Lesvos lies in the far east of the Aegean Sea. It faces the Turkish coast (Gulf of Edremit) from the north and the east; at the narrowest point, the strait is about 5.5 km (3.4 mi) wide. In 2015, 500,018 people reached the island per UNHCR figures, with an average of 3,000 daily arrivals until November 2015. KARA TEPE, the official refugee reception camp is situated a few minutesā drive from Mytilene, the capital city of the island. āWe have no migrants here, no refugees. We only have guestsā, says the camp manager in my last visit in July 2016. The campās philosophy is that everyone is a guest and should be treated as such.
Guests, hospitality or Filoxeniaāthe Greek word for hospitality, pervaded the discourse throughout 2015. The Greek government structured its response around the notion of hospitality and humanitarianism; being hospitable to those in need, being welcoming. Hospitality was intrinsically linked with the idea of transit; one could perhaps afford to be hospitable to those who were only passing through. A year later, things gradually changed. Greece transformed into an archipelago of reception/detention camps. It was not a quick transformation. Rather the building blocks were set over the past decade, and the arrival of the Syrians facilitated the string of developments both on an EU level and in Greece. Their numbers, speed of movement and organization revealed the inadequacies of the Greek migration management system, the unpreparedness and unwillingness of the European mechanisms, the deep political divisions in Europe, and perhaps more critically the limits of hospitality. The arrival of the Syrians has been crucial in de facto redefining the asylum system. Their rightful claim to asylum could not be countered, yet European societies after events in Paris, Cologne and Brussels shifted the discourse from the ārights of refugeesā to who is a genuine refugee. The German Chancellor Merkel alluded to the notion of hospitality by declaring Germanyās borders open to those originating from war torn countries fully aware they would arrive and settle in Germany. Hospitality, guests, refugees, and crisis are the words that characterized and influenced policy responses across the EU in the past 2 years.
Though words had a central role in the refugee ācrisisā, it was the images and statistics that set the tone of the discussion.
On December 2015, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees announced that a total of 1,008,616 persons arrived by sea to Europe with 3,771 recorded deaths. Images of dinghies and orange vests that covered entire beach areas, of vessels emerging from the morning mist and children crying became a daily occurrence as media rushed to Greece and Italy to cover the largest humanitarian crisis unfolding in Europe since the end of Second World War. It was the visual of the body that dominated our screens every nightāthe body being squeezed to fit small spaces of trucks, the body overcoming physical obstacles and persevering, the body of a small child awash on the beach in Turkey, the bodies of survivors and of the dead. The body invokes powerful emotions for it āimplies mortality, vulnerability, agency: the skin and the flesh expose us to the gaze of othersā, or in other words, āthe body has a public dimensionā (Butler, 2004: 26) that becomes part of the public sphere. As 2015 progressed, the images of arrivals were soon followed by images of bodies in transit, en route to northern Europe, in detention awaiting deportation, stuck between borders and by mid 2016 stranded in Greece. For all the discussion around global borders and global flows, it is apparent that mobility is not for all. In fact, as Bauman has already noted the right to be mobile is more class-specific and selective than ever (Bauman, 1998). The āright to be mobileā encompasses the refugees and this in turn brings to the foreground a critical issue: who is a refugee and who is thus entitled to seek protection in the EU borders? International protection in 2016 appears increasingly dependent on oneās nationality and oneās understanding (or lack of) on national and regional context and this is particularly relevant to the Afghans that are slowly āpushedā towards the economic migrant rather than the refugee category.
The Afghans are a unique group on the move. Hospitality and guests are words that characterized much of the response of the countries neighbouring Afghanistan towards the Afghan refugees in the past. They have been religious guests in Iran, guests on the receiving end of hospitality and protection in Pakistan, guests in Turkey. Though not officially recognized as refugees in line with the 1951 Convention in some of these countries (e.g. Turkey has geographical reservations to the Convention), they have been treated as such at least for 20 years. Nonetheless, in the EU member states have responded differently to their arrival. In some countries, they quickly acquire international protection status (e.g. Sweden, Germany) while in others, their claim to protection is scrutinized extensively with many found eligible for return (e.g. UK, Finland). The different treatments are indicative of the different protection standards currently in place in the EU. In Greece, they hold an even more unclear position: neither welcomed nor until recently entirely unwelcomed, belonging in the in-between grey zone, often undefined in status, perpetuated by slow asylum processing. It is becoming increasingly difficult for Afghans to receive international protection in 2016, partly due to the overburdened asylum systems and partly because asylum is being redefined. Perceived more as economic migrants, with a history of mobility and multiple countries of departure, the Afghans exemplify today the complexity of migratory movement. If the āStateā sees them as economic migrants, most Afghans perceive themselves as refugees. This gap impacts both our understanding of their mobility and our response to it.
Migration from Afghanistan to Greece and by extension to the EU is the focus of this book, yet through the discussion of Afghan migration a broader picture emerges as regards transit migration, hospitality, asylum (how it is perceived, access to it) and the riseāmore than ever beforeāof fortress Europe. Greece, like the Afghans, holds a special place in the discussion (Dimitriadi, 2013a). A country largely unexplored as regards contemporary migratory flows, it has dominated media discourse and policy makers in the past 2 years, when Syrian refugee flows peaked. A discussion around border controls, Schengen area and Greeceās role as a transit country suddenly appeared front and centre on the agenda. On a personal note, this was surprising to me. Greece did not suddenly become an entry point nor a transit county. It has been consistently both since 2004 for specific nationalities. The transit state emerges as a result of the policies of the country but also how that country is perceived by the migrants arriving in it (Dimitriadi, 2016a). A symbiotic relationship is formed whereby the individual impacts policy and policy in turn impacts the individual, thus creating a never-ending cycle of action and reaction. Though it evolves alongside migration, transit is not a recent phenomenon, particularly in relation to Greece. Neither is the arrival of the Afghans.
