vendte tilbage til Tyskland, fortalte jeg min mor om alle farverne, duftene, de forskellige fisk og smukke skaller, det hvide sand og de endeløse strande. Med øjnene vidt åbne som et barns lyttede hun til alt, hvad jeg havde at fortælle og spurgte til sidst, om vi en dag kunne tage ud til havet sammen. Jeg lovede hende, at det ville vi gøre, men som med så mange andre ting, så skulle det ikke ske.

Min mor døde uden nogensinde at have set havet.

Hun er begravet i Berlin, langt inde i landet.

Siden dengang har jeg altid boet tæt på kysten.

[Til minde om min mor, Asifa, født i Kabul 1930, gået bort i Berlin 19. januar 2006]

Migration og film af Mark Le Fanu

Filmindustrien blev som bekendt sat i gang af migranter. De store filmmoguler, der i sin tid grundlagde studierne – Laemmle, Fox, Meyer, Cohn, Warner-brødrene osv. – kom alle fra den gamle verden, hvorfra forældrene flygtede fra jødeforfølg elserne bare en generation forinden. Det 20. århundredes innovative kunstform, der var stum i sine første tredive år, bortset fra det typiske piano-akkompagnement, var særdeles velegnet til en tilskuerskare af tilflyttere – jøder, italienere, skandinaver – der langsomt var begyndt at tilpasse sig læse- og skrivefærdighederne i et nyt sprog. I sprogets fravær betød gestikken alt, som man kan se i enhver af de gamle Chaplin-film. (Charlie lavede en berømt film i 1917 – The Immigrant: vores helt set som en fremmed på vej mod frihedens land.)

Senere fik eksilets og hjemkomstens patos den helt store behandling i storbudgetfilm som Exodus (Otto Preminger, 1960), The Emigrants (Jan Troell, 1971) og – helt sublimt – i Elia Kazans mesterværk America, America (1963). Endnu senere har vi

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Titanic (1999), der delvist har migration som underliggende tema. Og Hollywood fortsætter med at behandle emnet den dag i dag. James Gray, der så finurligt dykkede ned i livet hos russiske tilflyttere i New Jersey i thrilleren Little Odessa (1994), har netop skrevet under på en ny film, The Immigrant (jeg har den til gode, og trods Chaplins film af samme titel tror jeg næppe, det er en komedie!); mens Terrence Malicks seneste, To the Wonder, behandler (så vidt emnet faktisk kan udledes: filmkritikere var uenige hvad dét angik) en russisk kvinde i selvvalgt eksil og de mentale kvaler omkring at skabe et nyt liv i Amerika med sin elsker.

Disse er hovedsageligt eksempler på amerikanske film, men der findes naturligvis andre filmskabende kulturer at undersøge – lige såvel som der er andre rejsemål end lige Frihedsgudinden.

Den mægtige Edgar Reitz, hvis Heimat-serie frydede tv-publikummer i 80’erne og 90’erne, fandt for nylig på at tilføje et ekstra afsnit til sagaen (Die andere Heimat, 2013), der viser udvandringen af

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tyskere fra landet til Brasilien i midten af det 19. århundrede. Havnebyernes grimhed – som springbræt til en mulig frihed – bliver udforsket på opfindsom vis i den britiske film Last Resort (Pawel Pawlikowski, 2000), men også i Aki Kaurismäki’s Le Havre (2012). Undersøgelsen af emnet er kort sagt for stort et felt til at et essay alene kan behandle det tilstrækkeligt. Det er dog stadig interessant at forsøge at følge sporene fra forskellige rejser i samtiden i al deres farlighed og skrøbelighed. Vi lever i en globaliseret verden, så måske kan emnet bedst beskrives geografisk.

Østeuropa til Vesteuropa

Film bliver let glemt, og det er længe siden, jeg har set Gianni Amelios Lamerica, som fortæller historien om en stor udvandring fra Albanien efter landets frigørelse fra kommunismen i de tidlige 1990’ere.

Filmen udkom i 1994, og dét jeg husker bedst fra den er realismen i scenerne om bord på skibet: solbrændte, livshærgede ansigter, og det gamle, rustne skib i sig selv fyldt med stimer af håbefulde mennesker. Det er en folkevandring i storskala, som var det hele den albanske nation, udhulet og ødelagt efter årelang misrøgt, der med ét besluttede sig for at pakke sammen og tage afsted. Mange illusioner er naturligvis på spil her: Passagererne – i hvert fald nogle af dem – tror, at de sejler mod Amerika (som skibets navn lader dem tro), hvorimod rejsemålet faktisk er Italien. Immervæk er det et bedre sted at havne end dér, hvor de kommer fra, og filmen udpensler farverigt de provinsielle protagonisters håb, humant og usentimentalt.

Endnu mere frisk i min erindring er en anden historie om albansk emigration, i mindre skala denne gang, bragt til det hvide lærred af den serbiske instruktør Goran Paskaljević. Honeymoons (2010) fortæller endda to historier om emigrationsforsøg. I den første historie flygter et ungt par fra Tirana, fra presset fra deres familie, ved (som i Amelios film) at tage til Italien. I den anden historie, der marginalt, men dog subtilt er forbundet med den første (ved et undertema af politisk uro i Kosovo), er det en dreng fra Beograd, der spiller cello, der bliver standset ved den østrigske grænse med sin kæreste, da han forsøger at komme til Wien efter at være tilbudt en stilling i byens symfoniorkester. Kommer han (eller de) igennem? Paskaljević er efter min mening en af Europas store, moderne instruktører (man har muligvis set en af hans tidligere film, Powder Keg, også kendt som Cabaret Balkan), og det der er så fantastisk ved denne film, som i alle hans værker, er dens observerende klarhed, dens fornægtelse af deterministiske klichéer, dens indlevende følelse af at ting altid kan gå "begge veje", og at der er menneskelige overraskelser i vente, selv i de mest grusomme situationer.

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Latinamerika til USA

Farerne ved præcis denne rejse – tværs gennem Mexico på et togtag, med fare for bagholdsangreb og røverier når som helst – blev først vist i moderne form så længe siden som 1984 i Gregory Nava's geniale film El Norte, netop genudgivet på dvd af Criterion, som er absolut anbefalelsesværdig, både for dens billedlige skønhed og dens sobre skuespil fra de unge protagonister, en bror og en søster på deres tragiske færd fra Guatemala. Hvis selve rejsen er forfærdelig, så er selve det at krydse grænsen stadig den allerværste og mest farlige del af det, en forhindring, der bliver mesterligt skildret i to nyere film, som (tilfældigvis) bærer præg af det samme – begge lægger vægt på pilgrimmenes ungdom og sårbarhed. Sin Nombre (Cary Fukunaga, 2010) skabte røre, da den udkom, med sin farverige udlægning af den mexikanske bandekultur, udspillet på hver sin side af jernbanesporet. Det er muligvis en mere melodramatisk film end The Golden Dream/La Jaula de Oro (Diego Quemada-Diaz, 2013), men begge film er i sidste ende urokkelige; Ved grænsen venter Døden på de rejsende (eller, i hvert tilfælde, venter den på én af dem). Og i hvert tilfælde – man ser Håbet her hvis man vil – overlever den ene af dem – for at kunne bære vidnesbyrd og sende besked tilbage fra USA.

Pakistan til Storbritannien

En rejse, der følger denne rute bliver fulgt i Michael Winterbottoms neorealistiske film In This World, der udkom i 2002. Egentlig er de fiktive protagonister Jamal og hans ældre fætter Enayat afghanere, der er blevet placeret i Pakistan som flygtninge, og sat i kontakt med de sædvanlige tvivlsomme menneskesmuglere. Deres rejse igennem Iran, Tyrkiet, og tværs over vandet til Trieste, låst inde i et fragtskib (Enayat overlever desværre ikke), og derfra til det berygtede Sangatte-modtagelsescenter i Calais, bliver filmet af Winterbottom med digitalkamera og en særlig detaljerig opmærksomhed: Den blotte fare og ubehaget ved sådan en tur er muligvis aldrig før blevet bedre dramatiseret. Dette er en film, hvor teksturen er så rå, detaljen så overbevisende, at man tror, man ser dokumentar.

