In despair…

Lesbos island, Photo by Ayhan Mehmet – Anatolian News Agency

Refugees flocking to borders as Turkey says not to stop them reaching Europe

Hundreds of refugees and migrants are trying to reach Europe via Turkish land borders and coastal areas after Turkey says it will no longer prevent refugees from reaching Europe.

After a series of airstrikes on late Thursday killed at least 33 Turkish soldiers and wounded 36 in Syria’s Idlib, a senior Turkish official told Reuters that Turkey will no longer stop Syrian refugees from reaching Europe by land or sea.

Hundreds of refugees have rushed into Turkey’s northwestern province of Edirne which is located along the European Union countries Bulgaria and Greece following the statements of Turkish authorities in the wake of the deadly airstrikes.

Some refugees came to the city by taxis from İstanbul as some others were transferred by buses to reach Kapıkule border gate after the airstrikes that killed Turkish troops in Syria.

As the refugees rushed into the border gate in Edirne, the border officials are claimed to direct the refugees to “the river or the forest” en route to Europe. Some different groups of refugees have been observed in Edirne, the city that has borders with Bulgaria and Greece…

Photo by Ayhan Mehmet – Anatolian News Agency

“No illegal immigration,” said the Greek prime minister, responded to migrants with tear gas…” video by euro.news

Some refugees speak in English, like Palestinian refugee who started talking in 1.5 minutes, but I tried to translate the others. In some places due to their Turkish is not good enough I translated word to word.

0-10 seconds:

-Why do you want to go?
-The price of everything is raised in here Turkey, there is no work, no money, what are we going to do?

0.50-1.26 minutes: Syrian refugee

-How long have you been in Turkey?
-One and a half months.
-Why do you want to go?
-To go Europe. There is war in Syria. Much problem. There is no life at there.
-So, have you tried to go from here before?
-Two times. Greece holds, hits, they took my money and my phone.Then I deported to Turkey.
-Aren’t you afraid of?
-I’am afraid already. You’re not like human at there. Much problem.

2.04-2.35 minutes: Afghan refugee

-Four months ago I came to Turkey.
-Why do you want to go? Where would you like to go?
-We are going to Europe.
-Why?
-There are many wars, prohibitions, everything in our country. This place is not so easy for us either. They don’t allow. They do not give a residence permit. Very difficult in Turkey. So much Afghan comes here, what will they do? That’s why we want to go.
-So, what if the border gates don’t open? (by Greece)
-It will be very bad. So many women, kids in here, what are they going to do? We are young, we would find a solution, but what are they going to do? Very difficult, very bad.
-So, do you want to live again in Turkey? What are you going to do if gates don’t open?
–We are desperate, of course we will live.

…….

As you can see, there are many refugees try to cross borders to go Europe from Turkey for last two days. Inside them, many Afghan, African, Uzbek, Iranian, Pakistani, Iraqi,  Moroccan except Syrians. According to today’s figures by Interior Minister of Turkey, more than seventy-six thousand migrants have crossed the border of Turkey. I do not know how many of them have reached Greece or Bulgaria, or how many stay in the buffer zone in between countries. Yesterday, Greece said, they sent 4000 refugees back. Right now, beside it is not possible to tell the exact number of people who do not wait in the buffer zone and try to reach the Greek islands by sea. In the video below you can see how some African refugees have struggled to survive with difficulty with inflatable boat until they reach Lesbos Island. (1 minute video)

https://www.euronews.com/embed/1034598

Even the women, men and children’s teeth are shaking from the cold. It is known Aegean Sea has high temperature in summer. But what the people who do not live in here, don’t know is when the weather is cold in the winter, and because of the high humidity, plus if there is wind and storm, you will feel the cold air until to your bones. All parts of your body must be closed, if there is a tiny open place, even the wind entering from there that can cause pneumonia. Believe me my earthling friends, the cold of Moscow is better than the cold of the Aegean sea that met these conditions. And when these people were trying to cross the Aegean sea, there was a strong storm, with a speed of 50-70 km per hour. The humidity is 73%. The air temperature was 7-11 degrees Celsius; 44-51Fahrenheit. So the conditions I mentioned were been provided. While most people are in their warm beds, they struggle to survive under these conditions.

