WEBVTT - EU Border Enforcement, Part 2 0:00:01.760 --> 0:00:04.720 A Zone Media. 0:00:05.120 --> 0:00:07.040 Hi, we're back, And just to remind people, if you 0:00:07.040 --> 0:00:09.840 haven't listened to the episode yesterday, you probably won't pick 0:00:09.920 --> 0:00:13.080 up what's going on today. So I suggest starting there 0:00:13.240 --> 0:00:15.720 as we commence on our second part of the discussion 0:00:15.760 --> 0:00:18.400 about the EUS border. Today, we're going to discuss the 0:00:18.480 --> 0:00:22.480 EU's external border and what that means for migrants. We'll 0:00:22.520 --> 0:00:26.520 pick up with Mick and Rose and we'll start off 0:00:26.600 --> 0:00:29.240 more or less where we left off yesterday. Like you 0:00:29.280 --> 0:00:31.720 can map, and I'm not the first one to have 0:00:31.760 --> 0:00:34.400 made these maps, but you can look at humane borders 0:00:34.400 --> 0:00:37.560 in Arizona, and then you can look at EFF's map 0:00:37.600 --> 0:00:39.920 of fixed and mobile towers and you can see people. 0:00:40.560 --> 0:00:42.960 And again this is something I'm more familiar with, and 0:00:43.000 --> 0:00:45.600 I'd like to be people dying in the shade of 0:00:45.640 --> 0:00:49.640 the surveillance towers, without help, without water, without the very 0:00:49.840 --> 0:00:52.440 minor things that it would take for them not to 0:00:52.479 --> 0:00:56.600 have died. And so yeah, this provides justification. It provides 0:00:56.640 --> 0:01:00.440 a massive outlet for the post War on Terror like 0:01:00.520 --> 0:01:04.400 military industrial complex to continue to make its money, and 0:01:04.480 --> 0:01:07.920 to continue to make its money through innocent people dying. 0:01:09.880 --> 0:01:14.959 Yeah, I think it was either abolish Frontex or the 0:01:15.080 --> 0:01:18.800 transnational institutes. I got some hands on some literature they 0:01:18.800 --> 0:01:23.720 were spreading, and there is a direct you can draw 0:01:23.720 --> 0:01:26.600 a direct line between like the end of the Cold 0:01:26.640 --> 0:01:32.720 War in the nineties, with military industrial complex having to 0:01:32.760 --> 0:01:36.080 fight new ways to sell their products to states. And 0:01:36.120 --> 0:01:39.640 that's also why the border keeps getting more and more militarized, 0:01:39.640 --> 0:01:41.720 because it is the one point where they can still 0:01:41.840 --> 0:01:44.640 sell a lot of things without their having to be 0:01:44.680 --> 0:01:45.000 a war. 0:01:45.560 --> 0:01:45.760 Yeah. 0:01:46.200 --> 0:01:49.760 Yeah, there's like a very serious lobby of companies who 0:01:49.880 --> 0:01:52.800 just want to make money out of making our borders deadly, 0:01:52.880 --> 0:01:54.880 and they're really successful. 0:01:55.800 --> 0:01:57.480 Yeah. I think they just want to make money and 0:01:57.520 --> 0:02:00.360 they don't care if they make our borders deadly. The 0:02:01.640 --> 0:02:04.880 end goal is always profit for them, right like, and 0:02:04.880 --> 0:02:07.360 everything else is consequent to that. 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:10.799 Think of the stockholders they have to live as well. 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:17.400 What I personally find most troubling is this extension of 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:22.240 the Iron border into non European countries. So the EU 0:02:22.400 --> 0:02:26.120 is making deals with countries in which for the in 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:29.960 exchange for large sums of money that those countries are 0:02:30.000 --> 0:02:34.760 now containing, or stopping migrants and refugees from ever leaving 0:02:34.919 --> 0:02:38.920 the Middle East Africa. Like Rose said earlier, The Turkey 0:02:38.960 --> 0:02:43.400 deal is essentially a political deal between the EU and 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:47.320 Turkey for Turkey to hold a portion of Syrian refugees 0:02:47.760 --> 0:02:51.520 over within their border to stop them from coming into Europe. 