Stories From Serbia: A Bulgarian Experience, The Harmanli Protester
In late November 2016 the Bulgarian authorities decided to quarantine Harmanli, the largest refugee camp in the country, over fears of a possible outbreak of skin disease. Harmanli camp in southern Bulgaria on the Turkish border had around 3000 people mostly from Afghanistan living there. The camp was an open camp and despite protests from the local inhabitants of the town, the people staying there were free to leave the camp between 9am and 7pm. The people living in Harmanli were used to coming and going in the day, so when they were told one morning the camp was under quarantine and no one could leave, it came as a shock. Preferring to cook food to their own liking the camp’s residents were used to buying food from the local market and cooking traditional Afghan cuisine. The quarantine sparked long, smouldering frustration in the camp’s population and riots ensued which saw a number of buildings damaged with Bulgarian firefighters and additional police officers called in to maintain control of the quarantined camp.
The protest was quashed after a water canon was brought in and rubber bullets fired into the protesters. Four Bulgarian police officers were injured and a considerable number of Afghans from the camp received injuries of varying severity. Georgi Kostov, the interior ministry’s chief secretary at the time confirmed to the press that “Over 40 of the most rampaging migrants were detained. They will be charged”.
Five months later, now in Serbia, Aaban shared his account of the Harmanli protest and the aftermath. Using a different name to protect his identity, in fear of facing repercussions if deported back to Bulgaria, Aaban told me his story. This account cannot be independently verified.
When I arrived over the border I was beaten by police with four other people. Some people are lucky and if they got the German border guards they are just taken to a camp with no beating. (There is a EU border presence on the Bulgarian/Turkish border, with teams of German and other EU nationalities working in conjunction with their Bulgarian counterparts).
I have only left Afghanistan because I have problems with the Taliban. I am from the Tora Bora region where the Taliban are becoming stronger and trying to recruit people. They stop us going to school and threaten us with death if we don’t help with their Jihad. All 34 provinces of Afghanistan are under some form of war, even the capital Kabul, there are terrorist bombs every now and then. There is no peaceful system in Afghanistan. Even the police are corrupt so how on earth can we have some kind of normal life there.
First when Afghan people arrive in Bulgaria we are taken to a closed camp for registration and then transferred to an open camp after a few days. The Bulgarians will steal phones, money or anything they like. It doesn’t matter if you try to hide the money because they take your clothes and check you everywhere, it’s like being an animal.
I was in Harmanli during the protests and the Bulgarian police treated us very badly. The Bulgarian police had video of the whole protest from start to finish. When the protest happened, okay some of the people threw stones, made fires and attacked the police but most people stayed in their rooms, far away from the riot. I didn’t want to be involved so me and three friends stayed away. They took around 30–40 guys away from Harmanli after it was over and the rest us us had to stay in the camp.
Guilty or not we were all punished in one way or another. The camp was closed and we were stuck there but also the food seemed smaller and worse quality at that time. Like brown apples and hard bread with water. In the evenings Bulgarian guards would call some people to the office by name or if they caught you walking in the camp and didn’t like the look of you they would take you into the office. The guards would start drinking in the afternoon and by 8 onwards they were ready to have some fun with us.
I knew I didn’t want to go anywhere near the office so I stayed in my room from 6pm onwards. I spoke to four others who had to go in there, three were called and one was caught walking near his room and told to go in there. All were beaten badly and one had cigarettes burnt out on his shoulder and elbow.
I did well avoiding the guards or being seen by them but one night I needed the toilet so snuck out and walked to the toilet block. It was 9pm and a dark night in December. I remember it well because it was the worst thing I have ever experienced. There was a light rain and it was so cold. I was almost back in my room when one guard just appeared screaming at me to “Stop, stop”. I asked him what have I done but he said nothing and just took me by the arm to the office block.
He swung the door open and pushed me into the room following me in. There was a room with desks pushed to the side with computers on them and 5 guards sat there smoking and drinking wine. He forced me into a smaller room to the side with only a desk and ashtray inside. He punched me in the back of the head and shoved me into the corner. It was like a gangster film, you know the old yellow light bulb swinging and the cigarettes in the ash tray smoking. That’s how it felt — they were the gangsters and I was definitely the victim.
Two more guards came in and told me to take off my clothes except the underpants. I stood there in front of them for 5 minutes while they finished their cigarettes and had what seemed like a normal conversation. Then they turned to me and two grabbed me holding out my arms while the other punched my chest and stomach. After 10 minutes the two holding me up left and the one man carried on beating me. He would stop for a few seconds here and there to take a sip of his drink, catch his breath then would continue.
After a while he became tired, it was obvious because he began to sweat and breath heavily. So he left the room and then the next man came in and continued to kick and punch me. This changing of guards and beatings carried on for around an hour and then they chucked me out the building in my pants and just threw my clothes on top of me. I couldn’t stand easily so they picked me up by the arms and did the count, you know “123” then chucked me out. I was so happy to be out the room and I didn’t care I was lying in the rain just wearing pants because the cold felt good on my beaten body. I stumbled back to my room and the guys there helped me into bed. That night I couldn’t sleep. My rips were bruised, my shoulders sore and whichever way I lay on the bed it hurt.
This beating game or using refugees like a boxing club went on for more than two weeks after the protest. After the protest it was fun for them so I can’t imagine they would have stopped this behaviour. It sounds like I’m exaggerating but I’m not! The only way I can describe it was like a boxing club and we were the punch bags. The whole thing was like a collective punishment and it didn’t matter who was guilty or not.
As soon as the quarantine was over I paid a smuggler €500 to get me to Serbia. The deal was he should drive me to Belgrade but instead he dropped me Dimitrovgrad just over the Bulgarian border. I made my way to Belgrade from there and now I live in the Barracks. (The Barracks closed at the beginning of May).
You can speak to anyone who has spent time in Bulgaria and they will tell you similar things. Bulgaria is part of the EU but I don’t want asylum there and I never want to see that place again.
April 2017.