Måske er det vigtigt at nævne, som mere end en forbigående bemærkning, at ægte dokumentarer om emnet rent faktisk bliver lavet. Og detaljen i disse dramaer er "overbevisende" ipso facto.

Kaveh Bakhtiaris Stop-Over/L’Escale (2013), der blev nomineret til "Best European Documentary of the Year", tager os med til et krisecenter i Athen, hvor seks iranere planlægger hver deres rejse til Europa på forfalskede dokumenter. Det eneste det kræver er, at de kommer helskindet gennem lufthavnen, sikkerheds- og paskontrollen, og gør de ikke, bliver det fængsel, udvisning og vanære.

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Spændingen er med andre ord indbygget, og velmanipuleret af instruktøren, der på det tidspunkt nok ikke vidste mere end mændene selv, om hvorvidt det ville lykkes eller ej. Held spiller en stor rolle i disse anliggender: for nogle af mændene kommer det til at virke som om det hele er så let, hvorimod for andre – Mohsen, gruppens vellidte ekstrovert; Hamid, deres "træner", der sultestrejker på dramatisk vis ved at sy læberne sammen – syntes intet at være mere metafysisk umuligt end at tage det sidste fatale skridt af rejsen. En tragisk og dyster film, der eminent indfanger den specifikke lidelse, det er at vente, der er mindst lige så stor en del af en flygtnings verdensbillede, som den komplementære oplevelse af let fremgang.

Centralasien til Vesteuropa (via Moskva)

En forholdsvis ny film fra Kirgisistan kunne passende nævnes på nuværende tidspunkt. Pustoy Dom/The Empty Home (2012, skrevet af Ekaterina Tirdatova og instrueret af Nurbek Egen) fortæller historien om en smuk og ressourcestærk, omend ikke helt moralsk upåklagelig, ung kvinde, der er besluttet på at slippe væk fra det allestedsnærværende patriarkat: det er en slags kedsomhed, der driver hende til at forlade sin flotte, men farlige og hævngerrige husbond, og sætte kurs mod Moskva for at prøve lykken. I hovedstaden møder hun hen ad vejen en ung franske kvinde på rejse med sin mor: Tilsammen overtaler rejseparret (og helt mentalt stabile er de nok ikke) vores heltinde til at rejse tilbage med dem til Frankrig, hvor hun skal passe den yngre franskkvindes barn som en anden surrogatmor. Eskapaderne ender i ynkelig tragedie, med detaljer vi ikke bør hænge os i her. Det der vises så eksemplarisk, er den tilfældighed der omgærder det allerførste tegn på flugt, "the migratory gesture". Objektivt kan man sige, at kvinden nok vil trives bedst i længden i eget land; det sker imidlertid bare ikke, og hvorfor forstår man sådan set udemærket. Verden over er der tusindvis – millioner? – af kvinder som Ascel (Marel Koichukaraeva i fremragende skuespil), der er utilfredse med deres provinsielle baggrund, som lader sig forføre af det nye og ukendte.

Afrika

De finder hen til den tilsandede udkant af kontinentet af så mange forskellige grunde. Nogle er "ægte flygtninge", på flugt fra krig og konflikt; andre, også børn og unge, er blevet taget af mellemmænd, og er ved at blive solgt som handelsvarer; andre endnu, med fast greb om friheden, søger nye muligheder for at arbejde i udlandet, som en vej ud af en barsk national armod. Disse folkevandringer sker hele året rundt, men vi hører kun om dem, når skibspassagererne havner i farvandet et sted mel-

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lem Siciliens kyst og ude i det store Atlanterhav.

Rejsernes drama skildres i mange nyere film, navnlig La Pirogue (2012) af den senegalesiske instruktør Moussa Tour. (En pirogue er et stort, havdygtigt skib med en smuk udformning, normalt til fiskeri, men også egnet til længere ture til havs.) Udførligt skildret i dette sobre og klassiske stykke håndværk er forestillingen om havet som historiens protagonist, livsbærende på den ene side, truende på den anden, med døden hængende lavt over de cirka 30 afrikanske mænd på åbent hav på deres vej til den sikre spanske kystlinje, de har drømt om.

Endnu inden man syner havet, inden turen til søs overhovedet begynder, er der trukket episke spor tværs over ørken og bjerge. Sagaen om intern migration er smukt skildret i den belgiskproducerede film Si le vent souleve la sable/Sounds of the Sand, instrueret af Marian Hänsel i 2006.

Det starter med en familie og dens geder. Vi er et sted i Afrika syd for Sahara. Vand er en mangelvare; De vil gerne rejse mod nord, hvor de hører der findes større forsyninger. På deres vej mod destinationen oplever de den barske virkelighed i det moderne, militariserede Afrika – store bander af omstrejfende, uniformerede militser (almindelige soldater eller "rebeller", det gør ingen forskel), der røver deres løsører og til sidst, på tragisk vis (i dette tilfælde med to af deres børn), deres liv. Filmen er i dén grad grum, men evner stadig at være utrolig blid og rørende: det er svært at beskrive dens indlevende menneskelighed. Konceptudviklet af et europæisk produktionsteam, føler man aldrig, at perspektivet er anderledes, end det bør være: "Fattigdom skaber uro; uro fører til vold; vold ødelægger infrastruktur." Der er naturligvis ingen behov for at minde os selv om, at der er mennesker – uskyldige mænd, kvinder og børn – der i sidste ende er ofrene for denne cyklus.

Kina

Kina er som bekendt i udvikling. Men her, igen, som med Afrika i Sounds of the Sand, er det den interne migration, der er lige så dragende som en exodus ud i den store verden. Mange filmskabere har forsøgt at fremkalde denne moderne omflakkende sociologi, og mest succesfuldt er det lykkedes Jia Zhang-ke, den ypperste af Kinas moderne filminstruktører, og en kunstner lige så hjemmevant i alle genrer indenfor dokumentarer og spillefilm.

(Faktisk er Jias værker som regel altid en blanding af de to.) En af hans tidlige film, XiaoWu/Pickpocket (1997) skildrede bevægelsen fra land til provinsby set fra en småkriminels perspektiv (i øvrigt sympatisk portrætteret, usædvanligt for Kina i denne era.) Still Life (2006) skildrer de forskellige personers gøren og laden; personer, hvis liv er kastet ud i forvirring af, at den oldgamle by Fengjie destrueres af projektet De Tre Slugters Dæmning. Rejser,

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på færge, jernbane, motorcykel og bus, er et underliggende tema i Jias seneste film A Touch of Sin (2013), der fører beskueren, over fire særskilte men forbundne episoder, fra Shanxi-provinsen i nord ned til Guangzhou City i den sydligste del af landet, lige ved Hongkong. Det er igennem disse parallelle rejser, at Jia væver en kritik af den moderne Kinas manglende ånd – og dens latente vold, underrepræsenteret i vestlige medier, men stadig et truende og gennemgående element i det nye industrielle proletariats liv.

Tyrkiet, Mellemøsten – og musik

Folkevandring som forårsaget af det arabiske forår er endnu ikke blevet oversat til spillefilm, dog regner jeg med at det sker inden længe. Tyrkiets, Syriens og Libyens porøse grænser råder over utallige hjerteskærende historier, når bare vi ved, hvor vi skal lede efter dem. Jordan og Libanon gør alt, hvad de kan for at imødekomme flygtningestrømmen fra nabolandene, hvem kunne dog bebrejde dem at byrden på et tidspunkt blev for stor. Hvad angår en tidligere fase af konflikten, der rækker mod vest fra Afghanistan, tværs over den islamiske verden, er der kommet mange vigtige og mindeværdige kommentarer om det på det hvide lærred.

Jeg tænker på konkrete eksempler, som Samira Makhmalbafs Blackboards (2000) og samme instruktørs At Five in the Afternoon (2002) (hvor er Samira nu? I eksil!); eller den fine undersøgelse af smugling og flugt, A Time for Drunken Horses (Bahman Ghobadi, 2000).