0:02:51.800 --> 0:02:56.960 And I think we paid a few billion, more than 0:02:57.000 --> 0:03:00.280 a few billion probably for Turkey to do that. So 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:05.040 the most prominent of these deals are, as I said, Turkey, 0:03:05.520 --> 0:03:10.040 but also Tunisia and Libya. We're essentially outsourcing the abuse 0:03:10.080 --> 0:03:13.800 and human rights violations to countries that are outside the 0:03:13.800 --> 0:03:17.000 scope of our media, who have regimes that we would 0:03:17.000 --> 0:03:21.200 declare dictatorships and autocracies. In the case of Libya, it's 0:03:21.240 --> 0:03:26.320 even like rebels and warlords being funded with EU taxpayer money. Today, 0:03:26.360 --> 0:03:28.959 the EUPAC with Libya has given rise to a full 0:03:29.000 --> 0:03:32.560 fledged slave market run by cold blooded human traffickers who, 0:03:33.040 --> 0:03:36.920 incentivized by the EU's crackdown on irregular migration and the 0:03:37.000 --> 0:03:41.000 resulting business downturn of would be profitable passengers, are now 0:03:41.040 --> 0:03:46.920 auctioning economic migrants and refugees as slaves. Yeah, we're just 0:03:46.960 --> 0:03:50.560 doing slavery with extra steps now. So to make it 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:54.480 inescapably clear how bad the situation is, I'm now going 0:03:54.480 --> 0:03:58.080 to quote from an Amnesty International article from twenty twenty one. 0:03:58.720 --> 0:04:04.200 Three Police Shada al Zawa Center is a facility facility 0:04:04.320 --> 0:04:10.280 which was previously run by a non affiliated militia and 0:04:10.440 --> 0:04:15.280 was recently integrated under the DCIM and designated for people 0:04:15.320 --> 0:04:21.040 in vulnerable situations. A DCIM is an acronym for Libya's 0:04:21.320 --> 0:04:26.440 Directorate for Combating Illegal Migration. It's essentially a department of 0:04:26.480 --> 0:04:32.080 their Interior Ministry. Former detainees from that facility said that 0:04:32.160 --> 0:04:35.000 guards raped women and some were cohoersed into sex in 0:04:35.080 --> 0:04:38.320 exchange for their release or for essentials such as clean 0:04:38.360 --> 0:04:42.800 water grace. A pseudonym said she was heavily beaten for 0:04:42.880 --> 0:04:45.680 refusing to comply with such a demand. I told the 0:04:45.720 --> 0:04:48.080 guard no. He used the gun to knock me back. 0:04:48.400 --> 0:04:51.200 He used a letter soldier's shoe to kick me from 0:04:51.279 --> 0:04:55.200 my waist. Two young women at the facility attempted to 0:04:55.200 --> 0:04:59.000 commit suicide as a result of such abuse. Three women 0:04:59.040 --> 0:05:01.960 also said that two babies detained with their mothers after 0:05:02.000 --> 0:05:05.279 an attempted sea crossing had died in early twenty twenty 0:05:05.320 --> 0:05:08.640 one after guards refused to transfer them to a hospital 0:05:08.720 --> 0:05:13.160 for a critical medical treatment, and the International Report documents 0:05:13.200 --> 0:05:19.359 similar patterns of human rights violations including severe beatings, sexual violence, extortion, 0:05:19.960 --> 0:05:24.640 force labor, and in human conditions across seven DCIM centers 0:05:24.680 --> 0:05:28.040 in Libya. In Abuisa Center in the city of al 0:05:28.160 --> 0:05:33.120 Zayadtnes reported being deprived of nutritious food to the point 0:05:33.160 --> 0:05:35.200 of starvation end growth. 0:05:35.680 --> 0:05:41.560 Yeah, Libya is is just on a completely different level. 0:05:42.200 --> 0:05:47.120 And we have systematic torture on almost all border crossings 0:05:47.160 --> 0:05:53.320 by European border guards, but Libya just manages to do 0:05:53.440 --> 0:06:01.080 worse than that, just systematically enslave, rate, murder, torture. And 0:06:01.120 --> 0:06:03.400 I think it's important to stress that, Like there's this 0:06:03.480 --> 0:06:06.640 Libyan Coast Guard, they're funded by the European Union. So 0:06:06.960 --> 0:06:10.279 the opinion Union will go out with drones support the 0:06:10.320 --> 0:06:15.640 boat of migrants. Previously, the European Union actually had rescue ships, 0:06:16.480 --> 0:06:20.679 but the European Union, if a boat is near another 0:06:20.680 --> 0:06:23.559 boat in distress, there's an obligation to rescue, and after 0:06:23.600 --> 0:06:25.479 the rescue, you have to bring the people to a 0:06:25.560 --> 0:06:30.400 safe port. So having having a