From 1 September to 4 October, the Church celebrates the Season of Creation.
Christians around the world are encouraged during this period to renew our relationship with God and creation. This can be done through conversion, commitment and celebration – even as the world struggles with the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.
In a video message recorded before he returned to Manila and tested positive for Covid-19, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle highlights the importance of this month-long period themed “Jubilee for the Earth”.
The celebration ends on Sunday – the feast day of Saint Francis of Assisi – who is also the patron saint of ecology.
“It is a season which is liturgical”, explains the Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, “to celebrate in prayer, and especially in the Eucharist, the goodness of creation, signs of God’s bounty and love.”
A season with an ecological message
The Season of Creation, continues Cardinal Tagle, “is a celebration with a clear social ecological message, for the way we deal with creation is also carried over to our attitude toward life and human beings.”
“It is also a call to rediscover our vocation as stewards of creation.” Very often, he notes, “we behave like owners and forget that we are caretakers.”
The Cardinal also recalles “with joy and gratitude”, the celebration of the Season of Creation in the diocese of Imus and the Archdiocese of Manila – both in the Philippines.
Concluding his message, Cardinal Tagle enjoins everyone to celebrate in the Season of Creation, the interconnectedness in the family of creation and in the human family, especially with the poor.
Press statement by President von der Leyen with President of Lithuania, Gitanas Nausėda,Prime Minister of Estonia, Jüri Ratas, Prime Minister of Poland, Mateusz Morawiecki, and Prime Minister of Latvia, Krišjānis Kariņš
Good morning,
I am very pleased to welcome the leaders of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland to the European Commission. Today is a very important day for Europe. We are taking a big step toward connecting Europe. And we are showing European solidarity in action.
Last night, we awarded EUR 720 million from the Connecting Europe Facility to link the Baltic energy grid with the rest of Europe. This project is a landmark moment. It is a landmark moment in ending the isolation of the Baltic energy market. Most of the funding will go to a new interconnector in the Baltic Sea. And I cannot think of a better name than ‘Harmony Link’.
It will reduce the region’s over-dependence and over-reliance on a single source of energy imports by connecting it in full harmony to the rest of the European Union. It also looks into the future. The new offshore energy grid will bring electricity from renewables to all countries around the Baltic Sea.
And that is why I welcome the Baltic Declaration for Offshore Wind Energy signed this week by the Commission and eight Member States. This project is good for connecting Europe, good for our energy security, and it is good for the European Green Deal.
It demonstrates that in this Union, no matter where you are on the map, you are always at the heart of Europe.
With 35 votes in favor, 30 against and 1 abstention the European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs has adopted a draft resolution on Bulgaria. It calls on the European Commission to continue monitoring judicial reform and the fight against corruption in Bulgaria.
The need for the government to ensure tighter control over spending of EU fundsand to immediately respond to fears that taxpayers’ money is being used to increase the wealth of those associated with the government has been pointed out, BNR reported.
Speaking to the Bulgarian National Radio, MEP from the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats Elena Yoncheva said that this was not a resolution against Bulgaria, but in support of Bulgarian citizens and their desire to live in a country without corruption and with independent judiciary.
The resolution is not a binding one. It is yet to be discussed and voted on by the European Parliament.
On the 85th night of the anti-government protests in Sofia, one of the leaders of the event, Arman Babikyan, read part of the text of the resolution and said that Brussels had clearly heard the citizens in the square.
<h2>For Ruth Behar and her family, Cuba is not only a place of birth, but a site of refuge.</h2>
Last December, Ann Arbor resident Ruth Behar returned to Havana, her place of birth, to put the finishing touches on her newest novel, Letters from Cuba. She stayed in the same apartment building where she lived her first five years until 1961 — when her family left the island two years after Fidel Castro took over.
During her visit, the author worked in the nearby park she went to as a child, using public Wi-Fi to go over final editorial changes. The neighborhood is just a half-block from Temple Beth Shalom, also known as the Patronato Synagogue, a major hub of the Jewish community built just years before Behar’s birth.
Ruth Behar Gabriel Frye-Behar
She said the nostalgic location for the visit was intentional.