Filmene er, trods al deres skønhed, barske. Til gengæld når vi at slutte denne undersøgelse på en blid måde. Folkevandringer er altid

og alle steder kulturvandringer. En af de fineste film, jeg kender om migration er roma-dokumentaren Latcho Drom (Tony Gatlif, 1993), der på ekstravagant og kreativ vis sporer romafolkets bevægelser fra Indien, tværs gennem Europa og Nordafrika for at kulminere i Spanien.

Frembragt kun af deres musik og sang, er filmen en af de mest frydefuldte og farverige jeg nogensinde er stødt på. I samme dur med det enkelte værk af en udmærket instruktør: Fatih Akin er en 2. generations etnisk tyrker, opvokset og uddannet i Hamborg. Med film som Head-On/Gegen die Wand (2004) og The Edge of Heaven/Auf der anderen Seite (2007) har han givet moderne publikummer en barsk og usentimental indsigt i mentaliteten hos den generation hvis forældre eller bedsteforældre kom til Tyskland – og siden blev der – som gæstearbejdere. Men Akin vender mod musikken i sin brobyggende film, Crossing the Bridge: The Sound of Istanbul (2005), for at vise en anden form for væren, en der ikke så meget karakteriseres af konflikt og fattigdom, som af harmoni, overflod og gæstfrihed.

Det er en sublim blanding han har brygget sammen for os. På en café i Istanbul er der to forskellige musiktraditioner, roma og tyrkisk, der deler lige vilkår. Det er op til os at vælge. Det siges, at roma-musik får en til at danse, mens tyrkisk musik får en til at lytte. Publikum (mit publikum i al fald) vil danse og lytte! Og selvfølgelig er det også sådan, det bør være.

10. december 2013

Rabbit Land Amager strand

By Ursula Scavenius The following is an excerpt from a novel by Ursula Scavenius, which tells the story of a refugee girl, Fabiana, and her struggle for existence in the outskirts of Copenhagen, selling rabbits and dreaming of a better life together with Simon, the stateless.

The excerpt consists of several chapters or bits of chapters from different parts of the novel, offering us a glimpse of Fabiana’s background, milieu and her relationship with Simon, the artistic, ironic character, with whom all of the girls are in love. A dark building, a humid sink full of young rabbits, a runaway horse, Rimbaud and a bleeding birthmark.

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Chapter 1

She has so often sat in that shower at night, feeling dead. What if she was dead already without knowing it? She imagines that Simon and herself are dead. That they don’t know it. That they have long since been executed by the Danish state and thrown down into a common grave, and are now bathing in eternity, in hell, because they were not patient enough to become citizens, and that they are now sitting as a merged form in the bathtub, a man with long hair, breasts and a dick. Who knows? What gender does she in fact have herself as she sits there, staring across the hall and counting the pipes, but giving up because they are coiled around themselves and each other?

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It’s a whole different story when she checks in after work and searches the rooms for strangers.

And if there is nobody, she makes sure to push all the right buttons; first the green ones on her way in and then the red ones behind her, so that no uninvited guests can enter. For the housing is indeed unofficial, but it doesn’t mean that she wishes to be assaulted and pinioned and driven in a truck to Sweden as a sex slave.

Behind her, the tap is dripping, the rabbits are sleeping, it is 8 o’clock, no one is able to see her through the many doors, and yet she feels stared at as she sits there on the mattress and reads through the referral note. And then she takes a pen to write on the back of the referral note. At first only circles, then words. She contemplates writing a goodbye letter to Simon and thinks to herself that it will make him love her even more, forever maybe, even if he moves to Paris. But no one will find it anyway after she burns it all down and Simon might never receive it; if she wishes to say goodbye, at first she must get a decision, stay and obtain citizenship and marry Simon or lose the right to stay; go to Paris, where he will go when he can. Fabiana takes a look around and accidentally starts laughing at the thought of how offended Simon would be if they were to sleep here together.

He loves order; new pens, clean notebooks, a cleared desk. "This was the only room I could get for a thousand kroner under the table", she imagines defending herself. Illegal lodging and yet a start to becoming self-supporting for the scanty wage of four thousand kroner in return for the animal care here and there. If she’s given the right to vote, she won’t burn it down. If she isn’t, she will defect from society. (…)

Chapter 2

It is "the realpolitik which governs the decision".

Everyone knows that, and Simon has been caught in the system. He is 35 and he has written about freedom of religion and human rights in Russia until he was deported and managed to get away, and came to Denmark and became stateless, and no longer was able to return home, and does not have a home, not even in Denmark, because he is not getting that citizenship; he is "a scarecrow, a bogey to the other asylum seekers", he has been waiting since he was 20 and now he has become an artist and is ironic. She pictures him whispering with a dramatically underacted seriousness: "My heart is dead!"

That humour, which makes all the girls fall in love with him while he mocks them when they are not there. To Fabiana he says: "She is too fat, can’t you see it? Her breasts are too big." Or: "She is false."

"She is playing goody-goody." "She looks like a

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boy."

But once, when he was invited to film for a group of Danes who briefly felt sorry for the asylum seekers and their wretched conditions, and therefore signed up as volunteers, before they disappeared again, Simon fell in love with one of the South American girls who was helping out, she was a journalist, and then they started seeing each other and she came by the center regularly and made coffee and changed the sheets and played with the children and talked to the men, for the women avoided her.

But one day she found a Dane and broke up with Simon, and no one has seen her volunteering since. Simon rarely goes out after what happened, he hangs out in the day room and his own room looks like shit, besides, his sick younger brothers are in there, and the praying family dad who has lost his children, and a young guy who always wants to watch television in the room, so it’s almost like being in "a sick, noisy future planet," Simon says. Still he hasn’t wanted a new girlfriend after the South American girl. Fabiana could just rip the head off that girl, who has got Simon locked in a stubborn faithfulness. He doesn’t want Fabiana and still he holds her and begs weeping for solicitude; she is the sister that he misses in Siberia.

Despite all this, she cannot stop the urge to call. It is like a wound which breaks open again and again, and it has to be patched up by a phone call.

Just hearing the warmth of his voice is enough. The wound hardens and she calms down for a couple of hours. Her hands are shaking as she calls him from the phone booth. A little Kurdish girl from the playground of the kindergarten gave her a 20 for a little rabbit.

"Will you come and visit me if I tell you where I am?"

"Of course, I am just a bit busy."

"So you are not coming?"

"Maybe not. I’m pretty busy."

"There is no one but me. And the animals."

"What animals?"

"My rabbits. And my horse. So are you coming or what? You can get some money."

"Of course I’ll come if I get as much money as you.

I haven’t got any work permit!"

"I love you, Simon."

"Could you call again later? I am, as mentioned, a bit busy."

"Will you come?"

"I have that thing with the ears again. A new television has arrived. You could also come here?"

"No. It doesn’t matter then."

Fabiana hangs up, takes out a pair of scissors from her pocket and starts cutting the string but it won’t break. She cuts harder but nothing happens. Then she takes the scissors and throws them on the park-

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ing lot. Just then a dog barks angrily and shoots out of the bushes. Fabiana is running. She is thinking of her brother all the while. She hasn’t seen him since he was admitted with a drug psychosis. Now she wants to visit him.

Chapter 5

She immediately notices a difference in the kitchen and picks up the shirt from the drain. The rabbits are gone. She pulls up the mattress and places it against the wall; they are not hiding in the duvet.

She hears steps from the hallway, jumps up and reaches out for the big flashlight, ready to meet the unfamiliar.

"You probably thought that you had found a hiding spot!?", Simon laughs and steps into the light. She starts. The sight of him. The light flickers outside.

A plane thunders across the sky. Simon seems even taller and his eyes darker than the last time. His forehead is smooth and white and there is a little curl in his hair, which has turned lighter.

"Do you want me to go?", he asks. She still can’t say a thing. "Well, I just came by with your rabbits.

They had run all the way out to me."