Refugees have been captured by the consequences of the capitalist and imperialist world. Desperation is their living space. A young Pakistani refugee was saying in a video I did not share here: “Everyone wants to live in own homeland. But there is war, there is poverty; no one would want to leave homeland, live on the streets.”

There is nothing more to add on his words…

And the European or American, who do not want refugees in their country, do not rebel and do not go out on the streets for protest while bombing Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and other countries with their own taxes or while colonizing Africa and still exploiting. But when the refugee comes to their country, they hate the refugees. Why? Aren’t your governments who milking you like a cow with taxes to ruin this planet? Or are you glad that your taxes find a good place themselves when your governments made open financial agreements on refugees, bargaining clearly on human life?

Or none of them. Well then, didn’t you then understand that those who still represent you in your parliaments do not work? The only right political parties on the planet are socialist and communist parties. Otherwise this cycle will continue as long as you vote for other parties.

Here I add an interview with Dimitris Koutsoumbas, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Greece KKE in 28th February publishing in newworker.org, so that you can understand the difference.  Greek communists speak out! 

Edit 02.03.2020

Taken from Istanbul Bar Association Human Right Center twitter account

Report on Istanbul Bar Association Human Right Center’s Visit to Pazarkule Checkpoint

“How George H.W. Bush Made Guantanamo a Prison, Starting with Haitians” by Kim Ives

The second of two articles

Kim Ives  December 12, 2018

Haitian refugees being held at Guantanamo’s Camp McCalla on Dec. 31, 1991, three months after the coup d’état against Pres. Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Credit: Carol Halebian

(First part)

After George Herbert Walker Bush died on Nov. 30 at age 94, the mainstream press favorably contrasted him to Donald Trump, portraying the former Republican president as “kinder” and “gentler,” two watchwords from his inaugural speech.

But, Trump’s signature aggressivity towards immigrants is epitomized through extra-territorial interception and imprisonment and separation of families, brutal policies which were, in fact, pioneered by Bush I during the Haitian refugee exodus following the Sep. 30, 1991 coup d’état in Haiti.

A hangar at Guantanamo Naval Base where Haitian refugees were housed on cots in late 1991 through May 1992. Credit: Chris O’Meara/AP

As we saw in this series’ first article, George H.W. Bush’s administration gave manifest and tacit support to dictator Prosper Avril (1988-1990) and to the first coup d’état against democratically-elected Pres. Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

As a result of that putsch, tens of thousands of Haitians took to the high seas in small boats, many fleeing for their lives. In the first year after the coup, the U.S. Coast Guard intercepted some 38,000 Haitians in international waters.

U.S. interdiction of Haitian refugees had begun in September 1981 under Pres. Ronald Reagan, for whom George H.W. Bush was vice-president. Under the rules laid out by Reagan’s Executive Order 12324 titled “Interdiction of Illegal Aliens,” Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) agents on board U.S. Coast Guard cutters were supposed to interview and “identify candidates for asylum as political refugees under United States and international law,” explains University of Miami law professor Irwin Stotzky in his new book Send Them Back, about the efforts of crusading lawyers (including himself) on behalf of Haitian refugees during the 1980s.

The screening process was laughable, with interviews which were not private and as short as five minutes, while the snatched-up “boat-people” were often hungry, thirsty, scared, and confused.

Haitians lived in hundreds of tents at Camp McCalla at Guantanamo under the George H.W. Bush administration.

“As a result of these defective procedures, only 28 of the approximately 23,000 Haitians on vessels interdicted by the Coast Guard from the inception of the interdiction program in 1981 until mid-1991 were identified by INS officials as potential asylees,” Stotzky writes.

During Aristide’s eight months in office in 1991 (Feb to Sep), there was a net human influx back to Haiti, as thousands of joyful expatriate Haitians returned to their homeland to take part in a new democratic experiment after three decades of dictatorship.