“I wanted to feel the island right before my book went to press,” said Behar, a writer, anthropologist and the Victor Haim Perera Collegiate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Michigan. She is the first Latina to receive a MacArthur “Genius” Grant.
“I wanted to be there in Cuba again as I was letting the book go,” she said.
For Behar and her family, Cuba is not only a place of birth, but a site of refuge. Her great-grandfather Abraham Levin journeyed there from Poland in 1924 during the rise of antisemitism in Europe. He lived in the rural Cuban village of Agramonte.
Baby Ruth with her grandparents in Havana.
Behar’s Letters from Cuba, geared toward middle-grade students, was inspired by the true story of her maternal grandmother, Esther, a Polish Jew who journeyed by ship alone at age 17 in 1927 to join her father in Cuba. There, she helped make enough money to bring over the rest of her family from Poland, on the eve of the Holocaust.
The book features fictional letters from Esther to her younger sister, Malka, and imagines the experience of Esther as a young Jewish immigrant in a foreign country. Behar said that fiction became the perfect outlet for a Jewish immigration story that history does not have much record of. Instead, she used details heard in family stories, like the bread and bananas her great- grandfather sustained himself on upon arrival.
“That was a clue to how these new immigrants were taking care of themselves,” Behar said. “It showed how they were gently immersing themselves, trying the fruit of this new culture, while still trying their best to follow the kosher traditions of the old country.”
In addition to her grandmother’s story, Behar said she was motivated to write the book by the climate of hostility toward immigrants exhibited by the Trump administration. She saw connections between her family’s migration patterns and current events.
“It brought the past and the present together for me,” said Behar. “I thought, ‘My own family went through this.’”
In the 1920s, when Behar’s family was trying to escape persecution, the U.S. Immigration Act of 1924 set quotas on how many people could come to the country from Southern and Eastern Europe.
Goworowo map from Memorial Book.
“My family was unwanted here, so our American lives began in Cuba,” she said.
After Communist revolutionary Castro seized power in 1959, Behar said 94 percent of the Jews in Cuba left. Until her immediate family could obtain American passports, they spent a year in Israel living on a Spanish-speaking kibbutz. The family then immigrated once more to join her maternal grandparents in Queens, N.Y.
“I can actually remember looking out [the] ship’s window and seeing the Statue of Liberty when we arrived,” Behar said.
There, they joined a sizeable community of Jewish Cubans, and Behar worked hard to learn English. Still, she held onto her love of Spanish, and eventually pursued a career that allowed her to engage with her passion for language and diversity.
“As a cultural anthropologist, I have this intellectual passport that not only allows but encourages me to connect with the places I write about,” she said.
As part of her anthropological research and writing, she has lived and worked in Mexico and Spain. She has also made many return trips to her native Cuba.
“I do research there on the Jewish community, art and literature, and try to reconnect with the place I was born,” she said.
Haven from the Holocaust
Now, Behar enjoys a home base in Ann Arbor, where she teaches courses on Cuba and its diaspora and the concept of home at the University of Michigan. For herself, the concept of home evokes feelings of gratitude. She recognizes Cuba as the sanctuary that saved her family from a possible death in the Holocaust.
In Letters from Cuba, Behar aims to repaint this picture of the island as a center of welcome for many Jews. She said when it comes to Jewish migration to Cuba, scholars focus on the story of the SS St. Louis, a German luxury ship that carried more than 900 Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany in 1939. Only a handful were allowed entry into Cuba upon arrival. Behar believes this tragedy is out of character for the diverse country.
“I wrote this book in contrast to those stories,” Behar said. “I wanted to show that Cuba did offer sanctuary to very many Jews, that the majority, in fact, did find refuge.”
Behar also hopes the book will fill a gap in children’s learning, to deliver them the diverse kind of anthropological material she teaches to her students at the University of Michigan.
“They’ve read a lot of World War II stories,” Behar said. “They’ve read a lot of immigrant stories. But they don’t know the stories of Jews who went to Cuba.”
In sharing this history, she believes the novel will teach young readers to have compassion toward other immigrant children and hopefully make her readers better citizens of the world.