boat at sea meant 0:06:30.520 --> 0:06:33.800 that the European Border Agency Front Tax was obliged to 0:06:33.880 --> 0:06:37.320 rescue people at sea, and so they just thought let's 0:06:37.320 --> 0:06:39.159 just do away with the boats and let's just have 0:06:39.240 --> 0:06:42.599 helicopters and drones so we can still spot boats that 0:06:42.720 --> 0:06:45.599 are sinking, but we cannot help them. 0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:49.160 And they are obligated too. 0:06:49.920 --> 0:06:52.640 Yeah, I mean they're physically yeah, exactly. They they they 0:06:52.680 --> 0:06:56.479 managed to escape that responsibility under maritime law, and then 0:06:56.720 --> 0:07:01.000 they paid the Libyan coast Guard to rescue rescue people 0:07:01.880 --> 0:07:07.120 quote unquote. Libya is so bad that reportedly migrants just 0:07:07.279 --> 0:07:09.440 jump in the water if they see a Libyan coast 0:07:09.440 --> 0:07:12.000 guard because people prefer to drown them to be taken 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:15.200 back to Libya. The Libyan coast Guard takes the people 0:07:15.240 --> 0:07:18.680 on the boat, brings them back to Libyan mainland, and 0:07:18.760 --> 0:07:23.400 actually sells them to the militias running the detention centers. 0:07:23.600 --> 0:07:28.160 So the Libyan coast Guard gets paid twice for stopping migrants, 0:07:28.200 --> 0:07:31.520 first by the European Union and secondly by the militias 0:07:31.520 --> 0:07:35.440 that will later sell them as slates or use them 0:07:35.480 --> 0:07:39.600 for slavery. And this is what we have been funding 0:07:39.680 --> 0:07:43.760 for years, and there have been extensive documentation about these 0:07:43.800 --> 0:07:47.560 human rights violations and the very direct link of the 0:07:47.560 --> 0:07:49.800 EO funding, and it just keeps going. 0:07:52.360 --> 0:07:55.120 I think it was a year or so back where 0:07:55.160 --> 0:07:59.640 I saw a video of someone a woman on a 0:07:59.680 --> 0:08:03.840 dingy who was just incredibly emotional and she was just 0:08:04.280 --> 0:08:07.520 exclaiming all the time like I'd rather die than go 0:08:07.600 --> 0:08:10.720 back to Libya, which yeah, it's. 0:08:10.760 --> 0:08:14.320 Yeah, just literally what it is. Yeah. 0:08:14.840 --> 0:08:19.160 Yeah, I would encourage that the listeners to just google 0:08:19.560 --> 0:08:24.080 something like Libya migrant detentions or something and look at 0:08:24.080 --> 0:08:27.480 the pictures because it's you might get. 0:08:27.320 --> 0:08:30.480 Like traumatized, but you will be more aware of the 0:08:30.480 --> 0:08:31.360 horrors in the world. 0:08:31.960 --> 0:08:34.840 Yeah, yeah, that they're not great pictures to look. 0:08:34.679 --> 0:08:36.839 At, but thank you for good sleep. 0:08:37.120 --> 0:08:41.800 Like, yeah, I think it's important to see those things 0:08:41.840 --> 0:08:47.000 because that is the reality that we in Europe often 0:08:47.120 --> 0:08:50.079 do not get to see, and this is the reality 0:08:50.160 --> 0:08:55.680 that has been created by our overlords. So what the 0:08:55.760 --> 0:08:59.640 EU is doing is to be very blunt, extending its 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:03.520 own orders into sovereign territory of states outside of Europe 0:09:03.960 --> 0:09:07.200 to stop migrants from even entering the EU. Proponents of 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:11.480 these policies will undoubtedly argue that this saves lives by 0:09:11.520 --> 0:09:17.559 preventing people from crossing the Mediterranean in overcrowded boats and dinghies. Personally, 0:09:17.600 --> 0:09:19.960 I would argue that people will continue to make that 0:09:20.000 --> 0:09:23.920 crossing if only to escape the EU funded hellholes that 0:09:24.040 --> 0:09:27.640 these regimes create in order to get that sweet, sweet 0:09:27.640 --> 0:09:32.959 EU funding. What is definitely very concerning is that despite 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:37.880 criticisms from NGOs such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, 0:09:38.320 --> 0:09:42.400 Europe will likely continue these practices. Only last year did 0:09:42.440 --> 0:09:45.120 it sign a deal with Tunisia with the attention of 0:09:45.240 --> 0:09:48.160 using that as a third country as they call it, 0:09:48.760 --> 0:09:54.320 to prevent sea crossings. European Commission President Ursula von der 0:09:54.520 --> 0:09:58.320 Leyen stated that this could be a blueprint for cooperation 0:09:58.400 --> 0:10:02.040 with other countries. Surprise of no one, this will very 0:10:02.160 --> 0:10:06.440 likely increase the human rights violations and abusance that happened there. 