Another lockdown, more tragedy.

Greece is once again locked down. This time for three weeks, they say. Here a short description of the situation in the Moria 2.0 by one of the inhabitans:

“The camp is once again in lockdown, this time way more strict, only people with with specific reasons can go out, everyone has to wear a mask even inside of the camp, otherwise they will be fined €150. However some cops who are coming from outside and can transfer the virus are still not wearing a mask, they give food only two times per day and that food has a very bad quality. And with the lockdown people can’t buy food or anything to make the food at least taste better. There is no hygiene and people are running out of hygiene stuff and they can’t buy it because of the lockdown. Also winter is coming its getting cold and people have no money to buy clothes and even if they had they couldn’t buy it because of Lockdown. People feel imprisoned.”

This is the state of Lesvos at the moment. Locked down and with a curfew in effect. Police hardly checks people, unless you are a migrant. Also as described above, it’s getting harder and harder to leave the camp, and we have no idea if this will go back to “normal” in three weeks. There are three separate checkpoints before the main gate, and some people cannot even leave their tent without showing papers. Guards at the first checkpoint will say “tommorow,tommorow” unless you are able to show any kind of paper. This kafkaeque display of true bureaucratic disdain forces people to stay inside cold tents without heating. A lot of women suffer from dehydration because they dont drink enough water. This because they are afraid to go to the toilet alone in the night.
This in spite of the enormous amount of attention focused on this Island and the situation of migrants in general after the fire that struck two months ago. And also dispite the massive amount of donations that came from around the world for the camp, there are STILL no proper hygiene facilities or showers, despite the camp now being in use for almost two months. After two months, massive donations to organisations claiming to improve the camp and widespread knowledge of the situation of the people, it is still worse then Moria, and it doesn’t show any signs of improvement.

Meanwhile the pushbacks continue, and hardly any new migrands arrive on the Islands. In addition to this, new deals are being struck with different countries to ensure more deportations can take place. Also, Mitsotrakis reafirmed his belief in the notorious eu-turkey deal. This deal could be seen as representative of how the eu and greece think about migrants, and how they, the ones with the power to decide people’s futures, define “safety”. Their public affirmation with a deal made with a authoritairian oppressive state is symbolic. It represents the lengths to which our goverments are willing to go to keep out migrants, with zero regards for their lives or safety or the beliefs of liberty and freedom they claim to adhere to. The lives of people on the move being made more precarious every day as europe leans more and more towards the right, facing ever increasing economic damage because of the pandamic.

More Eu-turkey deals, pushbacks, closed camps, quota’s, xenophobic bureaucrats, politicians, police and double or triple standards define the still inhuman and outright racist treatment of migrants in 2020. After years of hollow words, empty promises and outright lies by politicians we have seen the situation decline time after time. Everytime we look back, the situation is worse then before and next year will be no different then any other. Unless we activly work and organise to abolish ALL camps, “detention facilities”, prisons and combat racism, colonialism, sexism and classism not only here but worldwide, it will only get worse.

The line must be drawn here.

Get Angry. Organise.

#LeaveNoOneBehind
#shutdownallcamps

The cold has come. Winter is beginning to settle on the Island, and with the new camp it has the potential to be one of the worst. New lockdown restrictions have been announced, and the camp will be locked down. This whilst the covid-19 quarantine area is a joke and there is no 24 hour medical service in the camp. It is a repeat of April, where we spend many words on writing about the cruel situation where a well known inhuman disaster of a camp was unfit for measeures that govemerments worldwide demanded to curb the pandememic. But it’s November now, and that camp is gone. The new one was build in the middle of the pandemic, and it therefore would have been reasonable to expect that this location would be somehow build with this in mind. They must know, that keeping people in conditions like these would put them at higher risk of dying from covid-19. But, like many other things, they don’t care.

The combination of strong winds, cold and rain has will be devasting for the inhabitans of Moria 2.0. But nothing seems to be done about it. It seems the people will be left on their own devices by the politicians,cops and society that forced them to stay there in the first place. Last week, there was also the first fire. No one was injured, and the fire was quickly put out, but it will not be the last. The lack of winter preperations by the relevant authorities will mean that people will have to find ways to warm themselves, often by making fire with whatever is around, creating a bigger risk for more fires. 750 people are allowed to leave the camp, so people have to cue up for hours, and with curfew at 20:00, sometimes only for a few hours. And there are still no showers, people are washing themselves in the sea. Imagine this in winter.

The global media once again turning away from Lesvos, Kos, Samos and the rest of the camps in the Agean or on the mainland proves that interest in this topic is sensational. When there is no sensation, there is no urgent media to speak of. The coming winter for the people in the camp in these appaling conditions is not a topic, while it again concerns preventable suffering and death.
The camp being closed to press is a strategic move on the part of the authorities. Because how can mainstream media outlets report on the conditions without pictures of people of colour behind fences or non-white kids playing in the mud of the flooded camp? The idea that a situation like the one here and in other places has to be “newsworthy” in order to report plays right into the hands of the authorities. They know, they can get away with many,many different smaller things as long as it is implemented slow and there is no large unrest. Who knows what they will try now the world is once again not looking, and not seeing the everyday sruggle for survival of human beings at the hands of the greek and european asylum system.

The US election shows us relying on “decent people” (the left) to do the “right thing” (vote left) at the right time (election day) to stop institutional racism, classism and sexism is not going to work. Win or lose, more people voted for Trump after four years of having him in office. The election of people and parties like Trump, Orban, the PiS and others is not a anomaly, it is part of the new normal. Their idea’s are supported by large groups of people that will exist whether their parties are in goverment or not. These people are creating and maintaining a society that is activly becoming more racist and exclusionary, and this is one of the reasons why places like Moria 2.0 exist and will keep existing.

Let’s make Moria 2.0 and all places like it a shameful part of our history, not the future.

Get Angry. Get Organised.