Perhaps most integral to Behar’s newest literary adventure, however, is remembrance. As remaining Holocaust survivors pass on, and as Behar worries about what she sees as a new climate of fascism, the author wants to make links between past and future traumas.
“We have to do everything we can to bring this historical memory into the present so young people can see it in relation to the contemporary struggles occurring,” she said. “We have to be able to connect all these things and understand how past and present are always in relation to one another.”
Member of the European Parliament Charlie Weimers tweeted that the European Parliament is holding a closed meeting devoted to the escalation in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone.
“President Emmanuel Macron confirmed France has evidence on Turkey supporting Azerbaijan with Islamists from Syria. He will ask the European External Action Service if the European Union has condemned Turkey’s interference in the conflict and if it considers the expulsion of Turkey from the OSCE Minsk Group,” he tweeted.
AMMAN, Jordan — Earlier this year, as the pandemic was sweeping across the globe, something unusual happened in news reporting—profound ideas about social transformation and acts of solidarity were making headlines worldwide. Although less pronounced now, news outlets continue to feature such stories, many of which would have been considered irrelevant or insignificant before the crisis.
Responding to increased interest among media professionals about new approaches to the field, Bahá’í communities in several countries have been exploring with journalists and others how the media can contribute to societal harmony and stimulate thoughtful conversations on issues facing humanity.
Responding to increased interest among media professionals about new approaches to the field, Bahá’í communities in several countries have been exploring with journalists and others how the media can contribute to societal harmony and stimulate thoughtful conversations on issues facing humanity.
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Photograph taken before the current health crisis. The Bahá’ís of Jordan have been hosting roundtable discussions with journalists on how the media can be a source of hope for society.
The Bahá’ís of Jordan have been hosting roundtable discussions with journalists on how the media can be a source of hope for society. “The Bahá’í teachings envision the media as a vital element of society with the potential to be a mirror for the world, reflecting the range of experience of diverse people,” says Tahani Ruhi, of the country’s Bahá’í community’s Office of External Affairs.
“At certain points in the past few months, a fuller picture of the world has been reflected in news reporting: not just of sensational narratives, but also of the constructive processes that exist in every community. The media’s power to inspire hope has become especially visible during this time. Due attention has been given to positive developments—big and small—that show the nobility of people and their capacity to put the needs of their fellow citizens ahead of their own.”
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A discussion with journalist held by the Bahá’í community of Jordan.
Ghada al-Sheikh of the Al-Ghad newspaper, a participant of the roundtable meetings, says: “These discussion spaces are allowing us to better understand important concepts related to progress and to think deeply about their implications for our work. Our consciousness of our mission as journalists is being strengthened as we consult together on issues of social and economic solidarity and how the media can contribute to people’s sense of priorities.”
The roundtable participants in Jordan have also been looking at the impact of structural factors in a media industry shaped by commercial interests. “Media practitioners should not view themselves as competitors, but as collaborators. We are seeking truth, whatever form of media we produce,” said Mahmoud Hishmeh, director of the East and West Center for Dialogue and Sustainable Development, during one of the discussions.
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Photograph taken before the current health crisis. A series of structured discussions held by the Bahá’í community of Australia in collaboration with First Draft and the Centre for Media Transition, is bringing together media practitioners to reimagine the Australian media landscape.
On the other side of the world, the Australian Bahá’í community has also been bringing journalists and others in media together to examine how to be conducive to social cohesion, an issue of great significance in the country. One such effort includes a series of structured discussions, in collaboration with First Draft and the Centre for Media Transition, bringing together media practitioners to reimagine the Australian media landscape.
“By drawing on the principles of Bahá’í consultation we have had the opportunity to exchange diverse experiences respectfully and in an environment that is encouraging and dynamic,” says Venus Khalessi of the Office of External Affairs. “In what is often a fast-paced environment, where complex decisions are made under immense time pressure, media practitioners appreciate the opportunity to step back and reflect on how to apply guiding principles and values to the situations they face.”
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The Australian Bahá’í community has been bringing journalists and others in media together to examine how to be conducive to social cohesion, an issue of great significance in the country.