One by one, the rabbits come running into the office, finding their corners and places.

"I love you too much", she notices herself whispering hoarsely deep down in the throat, but not a word is coming out.

"Okay, no, I called that Bente person, we get along quite well, and she told me where you were hiding", Simon says.

"Bente. You get on well?", Fabiana asks.

"Yes. Nice lady."

"She looks like a dead cat," Fabiana says.

Simon laughs like crazy and falls down on her mattress.

"You have written my name on the wall. What did you use?"

"A knife," Fabiana whispers, and can only think of how she feels like dying, because Simon is here, but is soon going to leave because Simon has fucked Bente and Mira and Julia and Radi. She is about to cry.

Simon stands up, takes her hands and holds her. She can smell that he has been smoking pot.

"I love you" rings out once again from her throat.

Then she coughs and has to turn away. Simon disappears out of the door to the garage.

"There’s your horse!" he exclaims.

"Has anyone else seen it?"

"No" she shouts. "Only you. You are the only one who has seen it!"

Chapter 25

The factory looks like a cabin in the snow, the clouds lie behind like a mountain. There is light in one of the windows. She walks over and looks

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inside the garage, where Simon stands, about to tie the horse to the iron pole in her read sweater. She tears the door open and runs inside. Simon cries out: "So, there you are? You really take good care of your animals. I must say that. The police were just about to come."

"You were the one who went to the cinema!".

"Me? I asked if you wanted to come along, and you wouldn’t, and when I come home, I see the horse standing and croaking out in the snow. Have you thought of seeing a doctor?"

"I have been talking to a doctor. I have been at the hospital all day."

She puts her hands on the horse’s mane, and it neighs.

"At least you love me," she says.

"Oh, poor little thing. The horse loves you. How lovely that you can make the animals love you."

Simon laughs, slaps her on the shoulder and walks into the kitchen. She can hear him put the kettle on, then she stands there staring straight ahead, she cannot stop, the snow has gone into her glance, and it won’t let her forget it. Snow, snow, snow.

"The Danish deported a Lebanese today", she yields. "He’s got a family in Denmark! His daughter is staying with an old man, named Aksel, who wants to fuck her, it’s so disgusting."

Simon murmurs something from the kitchen, and then: "The coffee’s ready."

"Aren’t you at all listening to what I’m saying?" she tries. "I’ve met a Lebanese girl, and there is this old Dane-pig, who’s trying to get her into bed with him.

We have to do something."

"Maybe she wants to fuck him too," Simon laughs.

"She wants his house and his money, is what she wants. He looks like a decomposing corpse".

"Maybe she needs it so badly, that it’s better than nothing. Here, take a coffee. You should have looked after your horse instead of trying to save the world. We live in night asylum ourselves."

"Night asylum."

"Rimbaud."

"My mother is sick."

"Of course she is sick."

"Like really sick. She’ll probably die soon."

"Everything is timeless. That’s what the sufis say."

Simon sits down on the mattress against the wall with the coffee in his hand. She does the same, sits against the wall with the coffee in her hand and looks at Simon. She cannot help but look at him, his skin is completely light and his eyes black. But the big birthmark on his cheek disturbs her glance.

Chapter 26

She waits, until he is asleep, before she cuts it off.

Simon wakes up with a scream and strikes out at her. He keeps screaming and screaming. Fabiana holds her ears.

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"Do something!" he yields.

But she doesn’t move. After a while Simon sits there staring out in the darkness with a cloth on his cheek.

"What’s wrong with you?"

And she apologizes unendingly, but he refuses to hold his arms round her. It’s still bleeding from his cheek, and she has a feeling that his birthmark lies in her mouth. That feeling of cutting through the big, fat birthmark makes her nauseous. She pulls up the rabbits, one by one, and places them on the floor. And then she throws up in the sink, as the rabbits gather around her feet, squeaking for food. She dries her mouth and puts away the cloth. There is one whole head of lettuce left. She cuts it up in four big slices and puts them on the floor. They’ll just have to bite it into pieces themselves.

As she lies down under the blanket, Simon starts sobbing with his head on her chest. She strokes his hair: "What is it, my love?"

He doesn’t object anymore, he merely says: "It’s my mother. Everybody knows. But still.

Nobody saw her face, after what happened, you know. But I saw it."

Fabiana tries to imagine a face dissolved in acid. A face that still functions, still talks, laughs, thinks, yells, but is acid-washed and without skin. "Your mother has made sure that you got your own face as a gift," she says. (…)

The horse is ill at ease, it kicks against the steel plate, and neighs howling. Fabiana knows what it takes. She sits beside it and waits for the dark to come.

The electricity goes as usual at eight o’clock.

Somebody still manages the payment of the light, Fabiana uses, somebody, she’ll never get to talk to, nor they to her, not even if it all burns down one day. She waits. At ten minutes past eight she unties the horse and leads it outside. Simon stands there smoking.

"Move a little bit," she says, " I am going for a ride."

"But you can’t ride," he says.

"No, I can’t, but the horse needs it."

"I can ride," Simon says. "Let me do it."

"Do you really want to do it?"

"Sure. But where do you want me to go?"

"To the beach. Follow me."

The paths to the beach are muddy and surrounded by towers. They walk a long time alongside a both rental place and the marina. Later on they pass endless rows of ships, stacked on top of each other. The horse treads with a lowered head and remains silent.

"Where did you find it?" Simon asks. She is able to see his green iris even in the dark.

"It was a girl on the beach. She fell off. She was

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all alone, and then I helped her up from the water.

The horse just rode deeper and deeper into the sea.

The girl started running, and so I went to fetch the horse."

"Isn’t anyone looking for it?"

"I guess, they think it’s dead."

"Why would they think that?"

"I helped them believe that, of course."

"How smart of you. Do you want a joint?"

"I’m done with that shit."

"Fine. No, I mean it. But what did you do?"

"I called the municipality and said that I had found a dead horse on the beach."

"And what did they do?"

"They told me to call the police. So I did. They wrote it down, and said, they would investigate the case. Then I called BT and said, that someone had found a dead horse on the beach, but that the police was trying to cover up the animal abuse that was behind it."

"You are a genius, Fabiana." He kisses her. "What do you call it?"

"Alexander," she says.

"But it’s a girl."

"How can you see that?"

Simon starts laughing, as if he cannot stop: "You should call her Herta Müller instead."

"Herta Müller. Who is that?"

"No one," Simon says and puts out the joint in the sand.

"That’s the last one," he says. "From now on I’ll help you with Herta."

Fabiana lets herself fall on the sand, she puts her hand harshly in between her legs and presses her fingers into her crotch, she cries a little and laughs at the same time. The horse is rearing and neighing as Simon sits on top of it. He rides at a gallop over the dark sand, and her trousers are drenched.

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From Kalaallit Nunaat to Copenhagen A Greenlander - in Greenlandic kalaallit - must travel 4000 km with a Danish passport to get to Copenhagen. Greenlanders are Danish citizens with equal rights, but at the same time, an overlooked group of migrants. They are not offered tailored help nor integration projects like other migrants, even though many Greenlanders also experience problems with bureaucracy, prejudice and language barriers when moving to Denmark.

BY Linea Kornum Rask

"You cannot overlook Greenland on a world map.

It is large and white, but it is not part of the Danish consciousness", says Nivi Christensen with a smile.

She is a young Greenlandic woman working in the information department at the Greenlandic House in Copenhagen. There are two things that she wishes Danes knew, at the very least, about Greenland.

1) That distance from Northern Greenland to Southern Greenland is the same as from Denmark to Africa and 2) That the geographical area of Greenland is 52 times larger than Denmark, but only about 56.000 people live there, and the majority of these reside in just 17 ​​cities. These simple facts illustrate how great the geographical differences between the two members of the Common wealth are. It should, according Nivi Christensen, arouse the curiosity of the Danes, which could help to break down the wall of ignorance and prejudice which many Greenlanders encounter in Denmark.