0:10:07.040 --> 0:10:11.360 And after this, I have two examples of stories that 0:10:11.520 --> 0:10:15.360 that happens at the EU borders that are I think 0:10:15.800 --> 0:10:20.520 particularly heartbreaking. And this was also the hardest part for 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:24.520 me to write, because there are so many stories out 0:10:24.520 --> 0:10:29.040 there that I think deserve to be heard and deserve 0:10:29.120 --> 0:10:35.120 to have like some lights shone on there just to 0:10:35.120 --> 0:10:37.960 show people the reality. But that would be that would 0:10:38.000 --> 0:10:40.040 turn into a very very long episode. 0:10:40.720 --> 0:10:42.280 Yeah, can I can? 0:10:42.280 --> 0:10:44.760 I quickly just I would like to say something about 0:10:44.840 --> 0:10:49.080 the these deals and I think there is something very 0:10:49.920 --> 0:10:54.680 ironic about the European Union pretending to value democracy and 0:10:54.880 --> 0:10:55.760 human rights. 0:10:55.840 --> 0:10:58.440 And Ladlav Well, I mean what you've just said makes 0:10:58.440 --> 0:11:02.200 it apondantly clear that human rights in Europe are just 0:11:02.240 --> 0:11:05.200 for Europeans and not for humans. But I would also 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:08.560 just like to stress that it's very strange and I 0:11:08.559 --> 0:11:13.440 think not maybe often enough address that what Europe is 0:11:13.440 --> 0:11:17.040 doing is it's just bribing countries. It is bribing countries 0:11:17.080 --> 0:11:20.640 to stop migrants, It is bribing countries to take unwanted 0:11:20.679 --> 0:11:24.920 migrants back through deportation. It is often also forced to 0:11:24.960 --> 0:11:28.240 take on its own citizens. So it's not only people 0:11:28.240 --> 0:11:31.160 from Sub Sahara Africa traveling through Libya, but it's also 0:11:31.240 --> 0:11:35.240 Libyan people themselves. So they have elected a government, they 0:11:35.240 --> 0:11:38.960 have an interest themselves as well, maybe in having the 0:11:39.000 --> 0:11:43.360 ability to move away from Libya, and the you needs 0:11:43.360 --> 0:11:45.679 to come up with enormous sums of money to force 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:49.960 these governments to Yeah, why do they need that money? 0:11:50.000 --> 0:11:52.000 Because that's not in the interest of the country or 0:11:52.040 --> 0:11:57.679 its citizens to do this. And especially in the Netherlands, 0:11:57.720 --> 0:12:01.240 there is this enormous Yeah, there's this is expectation that 0:12:01.520 --> 0:12:04.160 if we don't like something, other countries should do something 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:08.640 about it. So in the Netherlands, Moroccan migrants specifically are 0:12:08.640 --> 0:12:15.199 filified a lot, and and Algerian migrants, and both countries 0:12:15.240 --> 0:12:20.280 have not been very collaborative with deportations. But like, why 0:12:20.320 --> 0:12:26.120 the hell should they support the forced return of their 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:31.559 own citizens who don't want to go back to their countries. Yeah, 0:12:31.600 --> 0:12:34.880 like there's no reason for them to do that, except 0:12:34.920 --> 0:12:37.840 if Europe is just abusing its power and forcing it 0:12:38.120 --> 0:12:41.520 these countries to do things that are yeah, not in 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:45.840 their interest. I mean a lot of these border guards. 