At one gathering, Alan Sunderland, Executive Director of the Organization of News Ombudsmen and Standards Editors, said, “There are a lot of people talking at the moment about how the media can do more than just highlight divisions, but can talk about things that unite us. That is challenging for journalism, which traditionally is built on a conflict model, one where you find problems to expose. Finding ways to be constructive while recognizing that there is a fundamental requirement for journalism to ask difficult questions is a really interesting issue to explore.”
Participants at the most recent gathering in Australia expressed that the current health crisis has shown more than ever the responsibility of media to act for “the greater good of humankind.” Just as there is a need for accuracy in reporting facts, participants have noted the need for stories to convey values conducive to harmony. Examples of this during the pandemic have included a greater effort by news outlets in the country to report on stories of community-driven response and resilience.
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Photograph taken before the current health crisis. The Bahá’ís of Spain have been having conversations with journalists and other social actors about the need to overcome division and polarization in response to crises.
Meanwhile in Spain, the Bahá’í community has also been having conversations with journalists and other social actors about the need to overcome division and polarization in response to crises.
“Early in the pandemic, new topics entered the public consciousness,” says Sergio García of the country’s Bahá’í Office of External Affairs. “Media outlets focused on discussions of the need for greater international cooperation; the need to transform economic models to be more sustainable, inclusive, and resilient; and many other profound ideas in all areas of life.
“Though older patterns of media coverage reemerged after some time, this change showed a glimpse of how media can open the horizons of human thinking and foster a deep discussion about our common future in a shared world. Media contributes to setting the tone for relations among different elements of society, and it can generate the feeling that we are one world and one people who need to work as such to address our common challenges.”
President Tzitzikostas at local leaders conference in Mannheim: “Cities and regions need direct access to EU funds to turn green words into green actions”
The city of Mannheim virtually welcomed the 9th European Conference on Sustainable Cities & Towns organized by ICLEI with the support of EU institutions, including the European Committee of the Regions (CoR). Hosted by the Mayor of Mannheim and CoR member Peter Kurz, local leaders gave support to the Manheim Message, a collective call for cities and regions to be key partners in the EU’s path towards climate-neutrality and a joint commitment to develop Local Green Deals.
The Mannheim 2020 conference was held virtually from 30 September to 2 October in a difficult social and economic context due to the COVID-19. Five of CoR’s prominent members took part, including President Apostolos Tzitzikostas, calling for cities and regions to be placed at the heart of the design and implementation of the EU’s recovery plans, ensuring every territory becomes more sustainable, inclusive, and resilient.
Apostolos Tzitzikostas, CoR President and Governor of the Region of Central Macedonia intervened saying: “To reach climate neutrality by 2050 and deliver a sustainable future for our citizens, regions, and cities need to be part of the development, delivery, and monitoring of EU recovery policies. As local and regional governments, we need to take ownership of the Green Deal, shape our own national investment and climate plans, and have direct access to EU funds to make the Green Deal tangible in our communities. We must turn nice green words into real green action. If the Green Deal is not built and delivered with our cities and regions, it will not happen at all”.
The CoR member and Mannheim Lord mayor Peter Kurz (DE/PES) declared: “The Mannheim Message underlines how important cities and local authorities are as key actors for Europe’s future. We are committed to Local Green Deals designed in cooperation with our citizens and key stakeholders. We aim to build the strong foundations for the implementation of the Green Deal in Europe and to accelerate the transformation to carbon-neutral, sustainable, and inclusive societies. However, the Mannheim Message also stresses that we do not want to be merely implementation partners for programmes, measures, and regulations. We want to be truly involved in co-creating Europe’s future for the well-being of our citizens today and for future generations”.
The Mayor of Seville, Juan Espadas (ES/PES), Chair of the CoR’s ENVE commission and Green Deal Going Local Working Group, congratulated the Polish city of Katowice for winning the 2020 Transformative Action Award. Mayor Espadas said: “Our cities and regions need to undergo a deep economic and societal transformation to address the current COVID-19 crisis, but also the upcoming climate and biodiversity crises. A Europe made by smart revolutionary actions that have the capacity of changing the face of our territories, restoring ecosystems, contrasting climate change, and moving towards healthier and more inclusive societies is indeed possible. Congratulations to Katowice that through its action aims to increase civic participation and to encourage residents to help make the city more sustainable.”
