Page 11 - Aruba Today
P. 11
WORLD NEWS A11
Thursday 18 February 2016
Migrants find refuge ‘north of the middle of nowhere’
KARL RITTER vember, when “suddenly used that route last year crazy,” Hansen says, clasp- far cry from the crowded
there was no sun.” before the government ing a cup of black coffee and jail-like migrant centers
Associated Press The lack of daylight messed tightened the border in inside the main cabin. “Is it in some parts of Europe. Af-
up his body clock, like the November and started de- possible to have people in ghan children laugh and
HAMMERFEST, Norway day when he rolled out porting those who were not darkness on an island?” Not holler as they sled down
of bed at 11 and ambled deemed to be in need of only was it possible, it was a the slope from the camp to
(AP) — After hiding below to the cafeteria to have protection in Norway. big success, according to the rocky shoreline, where
lunch. Though that’s just a trickle Hansen and Paal Manns- men speaking Dari rinse fish
the horizon for two long caught in the icy fjord.
Later, as the sun drops be-
months, the sun has finally hind the mountains, they
will cook them over an
risen in Hammerfest, cast- open fire with onion, to-
matoes, eggs and spices
ing a pale pink hue over brought in from the main-
land.
the Arctic landscape sur- To some the contrast with
the life they left behind is
rounding the world’s north- almost surreal.
“I was in Afghanistan, a
ernmost refugee shelter. country far away from here
and now I’m in the north
From her modest room, of Norway. I could never
have imagined this,” says
Huda al-Haggar admires 20-year-old Zakria Sedequi.
He says he fled Afghani-
the wonderland of snow stan’s Maidan Wardak
province after the Taliban
and ice, a sight so differ- tried to recruit him. An ugly
scar over his left eyebrow
ent from her native Yemen, suggests they didn’t ask
nicely. Sedequi says they
where a Saudi airstrike de- rammed the butt of a Ka-
lashnikov rifle into his fore-
stroyed her home, forcing head. He documented the
bloody mess with his cell-
her to flee with her young phone camera.
Inside the camp, 62-year-
son. old Shukria Nawabi tears
up as she recalls the hard-
“It’s wonderful when I wake ship her family faced in
Kabul. She has lived on
up in the morning and see Seiland since October with
her husband, daughter and
this picture, the sea and the grand-daughter Helenar, a
7-year-old with pigtails, pink
mountains. It’s a wonderful tights and a sheepish smile.
Wrapped in a shawl, her
place,” the young woman daughter, Sufya, seems al-
most offended when asked
says as 5-year-old Omar whether the family strug-
gled to adjust to the dark-
plays with Lego on her lap. ness on this desolate island.
“If you were in my place,”
The wooden barracks she says, “where bombs
are going off in the street,
where al-Haggar and her where women are treated
badly, and you come to
son live used to house oil this place, would you worry
about the darkness and the
workers until Europe’s mi- Afghan asylum seeker Roheek Yausofi waits his turn for food cooked on an open fire, with fish isolation?”q
caught the day before by his father, on the island of Seiland, northern Norway, Tuesday, Feb. 2,
grant crisis reached the 2016. Waiting for their asylum claims to be processed, hundreds of people in emergency shelters in
Hammerfest and neighboring towns are slowly getting used to the extreme climate and unfamiliar
jagged shores of northern customs of the High North. They say they have adapted to the cold _ the temperature rarely drops
below minus 10 degrees C (14 F) along the coast, though it gets much colder further inland.
Norway, where the con-
(AP Photo/Alastair Grant)
tinent drops dramatically
into the Arctic Ocean.
Waiting for their asylum
claims to be processed, “But there was nobody compared to the 1 mil- verk, who manages the
there,” Saad says, giggling. lion people who entered camp, a cluster of wooden
hundreds of people in “It was 11 p.m.” Europe last year from the houses facing a pristine
Few of the asylum-seekers south across the Mediterra- fjord. Reachable only by
emergency shelters in expected to end up here, nean Sea, it forced Norwe- boat, the isolated location
280 miles (460 kilometers) gian authorities to quickly gives you a sense of being
Hammerfest and neighbor- north of the Arctic Circle, set up migrant shelters in at the end of the world — or
when they left their home- small towns separated as Mannsverk put it: “north
ing towns are slowly get- lands in the Middle East, by mile upon mile of un- of the middle of nowhere.”
Africa and Asia to escape touched wilderness. Yet the 36 asylum-seekers
ting used to the extreme violence, poverty, forced In Alta, a scenic two-hour staying here, all but one
marriages or armies they drive to the south, the from Afghanistan, seem
climate and unfamiliar cus- didn’t want to join. Northern Lights Hotel was surprisingly at ease. Han-
Some were relocated by converted into a shelter for sen and Mannsverk say it’s
toms of the High North. Norwegian authorities af- unaccompanied minors. because they try to keep
ter entering the country On Seiland island, a nature them active: fishing, chop-
They say they have adapt- from Sweden in the south. reserve west of Hammer- ping wood, sledding, skiing,
Others blazed a new trail fest, Stig Erland Hansen was and hiking instead of just
ed to the cold — the tem- into Western Europe by first asked to temporarily house sitting around waiting for a
entering Russia and then dozens of asylum-seekers decision by the Norwegian
perature rarely drops be- crossing its Arctic border in a remote lodge where Immigration Directorate,
with Norway. he hosts adventure tourists which can take more than
low minus 10 degrees C (14 More than 5,000 people, during the summer. a year.
mostly Syrians and Afghans, “At first I thought it was The camp on Seiland is a
F) along the coast, though
it gets much colder further
inland. It’s the darkness that
throws them off.
Rami Saad, a 23-year-old
Syrian from Damascus with
a neatly groomed beard
and tight slacks, says work-
ers at the Hammerfest cen-
ter warned him about the
polar night but he didn’t
believe them until late No-
