Calais Update 09/05/2018
Solidarity March | The movie Heroic Land projected in Calais on Friday | 3 Spanish and 2 Danish discharged after being accused of helping people crossing the border | Movie « Regarde ailleurs » (look away) | Stories from minors in Europe | 17 displaced people rescued lodged complaint with the ECHR
Solidarity March
The newspaper VarMatin released an article on the march. The eight participants who are walking the whole march as well as the dozens of people who have joined them don’t want to focus on the far-right individuals mobilizing against the march, but on the encouragement received and the festive atmosphere.
After the stage Le Muy — Le Luc on May the 7th, 77 participants joined Brignoles yesterday. Today’s portion will lead them to Saint Maximin
The movie heroic land projected in Calais on Friday
The movie heroic land will be projected in Calais at l’Alhambra on Friday May the 11th at 6:45 p.m. with the two movie directors Nicolas Klotz and Elizabeth Perceval
3 Spanish and 2 Danish discharged after being accused of helping people crossing the border
According to Euronews, three Spanish and two Danish citizens have been discharged after being accused of helping displaced people enter irregularly. They were participating in a sea rescue mission in 2016. The Spaniards are fire-fighters in Seville, volunteers with the association Proem-AID; the Danish are volunteers with Team Humanity.
“They came to help people, not for money, not for trafficking.” According to Lara Lussion, spokesperson of PROEM-AID.
“They are accused of having towed refugees into territorial Greek waters [as explained by their lawyer Haris Petsikos]. Thatis wrong. It didn’t happen like that. They are civil servants, fire-fighters, some of the most professional in Spain. They are certified rescuers on land and sea. They were there in an official mission, sent by their services to help Greek authorities.”
According to euronews, more than one thousand displaced people, including many children, have drowned between 2015 and 2016 between Turkey and the Aegean Islands, a route taken by nearly one million people during that time.
Movie « Regarde ailleurs » (look away)
«Look away » is a movie documenting the situation in Calais since the destruction of the jungle. The film can been viewed for free here
Find promotional materials here and here
To support the movie, click here
Stories from isolated minors in Europe
Amnesty published Ismael’s story, a sixteen years old from Burkina Faso. He is one of the 25,846 unaccompanied minors who arrived in Italy in 2016. His story helps to understand the difficulties that these young people face once they arrive in Italy. In Palermo, the municipality launched a call to volunteer tutors.
You can also find here the testimony of Malic, from the Ivory Cost
17 displaced people rescued lodged a complaint before the ECHR
Here is a portion of the article from Challenges
17 migrants rescued in an operation in the Mediterranean sea have lodged a complaint before the European court of human rights against the Italian government accused of leaving the situation to “negligent and violent” Libyan coast guards , announced the association on Tuesday.
Complainants accuse Italy of having violated their rights by “subcontracting” the sea rescue to Libya, in the controversial agreements set up in 2017 with Libyan authorities to block the flux of migrants in the Mediterranean.
They would like the ECHR to apply pressure on Italy. They are demanding to be paid damages to the complainants and to put an end to the policy of sending people back to Libya, which Italy condemned in 2012.
The agreements with the Libyan authorities and militia, including a support to Libyan coast-guards, reduced by 80% the arrivals in Italy this year in comparison to 2017. However numerous voices are raised to denounce the human cost of this agreements for migrants who suffer from detention, violence and extortion in Libya.
The complaint was lodged last week by 17 Nigerians. They had travelled from Tripoli on the evening of November the 5th. They were in an overcrowded dinghy that deflated partially during the journey.
Christian Salomé, l’Auberge des Migrants
Pierre Jothy, l’Auberge des Migrants