Rafał Trzaskowski (PL/EPP), Mayor of Warsaw, said: “The Climate Pact is, first of all, a bottom-up process in which local communities make public their commitment to the European climate neutrality by 2050. But it is also a catalyst for social innovation, enabling mutual inspiration on the methods, ways, and tools that are used to transform our societies towards a climate-neutral Europe as quickly and equitably as possible. Cities across Europe desperately look forward to some new, bold financing schemes. Already a year ago, Warsaw, together with the other signatories of the Pact of Free Cities, called for more European funds to be directly accessible for cities. Such funds would boost investment in new, sustainable transport infrastructure, renewable sources of energy, greenery, deep retrofit of buildings, and power-saving measures.”
Roby Biwer(LU/PES), Member of the Bettembourg Municipal Council, Head of the delegation of Luxembourg at the European Committee of the Regions took the floor at the session ‘Designing Just Green Cities through Urban Greening Plans’. The CoR rapporteur on various biodiversity opinions declared: “One of the key learnings from COVID-19 is that cities have to rethink their urban development plans. There is a higher expectation by the bulk of the population to breathe a better air and get greener areas in their neighbourhoods. We need to integrate nature and biodiversity in our lives to build a better future. The European Urban Greening Plans have the potential to bring nature back to cities and reward community action to restore and protect biodiversity in urban and peri-urban areas, by also allowing cities to exchange planning tools. Let’s be the leaders of biodiversity conservation, not victims of it.”
Publication of Eurosystem High-Level Task Force report on digital euro
Eurosystem needs to be ready for possible future decision to introduce digital euro
Public consultation and experimentation to be launched
The European Central Bank (ECB) today published a comprehensive report on the possible issuance of a digital euro, prepared by the Eurosystem High-Level Task Force on central bank digital currency (CBDC) and approved by the Governing Council.
A digital euro would be an electronic form of central bank money accessible to all citizens and firms – like banknotes, but in a digital form – to make their daily payments in a fast, easy and secure way. It would complement cash, not replace it. The Eurosystem will continue to issue cash in any case.
“The euro belongs to Europeans and our mission is to be its guardian,” said Christine Lagarde, ECB President. “Europeans are increasingly turning to digital in the ways they spend, save and invest. Our role is to secure trust in money. This means making sure the euro is fit for the digital age. We should be prepared to issue a digital euro, should the need arise.”
The Eurosystem task force, bringing together experts from the ECB and 19 national central banks of the euro area, identified possible scenarios that would require the issuance of a digital euro. These scenarios include an increased demand for electronic payments in the euro area that would require a European risk-free digital means of payment, a significant decline in the use of cash as a means of payment in the euro area, the launch of global private means of payment that might raise regulatory concerns and pose risks for financial stability and consumer protection, and a broad take-up of CBDCs issued by foreign central banks.
“Technology and innovation are changing the way we consume, work and relate to each other,” said Fabio Panetta, member of the ECB’s Executive Board and Chair of the task force. “A digital euro would support Europe’s drive towards continued innovation. It would also contribute to its financial sovereignty and strengthen the international role of the euro.”
A digital euro would preserve the public good that the euro provides to citizens: free access to a simple, universally accepted, risk-free and trusted means of payment. It also poses challenges, but by following appropriate strategies in the design of the digital euro the Eurosystem can address these.
The Governing Council has not taken a decision yet on whether to introduce a digital euro.
The Eurosystem will engage widely with citizens, academia, the financial sector and public authorities to assess their needs, as well as the benefits and challenges they expect from the issuance of a digital euro, in detail. A public consultation will be launched on 12 October.
Experimentation will start in parallel, without prejudice to the final decision.
For media queries, please contact Alexandrine Bouilhet, tel.: +49 172 174 93 66.