But the 1991 military coup cruelly cut short that hope-filled period and provoked a new refugee wave which overwhelmed the U.S. Coast Guard ships stationed off Haiti’s coast. As a result, the Coast Guard began transporting Haitians to the U.S. Naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, housing them in giant hangars and Camp McCalla, a makeshift city of hundreds of tents set up on Guantanamo’s paved runways and loading docks. At its peak, there were over 12,500 Haitians detained there.

After eight months, the Bush I administration finally dropped all pretense of giving Haitians any due process and discarded the Reagan-era screening protocols, as imperfect as they were. “On May 24, 1992, claiming there were too many Haitians coming, Bush ordered the Coast Guard to intercept all Haitians fleeing in boats and immediately return them to Haiti, without interviews to determine if they were at risk of persecution or death,” Stotzky explained to Haïti Liberté. 

Haitians at Guantanamo’s Camp McCalla on Dec. 31, 1991, three months after the coup d’état which ousted Pres. Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Credit: Carol Halebian

Beginning in 1991, “when the U.S. detained Haitian refugees indefinitely, it set a precedent,” concluded Prof. A. Naomi Paik in a comprehensive article last June about Haitians at Guantanamo on the website The Conversation.

This was the beginning of Guantanamo being used as a prison, for which it would become even more famous in the early 2000s after it was used to hold, in legal limbo, prisoners swept up in George W. Bush’s wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Guantanamo’s HIV Prison, Camp Bulkeley

Perhaps the least kind and gentle feature of the senior Bush’s internment of Haitian refugees was Camp Bulkeley, a God-forsaken collection of sun-baked buildings where close to 300 possibly HIV-positive Haitians were held until June 1993. U.S. Judge Sterling Johnson, who ruled in favor of allowing the refugees to finally come to the U.S., said that Camp Bulkeley was “nothing more than an HIV prison camp.”

These Haitians had been found to have plausible claims for political asylum, but they were barred from entering the U.S. because of their HIV status. Hundreds of children were interned in the larger Camp McCalla, and at least 25 children went through Camp Bulkeley.

George H.W. Bush’s Attorney General William Barr presided over what has been called “the world’s first HIV detention camp.” Today, not ironically, President Donald Trump has nominated Barr to be Attorney General once again.

On Dec. 10, CBS News ran an article on Barr’s role in overseeing the first use of Guantanamo as a prison camp. Although an immigrant rights leader called the way Haitian refugees were treated “a stain on United States history,” Barr defended his policies at Guantanamo as late as 2001…

For full article please continue…

 

 

In Denmark, cultural assimilation to the immigrant children

News was taken from SoL.news

According to the new laws in Denmark, in immigrant neighborhoods, which are defined as ‘ghetto’, some crimes will be double punished, and the children who are living in these low-income areas will be subjected to cultural assimilation under the name of ‘education of values’ by begining from one years old.

While other Danish citizens are not obliged to take any preschool education until the age of 6, the trainings scheduled for at least 25 hours a week are compulsory for children of families living in ghetto from one years old. According to the law, which mainly involves the neighborhoods of Muslim families, the social security payments of families which do not send their children to the trainings of “values” such as Christmas, Easter and Danish are being cut off.

Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen who gave a place for integration of immigrants at his speech at new year warned that ghettos could “reach out their tentacles onto the streets” by spreading violence, and that because of ghettos, “cracks have appeared on the map of Denmark.”

Double punishment for immigrant neighborhoods

That tough approach is embodied in the “ghetto package.” Of 22 proposals presented by the government in early March, most have been agreed upon by a parliamentary majority, and more will be subject to a vote in the fall. One measure under consideration would allow courts to double the punishment for certain crimes if they are committed in one of the 25 neighborhoods classified as ghettos, based on residents’ income, employment status, education levels, number of criminal convictions and “non-Western background.”