0:12:45.880 --> 0:12:48.840 I think Libya has an exception because they they actually 0:12:48.880 --> 0:12:52.240 make money out of the migrants in so many different ways. 0:12:52.840 --> 0:12:54.839 But if you look at Serbia or Bosnia, they are 0:12:54.880 --> 0:12:59.280 forced to control their borders, which is super expensive. And like, 0:12:59.440 --> 0:13:04.240 these are tries who have other issues to fix, Like, yeah, 0:13:04.520 --> 0:13:07.560 maybe they should, maybe they want to focus on building 0:13:07.640 --> 0:13:11.440 up their country and improving living conditions, but instead the 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:15.120 EU is just giving them money to yeah, to protect, 0:13:15.400 --> 0:13:17.960 to protect borders of people who aren't mainly just walking 0:13:18.000 --> 0:13:20.640 through their countries. Like that's not really a big problem 0:13:21.120 --> 0:13:24.600 for them. And yeah, it's very irunic because Europe is 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:27.760 like justifying its migration policies with this idea that every 0:13:27.800 --> 0:13:33.079 country has sovereignty over who it allows access. That's like legally, 0:13:33.120 --> 0:13:38.360 that's like the fundament of migration deterrence. But it only 0:13:38.960 --> 0:13:41.800 claims that right for itself. So if other countries say, well, 0:13:41.840 --> 0:13:44.559 I don't care if there's Serians walking through my country, 0:13:44.600 --> 0:13:48.040 like maybe they'll spend some money and they'll just leave anyway. Yeah, 0:13:48.400 --> 0:13:51.520 other countries don't have the right. I think Belarus is 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:55.880 an interesting example as well, because Belarus welcomed migrants and 0:13:55.920 --> 0:14:00.560 then brought them to the new border with Poland and Lithuania, 0:13:59.880 --> 0:14:03.480 and Bellus says every right to give feesa to people. 0:14:03.920 --> 0:14:08.640 You know, it's actually like just like the Namla says 0:14:08.640 --> 0:14:11.640 the rights to give freesa to people, Belarus says that 0:14:11.760 --> 0:14:15.280 right too. And then of course people can also go 0:14:15.360 --> 0:14:17.120 to the border across the border if they want and 0:14:17.200 --> 0:14:20.200 ask for asylum. So yeah, I just wanted to highlight 0:14:20.240 --> 0:14:26.440 the irony of how incredibly one sided Europe is in 0:14:26.520 --> 0:14:30.000 how we can claim that we want to keep people out, 0:14:30.080 --> 0:14:34.080 but other countries are not allowed to have sovereign migration policies. 0:14:35.160 --> 0:14:37.520 Yeah, we see it exactly the same in the US, right, 0:14:37.560 --> 0:14:42.480 and we're trying to outsource processing of migrants to Quatemolson 0:14:42.560 --> 0:14:47.120 on Durs. We are trying to I mean, we pay 0:14:47.200 --> 0:14:50.000 Mexico massive sum of money to enforce ourborder, right like 0:14:50.560 --> 0:14:53.560 we saw. It's funny there are three gaps outside of 0:14:53.560 --> 0:14:55.480 a combat that people who have listened to this podcast 0:14:55.520 --> 0:14:58.280 will be very familiar with my reporting on. And we 0:14:58.320 --> 0:15:02.200 saw those gaps close down, not when people started coming 0:15:02.200 --> 0:15:06.280 so much, but once once legacy media outlets showed up. 0:15:06.960 --> 0:15:11.160 Then by December, the US had a bilateral meeting with Mexico, 0:15:11.480 --> 0:15:15.360 and very soon thereafter, we saw Mexican National Guard sitting 0:15:15.600 --> 0:15:17.840 at those gaps in the border wall. The US is 0:15:17.920 --> 0:15:21.400 border like if people are leaving Mexico, it's not Mexico's problem. 0:15:22.160 --> 0:15:25.720 But we saw them with technicals and machine guns policing 0:15:25.840 --> 0:15:29.200 those gaps in the border. And the US gives a 0:15:29.280 --> 0:15:32.320 ton of money to countries to enforce its border right 0:15:32.360 --> 0:15:37.560 to prevent migration and get extremely The US has even 0:15:37.600 --> 0:15:43.520 taken actions to prosecute airlines that fly people north so 0:15:43.560 --> 0:15:45.640 that they can do that too. Yeah. 0:15:45.720 --> 0:15:51.040 Yeah, it's like insane, like half a million or something 0:15:51.200 --> 0:15:53.000 for like bringing one migrant. 0:15:52.680 --> 0:15:55.760 Without of these yeah yeah. 0:15:55.160 --> 0:15:58.880 Two is externalization, just as like bribing Libya to protect 0:15:59.080 --> 0:16:05.040 the border. Is also like actually forcing carriers, like forcing 0:16:05.280 --> 0:16:07.560 transport companies to be the border guard. 