Nivi Christensen is part of the large group of young Greenlanders who have travelled to Denmark to study, who speak perfect Danish and feel at home in both countries. Another large group of Greenlanders come to Denmark to work or as pensioners. There are between 14.000 and 18.000 Greenlanders in Denmark, and The Council for Socially Marginalised People estimate that about 6 to 20 percent of them live as homeless and addicts (Rådet fot Socialt Udsatte 2014:6).

In many ways, Nivi Christensen is part of a privileged group, but still she has encountered more problems as a newcomer than just practical issues with a health insurance card, an ID card and student grants.

The stigma that Greenlanders experience in Denmark is also a part of her life. Nivi, experiences that people feel sorry for her, when they hear she

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is from Greenland, because they assume she had a bad childhood. Others find it difficult to believe that she is Greenlander because she is doing so well. This problem of stigma and discrimination of Greenlanders in Denmark was brought into focus by The Danish Institute for Human Rights in their status report for 2013, who found that even though the vast majority of Greenlanders do well in Denmark, the group experience discrimination due to stereotypes about the Greenlander. This particularly center on alcoholism and homelessness, and can impact social interaction, job seeking, education and contact with social services (IFM 2013: 27).

A flawed system

For many Greenlanders the problems begin at the first encounter with Danish bureaucracy.

Greenlanders are Danish citizens so they have equal rights under Danish law and can enter Denmark freely. However, some Greenlanders cannot find their way into the system and are overwhelmed by practical problems as soon as they need to register in Denmark, says Mille Schiermacher. Schiermacher is the project manager for a mentor project at the Greenlandic House in Copenhagen and a member of the Council for the Socially Marginalised. "The difficulty with the Danish Commonwealth is that there are many things that work the same way in Greenland and Denmark, but there are even more things that do not" She explains: "It becomes extremely difficult to navigate and know when to be cautious. In this way it is almost easier if you come from a country where you know that nothing is the same." The project manager explains that many Greenlanders do not know how hard it is to get access to the Danish social benefits and that the services are not automatically transferred to the Danish system. For example, even if, one receives cash benefits or early

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retirement pension in Greenland, one is not necessarily entitled to it in Denmark. You must apply again when you arrive. It creates a lot of problems, according to Mille Schiermacher, because you can easily risk being without an income for a period.

This is especially true if you have a hard time finding a place to live, as this allows you to sign up for the national register.

To find your way through the system, requires a lot of strength and resources. If you are unable to push for a solution, it may take some time before you are even registered in Denmark. Schiermacher has seen this time and again in her work with disadvantaged Greenlanders. "It is already difficult when you have just moved 4000 km away, and if you already have social or psychological problems, it can have serious consequences to start out that bad", she says, pointing to this as a contributing factor to why about 6 percent of the homeless in Denmark have Greenlandic background.

In Greenland there are relatively significant social problems, high unemployment and housing shortages in the cities, so it may seem like a good solution to move to Denmark. However, there is a lack of information on the Greenlandic part, that there is also a difficult job and housing situation in Denmark, says Schiermacher. Another problem is that some Greenlanders are not adequately prepared when they travel to Denmark and lack the documents you need to register in the Danish system.

Insufficient economy is a further obstruction, because when you are able to afford a deposit for an apartment, you will then typically have "too much money" to receive cash benefits from the government, says Schiermacher. "Then you have to wait until people almost end up on the street before you can help them. It is of course too late, because it’s hard to break out of a group who live on the street and often have major problems with alcohol and marijuana abuse", she explains.

Schiermacher concludes that the Danish system is simply not built to receive the Greenlandic migrants, because the same issues are repeated over and over again. But, this also means that the system can be improved with fairly simple methods.

Even though it is small group of Greenlanders who end up as homeless, it is costly both emotionally and financially for society, waiting for the people to become ‘lost’ before they receive tailored help, she says. "Generally speaking, the fact is that as long as they are doing well, they are Danes, and when they are not, then they enter the category of marginalized Greenlanders. Today, there is no middle

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ground," explains Schiermacher.

The language barrier

Most people assume that all Greenlanders speak Danish. The majority does, but the Greenlanders who do not speak the language are, according to Schiermacher, in greater risk of being isolated and discriminated against. Today there are many different levels of proficiency in Danish in Greenland, depending largely on which historical period one went to school in and where - a small setlement or a large city. Greenland ceased to be a colony and became a county in Denmark in 1953, the Danes began a strong, if not forceful process of making Greenland more "modern" and more Danish.

Danish language was the priority in public schools and many children and young people were also sent to a Danish school for one year. The result was that many people forgot Greenlandic, or began to speak it very poorly. However, after the Home Rule Act in 1979, reforms were undertaken to make Greenlandic the principal language. This resulted in many members of these generations not having learned much Danish (Stork and Thomsen 2007: 12).

Schiermacher believes that this is why free language classes tailored for Greenlanders in Denmark are needed, similar to the classes offered to migrants from all other countries. Greenlanders have the opportunity to receive Danish lessons alongside other migrants if their municipality in Denmark will pay.

But experience shows that most drop out of their Danish classes, because their situation is so different. Some, for example, speaks Danish fluently, but write very badly, she explains.

The Institute for Human Rights has also focused on how language barriers can lead to discrimination between Greenlanders and the staff of the social system who are supposed to help them in Denmark.

This often happens because many Greenlanders, who have problems with Danish, do not know that they have the right to an interpreter and are not offered one (IFM 2013 :28).

An overlooked group

The sociologist Lise Togeby, was one of the first to point this out in her book ‘Greenlanders in Denmark – a neglected minority’ from 2002, Greenlanders are in general an overlooked group.

For Schiermacher, there is still too little focus on the downside of the citizenship for the marginalized Greenlanders: " It is a political decision that the Greenlanders should have the same rights and obligations. It might be true ideologically, yet it is not practically. There are some special problems, which means that some manage poorly if they are

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not offered tailored help." Though this idea has been rejected until recently, now some politicians are slowly starting to think differently, she says.

For the first time in their just released status report, The Institute for Human Rights also recommend that "an integration program is provided for Greenlanders who settle in Denmark, similar to the offer for other ethnic minorities, ensuring access to health checks on arrival, vaccination, interpretation, language training, educational and labor insertion" (IFM 2013: 25). But even though the need has been identified for at least a decade, dating back to Lise Togeby’s book and a large government study on marginalized Greenlander’s conditions, permanent measures of any kind are yet to be seen at a national level. This is despite evidence of good local experience with tailored help in cities like Aalborg.

According to Schiermacher, many practical problems can be solved by ensuring that the social, job and service centers that meet the Greenlanders have more knowledge about Greenland and the problems Greenland newcomers typically experience. This can be improved with a checklist in order to ensure that everyone gets a fair treatment.

Today, it is mostly by chance that you receive the correct help at a social, job or service centre, but there are Greenlandic houses in all the largest cities in Denmark which offer free advice.

Mentor help

The Greenlandic House in Copenhagen is one of the places that can help. The mentor project that Mille Schiermacher started in 2012 is built on Greenlanders in Denmark or Danes who know about Greenland that have volunteered to help newly arrived Greenlanders. This can be everything from advice, to a trip to the job center, to a guided bike trip in Copenhagen. The idea for the project began when Schiermacher worked as an anthropologist with homeless people from Greenland. Many Greenlanders told her that some of the key reasons for their addiction and homelessness, or the worsening of these issues, was dealing with the Danish system. "Their Danish citizenship should be a positive factor and not a pitfall, as it is now. This is the dilemma we are trying to work out", she says. So far the project has been a success. Most of the new Greenlanders who have participated in the project have received helpful input to begin their life in Denmark, with the support of the mentors and focus on each individual’s unique situation.

dark chapters, is a breeding ground for this prejudice. There has still not been a fundamental break with the Danish self-understanding as a kindhearted and civilizing colonial power (Jensen, Lars 2012:194). This ignorance, according to the Human Rights Institute, has consequences for equality: "Prejudices about Greenlanders and the stereotype of the group is caused by a generally low awareness of Greenland and Inuit people among the Danes, and this complicates participation in society on an equal footing" (IFM 2013:28).