Electronic ankle bracelets for immigrant youngs

Some proposals have been rejected as too radical, like one from the far-right Danish People’s Party that would confine “ghetto children” to their homes after 8 p.m. Challenged on how this would be enforced, Martin Henriksen, the chairman of Parliament’s integration committee, suggested in earnest that young people in these areas could be fitted with electronic ankle bracelets.

The proportion of immigrants coming from Muslim countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria is 13 percent in Denmark, which has 5 million 700 thousand population. The unemployment rate in the places where Muslim immigrants are majority is estimated to be 40 percent, and it is estimated that more than half of the immigrant population has a very low income.

Salute you, Portuguese kid!

This kid, yesterday after the Portugal-France final match of Euro Cup 2016, he consoled the French fan while he was crying. It is so beautiful behavior, and I want to thank to this kid from here! He left his happiness in a moment and he thought to console the opposing team’s fan. And with this behavior, he showed me there is still hope for this planet!

I am losing my trust to humankind sometimes, but this scene caused to gain my trust back again. Maybe we don’t need too much thing to believe or trust, maybe we don’t need to look at the far away points. Here it is, this kid wrote just in 30 seconds how humanity should be, without the need to write hundreds pages of book about this.

Also, there were many scene we have seen in Euro 2016. If I started from last match, a moth have made a show. 🙂 This moth landed to Ronaldo’s eyelash, while he was in suffer. After Ronaldo injured this moth showed itself, and maybe it wanted to be a super hero moth 🙂 I have no idea why it made this show, but it was incredible!

I think one of the most interesting football player has been Ricardo Quaresma who is a football player in Besiktas team in Turkey and Portugal National Team at Euro Cup 1016. He is really good midfield player and forvet, but I am not sure how can he make many goals while he is playing in midfield, maybe he is kind of midfiled-forvet mix:) He showed himself with enjoyable play and the olive leaf at his head on final match of Euro 2016. It is being said this leaf is their national symbol. Maybe it is I don’t know, I only know Turkish’s and Greek’s olive:) But this leaf seemed very cool, no doubt!

When these were living into the football field at final match yesterday, French police was spraying the pepper gas to the French people out of the football field. After 6 pm the French police sprayed the pepper spray to the football fans at Fan Zone, because of they claimed that the enterence to the Fan Zone is forbidden after 6 pm.

Enter a caption

Tear gas floats in the air during clashes near the Paris fans zone during the Portugal v France EURO 2016 final soccer match, at the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France, July 10, 2016. © Stephane Mahe / Reuters

By Thomas Samson/AFP

If you don’t have money or you couldn’t find a ticket you can meet with pepper spray! This is another kind of rule of this system. And I don’t know have you ever tasted the pepper spray, my Earthling friends. It is painfull according to my experiences and, highly no recommended by me! 🙂

If I turned back into Euro Cup, we have seen many ugly things besides the good things. Especially, the war between British and Russian fans in Marseille, or British fans who threw coins to the refugees children. Yes, we had seen at March, PSV Eindhoven fans had made similar humiliation to the Gypsy children at Champions League.

And very first time at their history , North Ireland joined to Euro Cup in this year. And their opposite team had been Ukraine for a match. While the match was playing on field, the Ukranian fascists were showed their Nazi tattoos on tribunes. And these tattoos weren’t be usefull again, because Ukraine defeated with 2 goals by North Ireland 🙂

picture was taken from: haber.sol.org.tr

I started to my post with very beatiful kid. And I want to finish this post with very beatiful football team. This team is National Football Team of Iceland. They gave joy to all of us when they played their football game at Euro 2016. We have learnt and seen Iceland team in very first time. They were incredible! Even not only with their game, for example we learnt how we can call the whales? Yes 🙂 While the football team was on field the fans of Iceland on tribunes chanted this way:

After these scenes, we learnt that this ovation was made by Icelanders to call the whales. Very interesting! The team of Iceland with their good football, they came to the quarterfinals of Euro 2016. This is very big success for a team which joins first time at Cup. And the Iceland people met their team with ceremony when the team turned back motherland, and of course with whale call 🙂 Here it is:

At this video it is written “Viking war chant” as tittle. But I am very sure this chant meaning is firstly “to call whales”. Maybe this can be another mean or RT video makers made wrong.

