Brussels, 17/11/2006 (Agence Europe) - The European Council on Refugees and Exiles (ECRE) launched a new campaign last week, 'Refugee Stories', where refugees present their experience of seeking asylum to European Union decision-makers and the public. 'The fate of many who seek protection in the EU is increasingly determined by decisions made in Brussels, but the voices of these men, women and children are rarely heard in the political and public debate,' explained ECRE General Secretary Bjarte Vandvik at the launch of the campaign.
Hadish Hailed fled Eritrea after being imprisoned for campaigning for a democratic constitution. He went to Sudan but was not safe there either and decided to go the EU. He crossed Libya where, he says, he was in danger because of being arrested and killed by the police because of his Christian faith. He was able to pay someone to get him across the Mediterranean to Malta, a five-day crossing which he didn't think he would survive - another boat never arrived. He landed in Malta in 2005, where he was held in a detention centre for immigrants for three months in very poor conditions, being kept in a cage like an animal without anyone informing him of his rights. He said he thought Europe was a place where human rights were fully respected but things were not as he thought, and thought the EU should help asylum-seekers, accepting them as human beings and giving them protection so that they could then help their own countries. Prisca Agbor, a refugee from Cameroon living in Austria, explained how she feels ashamed, stupid even, for being a refugee: 'There are refugees all over Europe,' she said, 'our concerns should not be hidden away.'
The refugees tell their stories at a time when the European Commission is paying great attention to asylum and is preparing a report on the Dublin II system. In 2007, the European Commission will launch a public consultation exercise on how to establish a common EU asylum system by 2010. Other refugee stories can be accessed at: http: //http://www.ecre.org. (bc)