A survey made ​​in 2012 by Visit Greenland among over 1000 Danes confirmed the extent of the prejudice. It showed that over 40 percent of respondents linked the Greenlanders with things like drinking, abuse and social problems, and that 42 percent believe that one in three hunters in Greenland still go hunting kayak (Information 2012). Schiermacher explains that Denmark is a bigger part of Greenland than vice versa: "In Greenland you get a lot of knowledge about Denmark from the teaching in public schools. Danish knowledge about Greenland is often stereotypes about the beauty of nature or the "social disaster." There is too little knowledge about Greenland as a modern society." Schiermacher is now involved in a project to develop new teaching materials on the contemporary Greenland for Danish schoolchildren. She hopes that by starting with children, it will be possible to begin to break down the prejudice against Greenlanders and pave the way for real equality.

Sources:

• Information. 2012: " We believe the Greenlanders " ( http://www.information.dk/telegram/311963 ) • Department of Human Rights. 2013: "Ethnic origin status 2013".

• Jensen , Lars. 2012: " Denmark Rigs Communities, tropical colonies and the post-colonial legacy.

Polity publishers.

• The Council for Socially Marginalised . 2014 : " In Greenland I Danish , and in Denmark I was ‘just’ Greenlander Greenlanders " .

• Stork , Naja Kleist and Thomsen, Ole . 2007: " Danish for socially disadvantaged " . Board of Specialist Consultancy and Social Services Vulnerability Unit, Ministry of Social Affairs .

"Stupid Danes"

A continuing and fundamental problem is the prejudice that Greenlanders meet with in Denmark.

The lack of basic knowledge about Greenland and Denmark’s role as a colonial power, especially the

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"They told me that I don’t exist" When Peter came from Nuuk to Copenhagen, his expectations of the Danish Commonwealth turned into a deep frustration with a flawed system with no understanding for the Greenlandic situation. He lived his first few months in Denmark as homeless, and can’t imagine where he would be today if it wasn’t for the help of a volunteer mentor.

By Linea Kornum Rask It's a cold, humid night in early January and the clouds hang heavily over Christiana, only Pusher Street is illuminated by green light and an oilbarrel fire. Peter greets me with a big smile as we sit down at the flowerpatterned tables of a small café to drink cheap coffee.

He shudders slightly in his duvet jacket. He grew up in northern Greenland with minus 40 degrees, but this subtle, moist Danish cold that embraces you like a wet blanket is something completely different, he explains.

Peter says that he has always been fond of Christiania since he came here on holiday for the first time in the 1980’s: the spirit of community, freedom and the relaxed atmosphere. But he did not imagine that it would one day, be one of the only places he can stay in Copenhagen. Since he came to Denmark in August, Peter has lived much of the time as an unregistered homeless person, staing with friends and acquaintances.

From tourist to homeless

"You can write that many Greenlanders move with the hope of a better life, and I'm one of them", says Peter.

When we talk about Greenland, you can feel his deep commitment to the country. Peter was born in 1968 and grew up with his grandparents in a small town in northern Greenland because his parents went to Denmark to work and study. Peter shows me a necklace with a small smooth polarbearhead carved from narwhal tusk. He wears it to remember his grandmother.

He recounts how she sat on the floor in his childhood home and sewed skinboots, singing hymns and telling him about the meaning of life. "What she has taught me has always been in my heart. She taught me to help others and she has given me the best upbringing.

Otherwise I would probably have been much worse than I am", says Peter with a laugh. He says he knows many people that leave Greenland, because they are

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tired of the Greenlandic system. He understands that.

The system works poorly, and people in difficult situations are not properly cared for, says Peter. He gives the Greenlandic development and quality of life "three out of ten stars" - the housing shortage is very bad in the major cities, for the poor in particular, and there is significant unemployment.

Peter has never had trouble finding work though. He has worked almost continuously since he was apprentice to a Danish plumber in 1985. But this summer he had a disagreement with his employer and quit his job in Greenland. So he came to Denmark in August to visit his friends, and maybe live out his dream of start living here: "I came as a tourist to dip into the Danish waters - should I stay or not?" says Peter.

Peter's first thought was to go home, but in the end he decided to stay, after spending some months on holiday. He is fluent in Danish, has many friends here, and with his savings he could get by until he found a job. It turned out, however, to be much harder than expected to start a new life in Denmark: "I went down the same road as my friends did, staying here even though it's a bit tough. I don’t know what the future will bring, and I only know the Danish system a little bit, but it looked like there were opportunities here, so why not try?" says Peter, adding: "But it’s probably true that we need more information on how much preparation is needed before traveling from Greenland. I have friends here who have lived in Denmark for many years, who have never been registered."

Welcome in Danish

Peter decided to stay, and in the beginning of December he went to the job centre in Vesterbro to get registered and start looking for a job. But he got a discouraging message: "They said, you don’t exist in our system. So I was thinking; but we’re supposed to have a national community, what does that mean then?", says Peter indignant. He tried to register with his friend’s address, but was told that his friend's housing association did not allow it. So Peter went from the job centre without a solution and with a feeling of not being treated as a human being, but rather as a missing piece of information: "I was a little scared. It was like in Greenland, if you're out sailing, and it suddenly becomes foggy, so you don’t know where to go and get lost."

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A helping mentor-hand

Fortunately Peter heard from a friend that you can find help in the Greenlandic House. There, he immediately got in contact with a mentoring project and was connected with a Greenlandic mentor who knew the Danish system and could accompany him. With the mentor's help Peter became aware of his rights and applied for emergency-help by registering as homeless. It was supposed to take two days for the Danish office to receive his information from Greenland, but in the end it took six weeks before he was registered. When Peter had still not heard from the social worker after a week, he contacted the office, but was told that they would send a letter when the application was approved, even though he explained that he had no address. "Then I thought, oh well they’ll wake up soon enough and look into the matter and call back later. Then I’ll get help. But nothing happened", says Peter.

He feels that he has been okay, with the help of his friends and mentor. "But at the end of December I still didn’t exist. It has been hard, but I don’t want to complain too much, for it was my own decision", says Peter. In mid-January, his situation finally improved - he became registered as homeless and was awarded emergency-help followed by a cash benefit.

However, the uncertainty and the passive standby position has been tough on Peter: "I'm pretty happy that I got help, otherwise I don’t know where I would be today. But it’s also hard to ask for help, when you have been used to taking care of yourself all of your life", says Peter.

Still only halfway home

Although it has been difficult to become a part of the Danish system, Peter is glad to be in Copenhagen.

He does not feel that he has met any particular prejudices from the Danes, besides the ignorance he has met in the bureaucracy. He says on the contrary: "I know about prejudice. I know that when I was young, I thought 'stupid Danes' because we had a sort of inferiority complex. We felt inferior to them, but the inequality was also much worse

when I was growing up." He refers to a time in the 1950’s and 60’s, when Greenland was in a very rapid process of ‘modernization’ and an army of Danish craftsmen came to build up the new society, without the Greenlandic workers getting their share of the tasks. At the same time, Peter is now grateful that he has learned his trade and learned Danish with his Danish employer. It would have been very difficult for him to get by in Denmark, with the very poor Danish he learnt in public school, though in Christiania he can sometimes forget that he is not at home.

Peter has accepted his situation, though he regrets the way he arrived here: "I had not planned well enough to move to Denmark. It can drive me crazy to think that I could have started in a good way, but I've always liked to be with people who are lowest in society, why not try to go their way?" he asks. But Peter also stresses that he wishes that the situation was better in Greenland so there were not so many people who felt like moving. Now he will try to find a part time job to start with, and he has maintained his optimism during the first chaotic months: "I have a hope that it will be all right. I speak Danish very well, and I have plenty of work experience. The only thing I need in order to get a job is a decent place to live. I hope it will happen soon", says Peter. Then he puts out the last handrolled cigarette before he goes out into the humid night, to a place he still cannot call home.

The name Peter is fictional as the source wishes to remain anonymous for the sake of his family. The identity of the source is known by the editors.