Also, I’ve watched a video on youtube about Iceland football team, and a man was saying that: “We don’t have an army, if we go the war, we would easily be defeated. This is kind of army for us.”

Icelanders, I think you should be proud of yourself, if you don’t have army. This meaning is you are very peaceful people. Please you build your army over the sport or other good things. We loved you with this kind of army! And, thank you to Icelanders, because you showed us the soul of Vikings 🙂

 

 

 

 

More and more and more refugees

According to the deal which made between AKP government of Turkey and EU, the first refugees and immigrants who entered Greece as illegally started to come to Turkey today. The ways of them are starting from Samos island of Greece to Cesme, Izmir Turkey and from Lesbos island of Greece to Dikili, Izmir Turkey. Yes, they are coming to my city, Izmir.

Already Izmir does have thousands of refugees, what the hell is this s**t!

AKP government announced that “the refugees who accepted by Turkey will sent to their homelands according to deal.” But it seems that this is not reflecting the truths.
At Dikili it has been a public protest against AKP policies on this weekend with huge crowded.

One of the speakers at the protest, the Mayor and Dikilim Platform spokesman Mustafa Tosun has told the reason for their reluctance to refugee camps at Dikili district. After the rumors that refugee camps be set up Dikili, he said that “we tried to get answers from the authorities about camps but we could not answer,”. Also he added: “We said that Dikili is not suitable town for camps because of Dikili is the tourism and greenhouse district. We weren’t informed yet by the government authorities for camps but it is being said that it will built refugee camp at Kaynarca, Dikili in 800 thousand square meters for 20 thousand refugees people. If 7-8 thousand people live the other camps in every 200 thousand square meters. It means that more than 20,000 people will be inside the 800 thousand square meters. Dikili will not able to shoulder this!

Yes, both Dikili and Cesme are the torusim towns at Izmir city, west coast of Turkey.

The other side, this might be a method to punish of those who didn’t give vote for AKP government policies. Because, if you look at below Turkey map you can see that AKP couldn’t get enough vote at last election from the all west coast of Anatolia.

You see Izmir is the one of these cities where the people who are mostly against AKP policies, live in Turkey. Also Izmir is the 3rd biggest city of Turkey. These camps seems like a punishment for Izmir public.

At old times, these election maps were different, the colors were spreading with almost equal way entire Turkey. But last 15 years, the map turned into this shape.

Especially the people who live at the red cities at Turkey are lonely people. Because they are managed by a government which they never liked and they are not able to accord with. Also, the most of the world sees them as the parallel with this government, even if these people never voted.

Sometimes, when thinking over this election map, I am seeing these people at red cities stuck between land and Aegean sea, and stuck between AKP government and the world public. Most of the world public doesn’t want to understand, already AKP government never liked and understood them. What is the solution: maybe to jump to the Aegean sea, I don’t know:)

quotes from: http://www.sozcu.com.tr/2016/gundem/dikili-multeci-kampi-istemiyor-1165854/

Members of a radical art collective in Czech Republic flew giant size red underpants instead of the flag at presidential palace

In Czech Republic, a radical art group which called themselves Ztohoven has signed an interesting action. Members of the group climbed the roof of the presidential palace in Prague, and flew a red giant size underpants instead of the flag of Czech Republic.

The members of Ztohoven who leaked to the palace with the costumes of chimney cleaner have announced that they did to protest the anti-immigrant explanations of President Milos Zeman recently. Three people were taken into custody after the action. President Zeman had said that the refugees would bring terrorism and disease to the country.

