A person does not always decide what cause they are going to dedicate their life to. Sometimes it is the cause that chooses her. It gradually enters its existence until it colonizes it. This is what happened to the journalist Sally Hayden (Dublin, 1989), specialized in the African continent. More than five years ago, she began receiving messages from migrants in detention centers requesting her help. Hayden became deeply involved, building a wide network of contacts, and coverage of the so-called “immigration crisis” became the center of her work. The result is the book When I tried for the fourth time, we drowned (Captain Swing), winner of several awards, including the Orwell Prize for political literature in 2022.
Ask. There is a lot of talk about migration, but do you think that European public opinion is well aware of the hell that migrants go through in places like Libya?
Answer. No, the European public debate is very separated from the human experiences of those who want to come to Europe. Even the concept of migrants is dehumanizing. They are people like us, with hopes, dreams, families. We often lose sight of the fact that the real crisis we are experiencing is a crisis of global inequality. A large part of humanity does not have the legal capacity to travel and have access to visas. The result is that many journeys are desperate and dangerous.
The real crisis we are experiencing is a crisis of global inequality
Q. There is a certain stereotype of migrants in society. Do they look like people you have met?
R. The problem is that they are often treated as if they were a homogeneous group when they are not. They come from very different places and the causes that pushed them to leave their homes, their personal circumstances, are very different. I have met very different people in the detention centers in Libya: artists, law or medical students, dentists… Some are from West Africa, others from East Africa, and they had never had contact with someone from the other extreme before. of the continent.
The public does not know the ramifications of European policy, which means locking up entire families in places where serious abuses are committed
Q. In the book he insists on the responsibility of the European Union and the UN in the serious violations of human rights in places like Libya. Does it reach the highest levels?
R. Yes of course. Something I discovered when I started the research is that the EU has a much more active role in the situation, and its leaders know it, and they do it on our behalf. Their justification is that citizens want these policies. But I believe that public opinion does not know the ramifications of European policy, which means locking up entire families in places where serious abuses are committed. Many even die there, but we don't know how many. The EU has a direct responsibility for the return of people intercepted at sea to Libya, to centers that Pope Francis calls “concentration camps.” Our taxes serve to reinforce dictators, warlords and systems that exploit other human beings. And that is a problem not only in Libya, since the EU's anti-immigration policy has harmful effects on all its borders.
Q. For many, even if they are recognized as refugees, the nightmare does not end with their regularization in Europe.
R. Yes, because often, once the danger has passed, trauma appears; when the mind tries to digest everything that has happened. Many suffer from post-traumatic stress, insomnia, and other disorders, and having to recount these horrors repeatedly in the processes to regularize their situation does not help.
We talk about the victims in the Mediterranean as simple numbers. The voices of those who suffer from this situation are ignored
Q. To what extent are the media also responsible?
R. It is difficult to talk about the media in general. It is true that the issue of migration is covered, but many times it is to reflect and reproduce the dehumanizing rhetoric of politicians. Other times we talk about the victims in the Mediterranean as simple numbers. The voices of those who suffer from this situation are ignored. We have to listen to them more carefully, and that is what I have tried with this book. One of the problems with covering the issue is that many journalists do not have sufficient resources, including time, because their media does not cover the expenses that this requires.
Q. Why do you think European public opinion is insensitive?
R. We live in a strange time. On the one hand, it is very easy to find out what is happening on the other side of the world, but it is also easy for many people to ignore this problem, not to take responsibility. But if we look at the causes of migration, they often have to do with our actions. In Senegal, large foreign boats are emptying the fish stocks on which local fishermen live. In Somalia, the drought linked to climate change condemns a society that has barely emitted polluting gases to hunger. Thousands of people have already died from this cause.
Q. If not due to pressure from public opinion, could policy change come through court resolutions?
R. The International Criminal Court is investigating European perpetrators for crimes against humanity, and my articles have been used as evidence. Perhaps these battles will be successful and will be able to change reality more than some journalistic reports have achieved. It is a tricky situation because, furthermore, this entire situation occurs while European countries need migration to fill many vacancies in their labor markets.
Many migrants suffer from post-traumatic stress, and having to recount these horrors repeatedly in the processes to regularize their situation does not help.
Q. To what extent does being so close to these hard cases also affect you on a psychological level?
R. You often feel guilty because you missed a message, or because you didn't respond in time. Since having telephones is prohibited in detention centers, the time when they can write to you—and they do so at the risk of their lives—is at night, sometimes up to three in the morning. The merit of this book is yours, many have risked their lives to get this information across. They are the ones who have truly suffered and who have to be at the center of the story, not me.
Q. Will you continue covering immigration issues in the future?
R. Yes, I'm not going to leave it.
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