Facts, If you need help:

Greenlandic House in Copenhagen : You can come in and get advice on the spot.

Counseling Office for social work and mentoring project ILIK .

Address: Løvstræde 6 , 1152 Copenhagen K. Telephone: 0045 33 91 12 12

Syrians fight for protection in Denmark A group of Syrian migrants went into action for humane treatment of all Syrian refugees in Denmark in connection with the Refugee Board's change of policy in September 2013. It turned into an absurd encounter with a system that blindly insisted on the policy change as "positive." By Mette Lundsfryd "Oh spinning world, if my little heart, as small as a lump of coal, is wider than your borders, I know how narrow you are!"

Samar Yazbek, April 15, 2011, Damascus

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Syrians, living in asylum centers all over Denmark, went to Copenhagen on the Friday before the autumn break to express their legitimate demands to Denmark’s highest body in the asylum proce-

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dure, namely the Refugee Board. The plan was to refuse to leave the Refugee Board until the demand for asylum for all Syrians was met. But the door to the Refugee Board was locked. "You have nothing to do here", said a man who stood in the doorway.

If rejected Syrians, who have heard nothing from the Refugee Board since the policy change and thus find themselves in a legal vacuum, have nothing to do at the Refugee Board, then who has?

The demands of the Syrians

On September 18, 2013, the Refugee Board amended the practices relating to people who have fled Syria.

The changes mean that Syrians who can prove that they are from particularly dangerous areas in Syria receive a temporary residence permit. The Board considers this a very positive change. The Syrians themselves find it absurd, since some of them are from areas not recognized by Denmark as dangerous enough. Others are obviously not able to go back to Syria to find the evidence necessary to provide proof that they are personally persecuted and that they are from particularly dangerous areas. Many of those who turned up had not heard from the Refugee Board and did not know where they stood.

The group consisted of a mix of Syrians who arrived in Denmark three months ago, Syrians who have been in Denmark for a year, and yet more Syrians who have been in Denmark for up to 10 years and have lived in asylum centers for as long as they have been in the country – also for a long time after being rejected. They have been stuck in Denmark partly because of the law of the UN Refugee Convention of non-refoulement, i.e. that one must not repatriate a person to a country where they risk the death penalty or torture, and partly because of the Dublin Convention, which confines an asylum seeker to the European country where he or she first got fingerprinted.

Syrians with Danish citizenship also participated in the direct action, in order to show solidarity. After some negotiations five Syrians, an interpreter and myself were allowed to come inside and speak with a representative from the secretariat of the Refugee Board.

The Syrians had written a document containing their demands and had also collected signatures; these were handed over to the man from the secretariat.

The demands are that the Danish state:

Acknowledge all Syrians as refugees and grant them permanent residency.

Acknowledge all of Syria as a dangerous terri-

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tory, and drop the area strategy, which results in a person who has fled Syria having to prove that she is from a particularly dangerous area in Syria or having to go through one in order to get back home. The Danish state uses this strategy in order not to acknowledge all of Syria as dangerous, and thus limit the number of residence permits.

Give Syrians with families in other European countries the opportunity to be reunited, so the families do not have to live apart.

Drop the sort of cases referred to as Dublin cases, i.e. cases where a person has given fingerprints in another European country before arriving in Denmark. According to the Dublin Convention, a person can only apply for asylum upon arrival in the first European country.

Take part in sharing the burden with the other European countries, just as Denmark has signed up to do through the UN Refugee Convention.

Encountering the system

We were invited into a small room, located in the middle of a bright room, like some sort of showcase.

The system was expressed through a man who sat at the head of a black table. This representative from the secretariat of the Refugee Board personified the constraints of the system. The windows of the room open out directly onto the street Adelgade, and are covered by dense, black bar-like metal strips, which cover the entire facade of the building. The people gathered outside on the street could barely see inside. From the inside, we had a clear view of people outside. The worried glances, impatient movements and deep voices, distorted through the glass, could clearly be seen and heard from the "showcase." The man from the system announced that he was not one of the Refugee Board, but part of the secretariat of the Refugee Board.

Among the five Syrians, who had come along inside, there was an older woman, who told of her two sons and daughter killed in Syria, of her house which was burnt down, and about life in an asylum center while battling cancer, receiving two refusals of asylum, and having her remaining son about to be deported to Italy. Then there was a middle-aged man in fine black suit with a Kurdish flag pin in his collar, who talked about his three rejections of asylum; rejections he had received despite the change in the Danish practices. Furthermore, there was a young man saying nothing, who just stood and listened to the interpreter, and a tall straight-backed man, who explained that he had lived 10 years in Danish asylum centers and is unable to return to Syria, but yet also has had his asylum request rejected, despite the change in practices. Finally, there was a young family man who had arrived in Denmark with his wife and two small children, and who despite hav-

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ing presented new evidence in his case more than a year ago, still hasn’t received a response from the Board.

The man from the system explained the consequences of the change in practices, and he continued to emphasize how positive it was, while clearly emotionally affected by the stories of the five people, and by two children - the young father’s whose hands were small enough to reach between the black bars and knock on the room’s window. It caused a smile to spread over his face.

"Only people from particularly dangerous areas can get residency"

During the conversation, the man from the system explained the new rules for Syrians in Denmark and described the situation in Syria to people who just arrived in Denmark from there: "Firstly, the conflict in Syria is not equally intense across the country. Therefore, not all Syrians can get a residence permit in Denmark just by referring to the situation in Syria."

All five Syrians answered almost with one voice: "All places are dangerous. There is a war going on."

"Secondly", he continued, "only people from areas with armed conflict and attacks on civilians, will be able to obtain a residence permit solely based on their coming from there. For example, the Board has authorized two people from the Yarmouk camp in Damascus (a refugee camp for Palestinian refugees). Thirdly, if someone comes from a relatively quiet area, but must travel through one of the dangerous areas to get home, they can get a permit."

He continued: "If you are a Syrian citizen, who has had their request denied before the conflict in Syria broke out, you can have your case reopened. You can always write to the Board and submit new information."

This confusing explanation created bafflement in the group: "But how do we find new information when our houses and cities have been burned?" the old lady asked.

"I have new information that I no longer have a house. I gave my information a year ago and have not heard anything," the young father said.

"You should either give me a residence permit or send me back. I’ve been here for 10 years. I’m slowly dying."

The man from the system impatiently moved around on the chair and said, "I can’t do anything about that. What I can say is that all cases are reviewed to see who should have residence permits. And it’ll be those from areas

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where there is fighting or assaults on civilians."

The older woman said quietly: "Listen to me. I am sick. I’ve had five operations. My husband is also sick. I have lost everything, including my health.

We want to ask for help."

The man from the secretariat, his mind burdened, responded: "Yes...I cannot promise anything to anyone. The decision taken by the Board is positive. Many of those who have been denied, are much closer to a permit than before. You are welcome to go home and find additional information about your case."

It was obvious that all five Syrians understood the word "home" as Syria and not as the Danish asylum centers. Therefore they did not understand how they could "go home" and find new information when their country is at war.

Wait or go home

The man from the system was eager to end the meeting, which was revealed by his body language since he stood up and rested his knee on the chair.

The middle-aged man asked: "Should we wait here or go home?"

"That makes no sense," replied the man from the system. "The Refugee Board functions as a court and will not be affected by the fact that you are here. Remember that no one is forcibly expelled to Syria. I understand that many of you are in incredibly stressful situations, and it has been a long stay in Denmark. And the situation in your home country is terrible. But I cannot promise that you will all get a permit when you leave.

You need to know that the decision taken by the Refugee Board on September 18, generally speaking, is very positive given your situation."

The old lady replied, "My son is to be deported to Italy. So it’s not true that you don’t expel compulsively."

"I cannot do anything about that. The Ministry of Justice is the appellate authority," replied the man from the system.

Personally, I have a hard time seeing anything positive in the way the Syrians are categorically rejected.