The manuscript is a product of years of researching and studying Afghan migration, extensively in Greece and to a lesser extent in Turkey. Greece is a member of the EU and has always been a transit country for the Afghans. Their understanding of asylum and expectations in parallel with personal experiences and the āmyth of Europeā weave a powerful narrative that motivates their onward movement. Based on empirical data collected, the aim is to show how the relationship between a group of people on the move (Afghans) and a country on the edge of Europe (Greece) unfolds. Through the book, I refer to the Afghans, yet they are not a homogenous group in terms of points of origin, though motives and routes overlap. Initially, Greece was on the receiving end of Afghans predominantly from Iran and to a lesser extent from Afghanistan. For the last 4 years (2012ā2016), there is a clear shift and a more balanced breakdown of points of origin, with Afghans departing directly from Afghanistan and Iran. There is a third point of departure, Pakistan. A traditional hosting country of millions of Afghan refugees, it has nonetheless underrepresented in my research, once more reflective of the current fabric of Afghan migration to Greece.
The purpose of the book is twofold. On the one hand, it is to utilize the journeys, stories and narratives of the Afghans and contribute to our understanding of a group of people who appear to be perpetually displaced, and in constant search for hospitable places to settle. On the other hand, the book will attempt to highlight the role of the State, and specifically the role of transit countries like Turkey and Greece. How does the State and the various policies in place shape the Afghan migratory journey? What motivates their continuous movement in the face of adversity? And how have events since 2015 impacted the journey, its progression and access to international protection?
1.1 The Significance of Categories
An underlying theme of the book is the question of categories, to which the Afghans as a group conform with difficulty. Throughout the text the terms migrants, refugees and people on the move are used. Some participants shifted from one category to the next, others could easily be considered all the above. In the end, arenāt all refugees first and foremost migrants? Before they cross the borders, they are unidentified. The State has no knowledge of their motivations, or of the circumstances of their journey. The differentiation between refugees and migrants has long been the cornerstone of the protection/asylum systems worldwide. Both the refugee and the migrant are in fact categorizations produced by state mechanisms. The ārefugee is first and foremost a bureaucratic and humanitarian termā (Limbu, 2009: 5); whereas, the migrant is also a bureaucratic term linked with the (in)formal labour market.
Contemporary irregular migration has evolved into a much more complex phenomenon. It is no longer sufficient to speak of migrants and refugees as easily distinguishable nor is that distinction feasible prior to crossing the border. Amidst the daily coverage, the images, videos and blogs, politicians, analysts and the media rushed to defend the right to asylum, define the status and category of the refugee, while simultaneously drawing a distinction from the āmigrantā.
The first to publicly declare it would no longer use that term in relation to the Mediterranean crisis was the Al Jazeera network.1 An online editor for the network wrote that the term: āIt has evolved from its dictionary definitions into a tool that dehumanises and distances, a blunt pejorative.ā2 A Washington Post piece asked if it was time to abandon altogether the term3 BBC came forth in support of it4 and as the summer of 2015 ended, media outlets were battling over the usage of a word. In the grand scheme of things, it seems like the least important issue amidst the refugee flows in Europe. And yet the underlying issue was and has never been the word itself but what it signifies.
Why is the discussion around refugee and migrant important? Beyond the academic context both have practical repercussions in the lives of millions of people and nowhere was this more visible than in Europe of the past 2 years.
Since the early 2000s, both the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) prefer to speak of āmixedā flows. Mixed migratory flows refer to people who move for different reasons but undertake the same journey, that is, the routes, means and modes of travel are the same. Because they share the same paths and means of entry, they also share the same risks, danger, and costs.
Mixed flows can include refugees, asylum seekers and others with specific needs, such as trafficked persons, stateless persons and unaccompanied or separated children, as well as other irregular migrants (Kumin, 2014). An individual can fall into more than one category: trafficked and unaccompanied, economic migrant eventually becoming an asylum seeker etc. Migrants can begin a journey in search of employment opportunities and en route become victims of exploitation, abuse and persecution transforming them to recipients of international protection. Asylum seekers may reach a country that offers protection from persecution but no prospect of long term integration and sustainable future, āpushingā them to continue their journey in search of alternatives. And economic migration is no longer motivated solely by the pursuit of better livelihood, as in some cases poverty can be so extreme that migration becomes a strategy for survival. Environmental disasters are also increasingly creating internal mobility, which in many cases becomes unsustainable and eventually results in migration. In other words, motivations are no longer clear, can shift and change en route, and very often individuals will put forth more than one reason for leaving their country of origin.
Categorizations are crucial, to reaffirm the stateās control over the foreigner-and particularly the foreigner that arrives undocumented. Without a document to define his/her identify, the āotherā, is in fact, unknown and not quite present. He/she acquires a clear presence once distinguished from the citizen, but also from its co-travellers. He/she acquires a position in relation to the allocated category. Migrant or refugee? In need of temporary protection, long-term protection or simply deportable? As noted by Collyer and de Haas ācategories have always been an essential tool of political power, the logic of the Ć©tat civil that Foucault was particularly critical ofā (2012: 468). The different categories, asylum seeker, refugee, economic migrant, family migrant, irregular migrant, victim of trafficking, unaccompanied minor, family reunification, impact both the individual and also the system. The individual may in many cases find him/herself in a category different than what he/she believes to belong in. The State categorizes arrivals on the basis of the motivation for leaving, nationality, gender, country of origin and increasingly, transit countries. Such categorization impacts both individual and State responses. It will determine who will require ...