Rahman* was out buying food when Spanish police handed him a 500 euro fine for breaking coronavirus restrictions. “I’ll pay this as soon as I get a residence permit,” he told them. He laughs and shakes his head as he tells the story on a video chat. “Look how thin I’ve become, I weigh only 57 kilos,” he says. The 21-year-old Palestinian lets the webcam display his skinny 1.70m frame.
We speak in Swedish, mixed with Norwegian expressions – his capacity in both languages is testament to the nearly five years he split between the countries as an adolescent. They were formative years where he learned that even apparently kind gestures like the offer of a place to stay could open the door to unfathomable cruelty.
It was a time where no matter what Rahman suffered, the legal right to remain in Europe always eluded him. His lack of status contributed to appalling crimes being committed against him, just as it left the criminals unpunished. He has been exploited and deported but his dream of Europe endures and he has found his way back to the continent but the future is uncertain.
In October 2013, 15-year-old Rahman arrived in Sweden alone. Like so many other young refugees, had heard many good things about Sweden: children are protected, they get to go to school and feel safe, their rights are respected and almost all get to stay.
He grew up in Jordan with Palestinian parents from Gaza. Jordan’s citizenship laws had no place for Rahman, leaving him stateless. When the war in Syria was in its third year his father wanted to send him across the border to fight with jihadists against the Syrian regime. His mother disagreed and the teenager fled to what she hoped would be a place of safety.
Refugee shelter
In Sweden, Rahman lived in a refugee shelter, started school and quickly learned the language. He played football in his spare time. But despite his young age and troubles in Jordan, the court of migration in Stockholm rejected his asylum application in the summer of 2014.
He didn’t know what to do, or where to go. The only thing he was certain about was that he couldn’t return to Jordan and his father. Rahman decided to stay in Sweden without a permit. He left the youth hostel in Stockholm to avoid being deported, and cut off contact with his guardian.
That’s when a friend introduced him to Martin: a large man in his thirties, with a shaved head and heavy gold chains around his neck. Once Martin understood Rahman’s situation, he invited him to a flat in central Stockholm.
When he got there Rahman was shocked. Some people sniffed glue; others did cocaine. He was given a drink – it was the first time he had tried alcohol. The night became a haze. Martin took him into a room. Rahman was struck to the ground and felt hands on his body.
The rapes and beatings continued for months. Martin threatened to kill him if he tried to run away. Rahman had seen guns and knives around the flat and didn’t dare argue or ask questions. “I had nowhere to go. No money. And there was no one to help me,” he says.
Fast food and drugs
A lot of people came to the flat, and it was Rahman’s job to keep it clean. He was given fast food and drugs. Martin would call at any hour and send him off with a bag and address to deliver it to. He was sent on drug trips across Europe, for which he was given new clothes, a fake passport and a bag to carry. Rahman, usually on drugs, slept through the flights.
Rahman is among thousands of children who came to Sweden in recent years only to go missing when their European dreams were shattered. According to the Swedish Migration Agency, 2,014 unaccompanied minors are missing without trace since 2013 — equivalent to almost 70 school classes. The threat of deportation is often mentioned as a reason for these disappearances, as is human trafficking.
But no one really knows, because no one is searching for them. The police keep records but often don’t actively search for the children. Municipalities say children no longer resident in their area are not their responsibility. The Swedish Migration Agency says they can’t examine the cases of missing children. In 2016, the UN Human Rights Committee criticised Sweden for failing to prevent these disappearances.
Many, like Rahman are vulnerable to abuses and traffickers. According to a 2015 survey by a Swedish government agency, the County Administrative Board, most suspected child trafficking cases involved unaccompanied minors. At that time, none of the trafficking investigations involving unaccompanied minors, had resulted in a prosecution.
Systemic failure
To understand where the system was failing, I researched every suspected case of human trafficking of minors in Sweden during a four-year period up to 2015. According to police reports and preliminary investigations, more than half of the trafficking cases involved sexual slavery, in which nearly half of the victims were boys. The police’s failed response to trafficking was systemic.
