Are they driven to the icy coast Europe Was it out of despair, or did thousands of Kurds embark on a dangerous journey in search of opportunity?
Officials in Iraqi Kurdistan are struggling to deal with the cause of the crisis, which is believed to have caused On Wednesday, dozens of citizens drowned in the strait, There are thousands of people bravely heading to Europe’s unstable immigration routes, and more people are preparing to leave.
“I will do what I need to do,” said a person who just graduated from Sulaymaniyah University. “If I stay here, I will be in debt anyway.”
News of death at sea, not far from British waters, tens of thousands Kurds It has been trying to arrive in recent decades, and there was a silent reaction in the capital Erbil and the second largest city Sulaymaniyah. Many of the drowning victims are believed to have come from the Lanya region in the north of the city, where families anxiously awaited news from their children on Thursday.
Razen Salim, 26, said: “The last time I talked with my brother was yesterday morning. He said that we will now travel from France to the UK, but since then we have not heard anything about him or his team. Message.” We saw some pictures on the Internet, which showed that some had reached the other side, but we could not identify them well. We hope they succeed, maybe now they have been captured by the British police, which is why they are not online. “
Kurds in Ranya make up a disproportionate number Have been to Belarus in recent weeks, Hoping to cross the Polish border, which is the gateway to the European Union. “This is the Holy Grail for us,” said the fresh graduate. “If we get there, we will be respected and can live our lives. If we stay, we will have no respect and no life.”
The Prime Minister of the Kurdish Regional Government Masrul Barzani tried to prevent the outflow of Kurds in northern Iraq. He said that looking for opportunities was the main driving force, not economic despair.
“Unfortunately, these people seem to be exploited by many people, such as’travel agencies’, human traffickers, and some political businessmen. If I can say that, of course there are also some people from within. Belarus Similarly,” he said at the Middle East Peace and Security Summit in Duhok last week. “These people did not leave the area under any pressure, were not pursued by law, and were not subject to any travel restrictions, so most of these people Travel freely through airlines and official channels.
“Many people want to go to Europe to find different opportunities,” Barzani said. “This is not a desperate escape. I want the world to know that these people have gone there, just like all other immigrants want to travel and go to different parts of the world to find different opportunities. But if they want to come back, they can come back anytime. to here.”
In the past week, a repatriation flight organized by Iraq’s national airline Iraqi Airlines has sent 400 Kurds back to Erbil from Belarus. Another 700 people signed up to return, and Kurdish officials said they arrested 10 travel agencies that facilitated their trips. Airport security officials also tried to prevent passengers from going to Minsk, carefully reviewing the journey and looking for known stopover points-especially Istanbul and Damascus.
Those who still decide to leave say that the opportunities that officials talk about either do not exist or are limited to small sectors of the troubled economy. “They want this to happen, but they say that this is not possible,” the student said. “As long as things get worse, people will want to leave.”