A son is to be deported to Italy, but in the eyes of the system, this is not a deportation. A family is torn apart, but in the eyes of the system, this is a case of another authority. A man’s life lies in ruins after 10 years in the Danish asylum centers, and now he must prove that he is from a certain very dangerous area in Syria, in order to obtain a residence permit.

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This is Denmark’s domestic policy response to the atrocities in Syria. Nothing is positive.

ally good. Thank you for making sure that they behaved in an orderly fashion."

Washed hands

I was disgusted by the fact that he was talking to me as though I’m worth more than the people he had just sat opposite, and who had told him their heartbreaking personal stories. I understand that he is ‘just’ the messenger of the system. He may have the clean hands of a civil servant, but they are still the cold hands of a bureaucrat whose iron law turns the wide world into a narrow cage.

Just as we, in October 2013, have just commemorated the 70th anniversary of the escape of the Jews from Denmark to Sweden, we are in a situation where people fleeing a repressive regime wish they had reached Sweden instead of Denmark.

Since 2011, Sweden has given Syrians a 3-year residence permit on arrival, and in August 2013, Sweden changed the practice and now provides all Syrians permanent residence permits. Shall we, 70 years from now, commemorate those Syrians who, fleeing a dictator, landed in a legal vacuum in Denmark?

Xenophobic discourse resonates in the rhetoric of the Refugee Board. Exclusionary and ignorant, the Board asserts: "The Refugee Board still does not find the situation in Syria such that it puts everyone coming from Syria, by returning to the country, at risk of abuse as defined by the European Convention on Human Rights Article 3 and thereby having the right to be granted asylum."

On my way out of the Refugee Board, the man from the system pulled me aside, shook my hand and said, "You really need to explain to them how positive the change of practices is. It’s as if they don’t understand it. By the way, your Arabic is re-

As of today, the Refugee Board continues to work according to the same practices which were introduced in September 18, 2013. A Foreign Ministry memorandum of November 2013 stresses, however, that the dangerous situation in Syria is increasingly applicable to all areas of Syria, and that 40% of the Syrian population is now in need of humanitarian assistance. Additionally, the situation in Syria is described by UN as "the worst humanitarian crisis since World War II." Some of the Syrians who participated in the direct action have had their cases reopened. Two of those who brought their demands to the Board on the Friday before the autumn break have on January 17, 2014, received notification of asylum. The rest are still waiting for answers, and a large group of stateless Kurds from the north of Syria with their requests denied by the Board are still waiting in legal limbo.

The Human Condition af Ina Serdarević When I came home from the birthday party, I’ve been told, my one hand was clenched into a little fist, all tight and with the nails deep inside the palm. And thus I wandered about for a while, did what I did, spoke, saw, just like I usually do, right until I was instructed to open the hand. And when my five-petalled finger-flower finally unfolded, carefully and a bit reluctantly, almost as if the muscles let themselves be held in a cramp by the power of an invisible resistance, a gnawed sausage appeared, all stubby and squashed in my glistening palm, after which my parents, as parents do, deduced, that the sausage had been shoved into my hand just like that and I had then eaten first-from-one-end and-then-from-the other-end until I was no longer able to bite past the closed fist. I had munched my way to the fingers and no further, I had tried to slip my tongue into the crack, like an anteater on the hunt for termites, the soft meat mush, which became softer and more smudged, I had tried to suck it out, like an Italian who sucks the marrow out of the marrow cavity of the veal shank.

It had never occurred to me to try and go for the contents of the hand in another way. I mean, why would I move the sausage around, when it had been shoved into my hand just like that in the first place?

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Et fængsel er et fængsel er et fængsel Rapport fra Vordernberg, Østrig den 15/1 - 2014 AF Katarzyna Winiecka, FOTOS AF Louis Reumann

Går du ind for en positiv udvikling af lokalmiljøet gennem den mulige opførelse af forretningsenheder i Vordernberg, […] der vil skabe omtrent 150 nye jobs i Vordenberg […] i forbindelse med opførslen af et center for frihedsberøvede, ja eller nej? (Referendum, 2009) Halvfjerds procent af landsbyen Vordenbergs indbyggere stemte ja til opførslen af et moderne fængsel tiltænkt migranter og flygtninge.

Herefter blev der udstedt en konkurrence om, hvem der skulle opføre institutionen for frihedsberøvede. Konkurrencen blev vundet af tegnestuen SUE fra Wien, der markedsfører sig som progressive reformister. I deres optik er institutionen for frihedsberøvelse "et hostel, hvor folk kommer til at bo midlertidigt." Indhegningen bag bygningskomplekset skjules af en treetagers bygning med kontorer for behandling af asylansøgninger, politi og administration. Vinduerne, der vender ud mod gaden, giver de nysgerrige indbyggere mulighed for at kigge ind. "For at opretholde det enkelte individs værdighed," er sports- og idrætsfaciliteter, grønne terrasser og et bibliotek blevet føjet til arkitektplanen.

Det østrigske indenrigsministerium har underskrevet en femtenårig kontrakt med det verdensomspændende sikkerhedsfirma Group 4 Securicor. Det er første gang den østrigske stat udliciterer fængselsinfrastruktur på denne måde og i en sådan størrelsesorden.

Indvielsen blev markeret med et Åbent Hus arrangement d. 15. januar, hvor flere hundrede gæster (mere end halvdelen af landsbyen) stod flere timer i kø foran hovedindgangen. Gullaschen, der blev serveret af det lokale brandvæsen, var ledsaget af racistiske bemærkninger og en generel skuffelse over, at de indsatte endnu ikke var blevet sat til skue.

Gennem dagen blev arrangementet mødt af protestaktioner. Refugee Protest Vienna var tilstede for at kræve fri bevægelighed for alle og et øjeblikkeligt ophør af fængsels- og udsendelsessystemet.

Det aktivistiske miljøs opgaver bliver nu at indsamle viden og tilbyde sin støtte til de mennesker, der er fanget i dette system. I forbindelse med det afsidesliggende deportationscenter er der nu planer om at opføre en lufthavn. Hvis denne lufthavn bliver en realitet, vil den gøre de allerede isolerede migranters liv og fremtid endnu mere skrøbelige, mens forudsætninger for menneskerettigheder og de aktivistiske gruppers arbejde vil blive endnu sværere.

Et visuelt ordforråd til Refugee Protest Vienna Af Katherine Ball, Katarzyna Winiecka og Imayna Caceres i samarbejde med Refugee Protest Vienna.

Disse piktogrammer blev designet i samarbejde med aktivister fra Refugee Protest Vienna i efteråret 2013.

De er baseret på faresymboler og inddelt i tre farver efter kategori.

Orange: De farer flygtninge står over for i deres oprindelseslande, grunde til at de er flygtet og hvad de igen vil stå over for, hvis de bliver deporteret.

Gul: Alvorlige mangler ved Østrigs og EU's asylsystem.

Blå: Krav fra Refugee Protest Vienna.

Symbolerne er skabt til flere formål. De har været brugt på plakater, bannere og skilte til demonstrationer og har været trykt på t-shirts og tasker.

Symbolerne har også været anvendt på et billboard, der var opsat i Sigmund Freud Park – en offentlig park i Wien, der allerede i efteråret 2012 var blevet

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besat af flere hundrede flygtninge. Besættelsen skete efter en 35 km lang protestmarch fra Østrigs største asyllejr. Formålet med denne march var at skabe fokus på de forhold flygtninge lever under i asyllejren. Billboardet satte protesten ind i en kontekst, forklarede dens historie og at den var en del af et større projekt. Arrangementet Transnational Forum, der omhandlede flygtninge og migranters forhold og kampe (wienwoche.org/2013/en/231/re-emphasis), var også en del af dette projekt. Forskellige flygtningebevægelser fra EU blev bragt sammen, for at diskutere strategier for en kampagne frem mod valget til EU-parlamentet i maj 2014.

Symbolerne kan frit benyttes i samenhænge, hvor de støtter flygtninges sag. Filerne kan downloades fra: katherineball.com/Refugee-Protest Støt Refugee Protest Vienna: refugeecampvienna.noblogs.org facebook.com/RefugeeCampVienna

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