0:16:08.240 --> 0:16:10.400 Yeah, to ascertain whether you have a visa or not, 0:16:11.520 --> 0:16:24.200 decide if you have the right to travel. Let's pick 0:16:24.280 --> 0:16:25.960 up with those examples you make, because I think it 0:16:26.040 --> 0:16:29.640 is important for people to kind of have a human 0:16:29.720 --> 0:16:31.200 face or a human story. 0:16:31.760 --> 0:16:37.000 Well, to preface this, like migrants are under EU law, 0:16:37.080 --> 0:16:39.800 migrants are supposed to apply for aside in the first 0:16:39.840 --> 0:16:43.440 EU country that they enter. This policy is likely the 0:16:43.480 --> 0:16:47.600 result of fear from more affluent European countries that the 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:52.240 majority of refugees will travel to those countries. This means 0:16:52.240 --> 0:16:55.440 that the countries geographically closest to Africa and the Middle 0:16:55.480 --> 0:16:58.880 East are the ones supposed to take in most refugees. 0:16:59.320 --> 0:17:03.680 Think of Spain, Greece, Italy, Bulgaria. They however, are not 0:17:03.720 --> 0:17:08.520 too acphusiastic at the prospect of taking huge amounts of migrants. 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:10.560 More are the migrants themselves. 0:17:10.640 --> 0:17:15.480 By the way, I can imagine that they're also a 0:17:15.520 --> 0:17:18.840 lot too keen to live in Bulgaria, especially after what 0:17:19.720 --> 0:17:25.439 follows next, because this story happened at the Turkish Bulgarian border. 0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:31.520 But I also personally it's just incredibly cruel that like 0:17:31.680 --> 0:17:35.879 the Netherlands and Germany and the Scandinavia countries are like, 0:17:36.040 --> 0:17:39.080 oh no, you should take you should take all those refugees, 0:17:39.240 --> 0:17:41.240 like we don't want them here. 0:17:41.840 --> 0:17:44.639 And I would say, that's like where the outstoarsing starts, 0:17:44.680 --> 0:17:47.600 like that's you law. We have shance, so we have 0:17:47.760 --> 0:17:50.679 like free travel within the u EU, but that comes 0:17:50.680 --> 0:17:55.080 with extremely violently guarding the outside of the u So 0:17:55.240 --> 0:17:58.119 if you are a border country, you are only welcome 0:17:58.160 --> 0:17:59.840 if you can prove to us that you are cr 0:18:00.240 --> 0:18:03.960 enough to discourage people from crossing this border. Because again, 0:18:04.080 --> 0:18:07.600 like Bulgaria doesn't really have that much interest in guarding 0:18:07.640 --> 0:18:11.080 the borders if people can just if they anyway want 0:18:11.119 --> 0:18:15.520 to go to Western European countries, right, so it's a 0:18:15.520 --> 0:18:19.880 way to again to I would say, the border externalization 0:18:19.960 --> 0:18:22.920 already starts from like the main countries of destination, which 0:18:22.960 --> 0:18:27.359 is like France and Germany and even Bulgaria would not 0:18:27.600 --> 0:18:30.720 have much interest in stopping migrants if there were not 0:18:30.840 --> 0:18:35.400 all of these rules to make them responsible. 0:18:36.440 --> 0:18:39.080 Exactly. But again, which is why I said, like the 0:18:39.119 --> 0:18:44.600 more affluent countries within you don't want that for reasons 0:18:44.640 --> 0:18:47.480 that I think anyone can think of at this point 0:18:47.520 --> 0:18:50.320 of the story is where pushbacks come into play. This 0:18:50.400 --> 0:18:53.240 is a tactic used by the countries I just mentioned. 0:18:53.800 --> 0:18:56.840 It's a set of measures that force people back over 0:18:56.880 --> 0:19:01.960 the border they crossed, often immediately after. This practice is 0:19:02.000 --> 0:19:04.440 often a force for violence and does not take into 0:19:04.440 --> 0:19:08.159 account the circumstances of migrants and denies them the opportunity 0:19:08.200 --> 0:19:11.560 to apply for asylum. This means that the EU does 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:16.800 pushback people that have very legitimate reasons to apply for asylum. 