Media Home
UN Web TV
UN Audiovisual Library
UN PhotoUnifeed
GREECE / ASYLUM SEEKERS
STORY: GREECE / ASYLUM SEEKERS
TRT: 3.18
SOURCE: UNHCR
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: DARI / SOMALI / ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 26, 25, 28, 31 MAY 2010, 1 APRIL 2010, GREECE
26 MAY 2010, FYLAKIO DETENTION CENTRE, NORTHEASTERN GREECE
1. Wide shot, men exiting cell
2. Wide shot, woman on bed with children
3. Wide shot, overcrowded men’s cell
31 MAY 2010, RECEPTION CENTER FOR UNACCOMPANIED MINORS, AGIASOS, GREECE
6. Close up, Wife’s Zila Soljeri, eyes
7. SOUNDBITE (Dari) Aref Soljeri, husband:
“I had to flee Afghanistan through Iran to save my life.”
8. Close up, daughter Marila Soljeri’s face
9. SOUNDBITE (Dari) Aref Soljeri, husband:
“I see myself and so many others who have arrived before and waited for five to ten years without an outcome. Our life is not moving on and things have come to a standstill. I hate everything here, because it is a detention centre. I feel very suffocated. I don’t like it at all.”
25 MAY 2010, FYLAKIO DETENTION CENTER, NORTHEASTERN GREECE
10. Wide shot, men lined up in cell
11. Wide shot, feet hanging through bars
12. Wide shot, woman on bed with children
13. Med shot, young man through bars
14. Close up, young man peeking through full cell
15. Pan right, from man inside cell to child outside cell
28 MAY 2010, MEDECINS DU MONDE RECEPTION CENTRE, ATHENS, GREECE
16. Close up, Zoleha (8 year old) reading out loud
17. Wide shot, girl reading to other children
01 APRIL 2010, RECEPTION CENTER FOR UNACCOMPANIED MINORS, AGIASOS, GREECE
18. Wide shot, teacher at blackboard
19. Wide shot, teacher teaching children
28 MAY 2010, ATHENS, GREECE
20. Wide shot, Somali Fortune Mohamoud goes up the stairs
21. Close up, Fortune unlocks the door and opens it
22. Close up, Fortune lays down the baby
23. SOUNDBITE (Somali) Fortune Mohamoud, asylum seeker:
‘Here, life is miserable. Early morning, we have to take our children in baby strollers and go with them to the church to eat. Then come back here. There is no place to do laundry, and children cry a lot. There is no place for them to play, the room is also not big enough for them to play and wonder around. Here, there are a lot of problems.There is no water, no toilet; Nothing. I have never seen the misery like this one.”
24. Wide shot, Fortune walking down the road with her baby on a baycart
FILE / YOUTUBE VIDEO / PATRAS, GREECE
25. Wide shot, Youtube page
26. Wide shot, train and rail station
27. Wide shot, people sleeping on stations platform
28. Wide shot, overview of station with refugees around
29. SOUNDBITE (English) Sudanese man:
“There is no water, no toilet; Nothing.”
30. SOUNDBITE (French) French man in station:
“I have never seen the misery like this one.”
31. Med shot, people eating
32. Med shot, people sleeping between tracks
31 MAY 2010, RECEPTION CENTER FOR UNACCOMPANIED MINORS, AGIASOS, GREECE
33. Wide shot, Soljeri (Marila, Aref and Zila) family walking into their room
34. SOUNDBITE (DARI) Aref Soljeri, husband:
“If you have to escape death in Afghanistan by fleeing through Iran, let me tell you once you arrive here you are in a dark closed tunnel.”
26 MAY 2010, FYLAKIO DETENTION CENTER, NORTHEASTERN GREECE
35. Wide shot, following child around cells
36. Wide shot, two police awaiting asylum seekers to go back into cells
37. Wide shot, crowded cells
38. Various shots, asylum seekers looking through fence
39. Close up, hand slipping off fence
They come by the hundreds to realize a dream, making a life in Europe. And Greece has become the gateway to that dream.
But the harsh reality of being an asylum seeker here is quite different.
SOUNDBITE (Dari) Aref Soljeri, asylum seeker:
“I had to flee Afghanistan through Iran to save my life.”
Aref Soljeri fled Afhganistan with his wife Zila and their daughter one year ago.
SOUNDBITE (Dari) Aref Soljeri, asylum seeker:
“I see myself and so many others who have arrived before and waited for five to ten years without an outcome. Our life is not moving on and things have come to a standstill.”
Asylum seekers arrested on the Greek border are placed in detention. Some stay a few days, some a few months. Living conditions are not always ideal.
There’s overcrowding. There’s even dissatisfaction among the youngest.
SOUNDBITE (Dari) Aref Soljeri, asylum seeker:
“I hate everything here, because it is a detention center. I feel very suffocated. I don’t like it at all.”
There are also eleven receptions centres for asylum applicants, but there are only 800 spaces a far cry from the need.
The reception centres offer services of Greek language classes for a future the seekers might have here.
Fortune did not have the option of being housed in a centre. She made her way to Greece through Turkey. Her second child was born here. Now she lives with her children and six other Somali women in this worn down hotel room.
SOUNDBITE (Somali) Fortune Mohammed Dalmar, asylum seeker:
“Here, life is miserable. Early morning, we have to take our children in baby strollers and go with them to the church to eat. Then come back here. There is no place to do laundry, and children cry a lot. There is no place for them to play, the room is also not big enough for them to play and wonder around. Here, there are a lot of problems.”
Shortly after this interview Fortune was advised by NGO workers to apply for asylum. She waits for a place in a reception centre that is suitable for her and her children.
Recently on YouTube, a videographer posted these pictures of asylums seekers living in abandoned railway cars in the port city of Patras. The living conditions are harsh.
SOUNDBITE (English) Sudanese man:
“There is no water, no toilet; Nothing.”
SOUNDBITE (French) French man in station:
“I have never seen the misery like this one.”
Most of these asylums seekers are waiting to be smuggled by boat to other European country precarious journeys with a poor rate of success.
As they sailed to Greece, Aref and his family witnessed the traumatic drowning of most of their fellow asylum seekers. He has dire warnings about making the sacrificial move.
SOUNDBITE (Dari) Aref Soljeri, asylum seeker:
“If you have to escape death in Afghanistan by fleeing through Iran, let me tell you once you arrive here you are in a dark closed tunnel.”
There are over 46,000 asylum claims awaiting a second hearing. Greece has proposed an asylum law bringing back the appeal committees which were abolished last year. The government says this is positive development, but critics say it will still take years to clear up the backlog.
Download
There is no media available to download.