Rahman was one of those cases. I tracked him down in Norway. After several months, he had managed to escape Martin. On reaching neighbouring Norway, he once again applied for asylum and reported his experience of trafficking to authorities. Rahman and his lawyer felt they didn’t take his case seriously. Because the trafficking took place in Sweden, Norwegian police passed the investigation to their Swedish colleagues. Rahman didn’t trust the investigators in either country. They didn’t seem to realise how dangerous it would be for him to single out Martin with no guarantee of protection.
“I can’t build a life here. I want to go to Europe again. I am never giving up.”
Shortly after Rahman turned 18, we spent a few days at a seaside resort. Surrounded by glittering Norwegian fjords, he and his court-appointed guardian sat outside on a mild summer evening. He leaned against her with his big ragged hair, long eyelashes and gentle smile. “She’s like a mother to me,” he said.
The Swedish trafficking investigation was eventually dropped. His asylum application in Norway was also rejected. Now he was no longer technically a child. In the summer of 2018, he was deported to Jordan.
After nearly five years in Europe, Rahman struggled to fall in line with the more socially controlled society in Jordan. He couldn’t return to his strictly religious family: he now smoked, drank alcohol and wore an earring. He was meant to try and find a job without a national ID, which also meant no access to doctors or hope of returning to education.
Yellow dinghy
The police seemed to relish harassing him. They would ask: Why were you in Europe? Why have you come back? And he was mocked by friends and relatives: Where’s the money, the success, the expensive things? For a while he worked 12-hour days at a tourist bazaar for wages that did not even cover his rent. After a few weeks, unable to see any other way, he decided to leave again.
First he attempted to sail to Greece via Turkey but the yellow dinghy was stopped by Turkish coast guards. After a month and a half in a Turkish prison, he returned to Jordan. He still had a Norwegian girlfriend at the time. As a European she could just take a plane and come to visit for a few weeks. Rahman has none of these options.
Thierry Monasse | Getty Photos
His friends in Norway arranged for him to stay with people they knew in Kosovo and he planned to continue overland further into Europe. But he was arrested in Montenegro and sent back to Kosovo. He became severely ill and returned to Jordan. But in his head he was already making new plans to reach Europe.
“I can’t build a life here,” he told me in the summer of 2019. “I want to go to Europe again. I am never giving up.”
This time he went to Morocco. Rahman knew this was his most dangerous journey so far. “But I am going to make it, I am sure of it!” he insisted. Later that summer, he reached the Moroccan border with the Spanish exclave, Melilla. This gateway to Europe is enclosed with high barbed wire fences and monitored by drones. Migrants and Moroccan boys his age were everywhere, hoping to get through the border at night. Some had been trying for months, even years. Rahman’s plan was to swim around the sea fences, a treacherous feat where border guards sometimes fire plastic bullets at swimmers. His first four failed attempts and was hurt in a fall before he finally managed to swim into the port of Melilla.
Cargo ship to Spain
“I am so happy – I am in Europe again!” he said in a message.
Afraid of being forced back to Morocco by authorities in Melilla, he stowed away aboard a cargo ship to mainland Spain. He was given a place in a refugee shelter and 50 euros a month to live on. But this assistance was cut after six months, just as the coronavirus pandemic hit Europe.
As we kept in touch over the years, I would always ask how he was and he always replied, “good,” no matter the circumstances. He has to stay positive, he says, to keep going towards what he longs for: an ordinary life, with a home, a girl and children. He would like to study languages and maybe work with tourists as he is so used to meeting new people.
Newsletter in English
But there is very little space to talk about the future right now. Rahman does not even know what tomorrow will bring, where he will sleep or how he will eat. He is considering two unwanted options: Start selling drugs again or commit a crime deliberately to get caught. “If I get arrested, I have somewhere to live until corona is over,” he said.
Rahman’s European dream has brought him back. Despite the trials he has gone through, the stateless boy is now a young man but no closer to having papers. The asylum process in Spain is long, up to 18 months, and uncertain and that was before the pandemic. He thinks of Sweden or Norway but doubts his chances. From Scandinavia to Jordan he has never been granted the right to belong. “Why is that?” he asks. “Why can’t I be legal anywhere?”
This article is part of the Europe’s Dreamers series, in partnership with Lighthouse Reports and the Guardian. Check the other articles of the series here.