0:19:17.000 --> 0:19:21.200 Under the EU's own rules, I'm going to quote, pushbacks 0:19:21.280 --> 0:19:25.280 violate the prohibition of collective expulsion of asylum seekers in 0:19:25.320 --> 0:19:29.480 Protocol four of the European Convention on Human Rights, and 0:19:29.600 --> 0:19:40.040 often violate the international law prohibiting on non refoulment. It's French, yeah, ah, okay, 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:46.679 I was never good at French, all right. It's a 0:19:46.720 --> 0:19:51.080 fundamental principle of international law that forbids a country receiving 0:19:51.119 --> 0:19:54.200 asylum seekers from returning them to a country in which 0:19:54.240 --> 0:19:59.560 they would be improbable danger of persecution based on race, religion, nationality, 0:19:59.720 --> 0:20:03.480 members ship of a particular social group, or political opinion. 0:20:03.880 --> 0:20:07.479 That being said, I'm aware even like the Dutch government 0:20:07.520 --> 0:20:11.800 has sent like Lgbtqi people back to countries where they 0:20:11.840 --> 0:20:17.160 could be like persecuted for that. So again those rules 0:20:17.160 --> 0:20:21.000 seem to be very optional. So what follows now is 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:28.280 two examples of border practices that I think are particularly egregious. 0:20:28.560 --> 0:20:33.400 So on October third, twenty twenty two, Abdullah Mohammed, at 0:20:33.480 --> 0:20:37.760 age nineteen, a Syrian refugee, attempted to cross the Bulgarian 0:20:37.800 --> 0:20:41.880 Turkish border. After being pushed back by border guards, they 0:20:41.920 --> 0:20:45.720 threw stones at the border I would emphasize here at 0:20:45.720 --> 0:20:49.480 the border itself, not at the guards. After this, a 0:20:49.560 --> 0:20:53.160 shot rang and Abdullah fell to the ground with a 0:20:53.200 --> 0:20:58.560 bullet lodged one centimeter away from his heart. He survived 0:20:58.720 --> 0:21:02.640 and was interviewed by Lighthouse Reports. He states that there 0:21:02.680 --> 0:21:05.400 was an intent to kill when he was shot. That's 0:21:05.440 --> 0:21:09.800 his belief. The bullet also pierced this hand, which is 0:21:09.840 --> 0:21:14.639 now partially paralyzed. There seems to be no justification or 0:21:14.720 --> 0:21:18.760 reason whatsoever for border guards to have shot, or to 0:21:18.840 --> 0:21:22.080 have shot with live ammunition. This was the first time 0:21:22.119 --> 0:21:25.359 that such an incident was called on video. If you want, 0:21:25.640 --> 0:21:29.520 you can find it linked on Lighthouse Reports. Attached to 0:21:29.560 --> 0:21:34.680 the article about this incident. The video is not as 0:21:34.720 --> 0:21:38.240 bad as you might think, but watch you at your 0:21:38.240 --> 0:21:42.480 own risk. As far as I'm aware, there have been 0:21:42.560 --> 0:21:46.000 similar rumors before, but this was the first instant that 0:21:46.119 --> 0:21:49.240 has entered like the public record, or the first time 0:21:49.240 --> 0:21:53.879 it was actually documented. Needless to say, no one should 0:21:53.880 --> 0:21:56.760 be shot for attempting to cross a border. I don't 0:21:56.760 --> 0:22:00.320 care about anyone's opinion or bad faith nuances. People have 0:22:00.359 --> 0:22:02.720 a right to apply for asylum, and as far as 0:22:02.800 --> 0:22:07.240 I'm concerned, this was a deliberate and calculated attempted murder. 0:22:07.920 --> 0:22:09.640 Yeah, I do think there have been quite a lot 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:13.800 of videos of people being shot, and definitely people making 0:22:13.800 --> 0:22:17.679 statements about it and just having the actual bullet in 0:22:17.720 --> 0:22:21.040 their body to prove that it happened. Yeah, it happened 0:22:21.040 --> 0:22:24.480 in Croatia, it happened in Greece. Greece is a habit 0:22:24.520 --> 0:22:28.520 of shooting at boats as well, and in that way 0:22:28.560 --> 0:22:33.399 making people drown. Yeah. And of course, apart from the shootings, 0:22:33.440 --> 0:22:35.639 which I would say on the European borders that they 0:22:35.640 --> 0:22:41.000 are still kind of rare. Yeah, the pushbacks and the 0:22:41.119 --> 0:22:45.240 violence and the torture is yeah, the evidence of that 0:22:45.440 --> 0:22:50.760 is like an enormous pile. There's when I was working 0:22:50.800 --> 0:22:53.480 in Bosnia, I think that was in twenty eighteen nineteen, 0:22:54.400 --> 0:22:58.440 there was no video footage of a pushback, and there 0:22:58.440 --> 0:23:00.560 was a journalist who volunteered with us for a while 0:23:00.640 --> 0:23:04.359 and they were the first one to film it. But 0:23:04.680 --> 0:23:07.639 in the past years there have been like many, many 0:23:07.720 --> 0:23:14.400 horrible videos of people being beaten up and actual torture. 