Debunking myths about why people migrate across the Mediterranean
►http://theconversation.com/debunking-myths-about-why-people-migrate-across-the-mediterranean-7
The myth of ‘destination Europe’
Many people we interviewed did not even know anything about the EU prior to their arrival. Far from planning his journey with Europe as a destination point, one man from the Ivory Coast told us when we spoke to him in Sicily:
My idea was not to reach Italy. I didn’t know Italy if not for the football. I never thought to come in Europe, because here I have not family. My family is only in Ivory Coast and Burkina. But is my family who pushed me to go to Mali. In Mali there was a war, then I moved to Algeria, otherwise I would have stayed there. I wasn’t lucky enough to stay in Algeria, if not I would have to stay there. I didn’t want to go in Libya, the situation is too crazy to go there. It [was] really hard … to stay in Libya … all these circumstances pushed me to reach here.
Such unsustainable living situations were reported by many people who travelled to. In Rome, we interviewed a Palestinian-Syrian refugee who had been born in Libya. He told us:
At first I didn’t want to come to Europe, I wanted to go to another Arabic country. I thought about doing some business in Libya, but then I discovered that there is no security, I can’t be free over there. There is always danger, for everybody. I have discovered a different reality from what I initially imagined in Libya. They treat everyone like slaves.
This man’s testimony resonates with recent reports of people being sold as slaves or prostitutes in Libya. Even those people aiming to set up a new life in Turkey reported problems in their journeys that drove them to move on. As an Afghan man told us when we spoke to him in Athens:
I didn’t care about borders. All I cared about was to save my life, seriously. I thought I could find a safe place and find work and that’s all. Maybe in Turkey. Turkey is a good place. But if they find you are illegal in Turkey they will deport you back to Kabul. This is the reason I came here [to Europe].