Besides, they have written in their web page:

“Over Prague Castle flew the flag of a man who was not ashamed
to:

support the segregation of special needs children from the integrated school system;

use the word “cunt” in national media to divert attention from his own trip on the private jet of an oligarch;

name an advisor who was an intelligence agent of the People’s Liberation Army of China;

name yet another advisor who was an untrustworthy businessman with connections to Russian oil, and, who refused to release his own resumé;

allow a scammer without security clearance to hold onto his position of chancellor within the Office of the President of the Republic;

praise an army that drowned a student movement in its own blood on the very ground on which it happened;
associate with questionable dictators;

pursue the prosecution of a man who allegedly threw an egg at him;

use a lie to shame a national hero who survived World War Two in a concentration camp;

stagger inebriated over the Czech Crown Jewels and proudly show his dirty laundry to the world.

Today over Prague flew the flag of a man who is ashamed of nothing at
all.

quotes from: http://www.ztohoven.com/?p=642&lang=en

news from: http://haber.sol.org.tr/dunya/baskanlik-sarayindaki-bayragin-yerine-kirmizi-don-astilar-130400

EU approves military operation against Mediterranean refugees

“…More than 300 slavery and migration scholars respond to those advocating for military force against migrants attempting to cross the Mediterranean. This is no slave trade. Where is the moral justification for actions that cost lives?…..
European Union political leaders have announced that their response to the staggering loss of life amongst migrants crossing the Mediterranean in unseaworthy vessels will be the use of force to smash the so-called ‘networks’ that operate out of Libya to orchestrate the perilous sea crossings. How? On May 11, EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini stated that “No one is thinking of bombing. I’m talking about a naval operation,” but two days later, the Guardian reported on a leaked strategy paper for an EU mission in the Mediterranean and in Libyan territorial waters proposing an air and naval campaign. This, the paper said, would lead to ‘collateral damage’. In other words, adults and children boarding or aboard the vessels under attack might be killed. With or without bombs, such ‘collateral damage’ is already a known product of the measures being employed by the EU to push back, deter, and divert migrants, including those seeking asylum. ..

https://www.opendemocracy.net/beyondslavery/twisting-%E2%80%9Clessons-of-history%E2%80%9D-to-excuse-unjustifiable-violence-mediterranean-refugee-c

News for the Revolution

By Johannes Stern
May 21, 2015
World Socialist Web Site

The European Union is putting its plans for a military intervention in the Mediterranean and North Africa into action. The decision was made by EU foreign and defence ministers at a meeting in Brussels on Monday.

A press release states: “The Council has agreed today (18 May) to establish an EU military operation—EUNAVFOR Med—to break the business model of smugglers and traffickers of people in the Mediterranean. This decision, which is one element of the comprehensive EU response to the migration challenge, will enable the formal start of the operational planning for the naval operation.”

The first phase of the mission to uncover the smuggling networks and their routes will begin immediately, to be followed by a second and third phase “that would work to search, seize and disrupt the assets of smugglers.”

According to the press release, the Italian…

View original post 981 more words

Only 60 seconds

There are about 3,8 million Syrian refugees in Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and Egypt. Most of those people (%90) live under the bad circumstances. At the beginning, when the all show stage has prepared, world public opinion and mass media turned their eyes to this region like Sauron eye. Even, Angelina Jolie came running to this region with tears. At those days everyone cried for this tragedy. What a beautiful show!

After that only two governments have given the help fund for the Syrian refugees: Russia and China. The all others, except the 5 countries, which I mentioned in beginning of my post, all others keep in silence. They keep in silence just about humanity. As far I can see, despite their silence about helping the Syrian refugees, they love to talk about war.

And their tragedy still continues. Today I saw a news. About 10 years old Syrian refugee boy wants to warm of his hands, and for this, he tries to heat with using the air of exhaust of stopping vehicles at traffic lights in -2 degree at Diyarbakir, Turkey.

It’s just 60 seconds. Only 60 seconds, he has got. After the 60 seconds the lights will turn green again; but, not for him.

news from:

http://www.cumhuriyet.com.tr/haber/turkiye/189569/-2_derecede_egzoz_dumaniyla_isinmaya_calisti.html

PS: I had decided to not add more news post. But, the mankind’s hypocrisy is on the stage in every single day.