0:23:16.080 --> 0:23:18.680 Yeah. Of course in the US, under the pretense of 0:23:18.960 --> 0:23:22.440 protecting us all from the coronavirus, which still killed millions 0:23:22.480 --> 0:23:24.880 of people in this country, we have done they called 0:23:24.920 --> 0:23:29.399 Title forty two, which allowed border patrol to quote unquote 0:23:29.400 --> 0:23:32.760 repatriate people to Mexico, even if they were Mexican, and 0:23:33.840 --> 0:23:38.480 just drop them back in Mexico, to include laterally transferring them, 0:23:38.840 --> 0:23:41.359 which is a pseudonym for kind of trafficking them halfway 0:23:41.359 --> 0:23:43.080 across the country and then dumping them in a place 0:23:43.080 --> 0:23:47.879 where they have no connections, no money, and no way 0:23:48.040 --> 0:23:53.200 of establishing themselves right. And this led to massively increased 0:23:53.560 --> 0:23:56.879 a fatalities at the border because people were trying to 0:23:56.920 --> 0:23:59.679 avoid border patrol where then coming in and surrendering themselves 0:23:59.680 --> 0:24:04.320 for so as we see now and massively increase encounters 0:24:04.359 --> 0:24:08.159 at the border encounters don't necessarily represent unique individuals. Right, 0:24:08.240 --> 0:24:10.560 this is my I will beat this fucking drum until 0:24:10.560 --> 0:24:14.680 I die. But apparently our colleagues at New York Times 0:24:14.680 --> 0:24:19.520 haven't worked it out yet. Wall Street Journal, almost every NPRT, 0:24:19.600 --> 0:24:23.000 every big outlet in the United States that likes to 0:24:23.000 --> 0:24:25.760 commission border reporters who don't live on the border will 0:24:25.800 --> 0:24:28.159 tell you that that, like the number of migrants went up. 0:24:28.840 --> 0:24:31.879 An encounter is an encounter. If someone crosses and then 0:24:31.920 --> 0:24:34.200 gets bounced into Mexico and then crosses again and does 0:24:34.240 --> 0:24:36.760 that five times, that's five encounters. It's the same person. 0:24:37.880 --> 0:24:42.240 BP doesn't keep records of unique individuals under Title forty two, 0:24:42.280 --> 0:24:44.199 or didn't keep under Citle forty two. We don't know 0:24:44.200 --> 0:24:46.680 how many people, but we know that more people tried 0:24:46.720 --> 0:24:48.520 to cross, and we also know that every time you 0:24:48.560 --> 0:24:51.600 try to cross, you risk your life. And so we 0:24:51.640 --> 0:24:54.159 certainly know that more lives will put in danger because 0:24:54.200 --> 0:24:56.720 of this policy, because again, like turning someone back is 0:24:56.760 --> 0:24:59.159 not going to stop them, especially when you're dropping them 0:24:59.200 --> 0:25:00.960 in a country where they don't want to be and 0:25:00.960 --> 0:25:03.320 where they're not from. Like, the people aren't just going 0:25:03.400 --> 0:25:07.680 to be like okay, cool, I'll stay in Mexico like that. 0:25:07.760 --> 0:25:09.480 That has not historically been the case. 0:25:10.960 --> 0:25:13.720 Yeah, we had exactly the same kind of juggling with numbers. 0:25:14.359 --> 0:25:17.400 I remember people in Bosnia. Some of them would get 0:25:17.440 --> 0:25:21.679 pushed back like forty or fifty times, and so they 0:25:21.720 --> 0:25:26.200 would be counted as individuals starts. Yes, indeed, so it would. 0:25:26.000 --> 0:25:28.480 Sound as if there was like, I don't know, tens 0:25:28.520 --> 0:25:32.760 of thousands, and I was like, it's really not that many, though, Yeah, yeah, 0:25:33.920 --> 0:25:36.520 just literally count the same person again and again and again. 0:25:37.160 --> 0:25:37.480 Yeah. 0:25:37.720 --> 0:25:40.639 And also I would like to say that like, yes, 0:25:40.680 --> 0:25:43.119 it is a border like the EO border countries, but 0:25:43.240 --> 0:25:47.119