Image: Room to Breathe, a 2019 exhibition sharing migrant stories and artwork at the Migration Museum, London.
Examining the experiences of Amsterdam’s undocumented migrants and what it means to be denied belonging and safety through the COVID-19 pandemic
words Shanthy Milne
Last August, I drove from my home in Amsterdam to the UK. Simultaneously, Omar*, a young Sudanese man I’d had lunch with just a few days before, was also on his way to the UK. He was hitching a ride to Calais; from there he planned to conceal himself on a UK-bound lorry or to travel by dinghy across the Channel to the perceived safety of the UK.
Cocooned in my vehicle, I was deeply torn about my journey. I found myself having to suppress my desire to offer Omar a safer passage, hidden in my car. Provided he stayed hidden during the crossing, he would at least be free from life-threatening perils on this last leg of his journey.
As a brown-skinned British citizen with the privilege to have made Amsterdam my home on a pre-Brexit whim, I struggle to reconcile myself with a system that allows safe passage to me – someone who is not escaping danger, whilst denying it to Omar – a young man fleeing conflict and persecution. This disparity seems deeply inhumane and causes me to question the legitimacy of concepts such as borders, belonging and home.
In response to the pandemic, borders throughout the world have been reinforced as instruments of quarantine and exclusion. Asylum processes have been shut down and the international community has eschewed its legal obligation to protect refugees. For most of us, the unprecedented restrictions that the virus has imposed on our liberty go hand in hand with the protection afforded by our citizenships and the walls of our own homes. Yet the pandemic has stranded asylum seekers in precarious situations, exposed to the virus and without the safety of a home.
I initially met Omar in Amsterdam during the first lockdown. As an undocumented asylum seeker, he’d spent several years trapped within the process of trying to gain asylum in the Netherlands. “I just need a normal life like anyone,” he told me, “I want to study the language and start my life – I can work and do many things like anyone, but in Netherlands, it has become impossible for me now”.
the pandemic has stranded asylum seekers in precarious situations, exposed to the virus and without the safety of a home.
Towards the end of 2019, the Dutch government altered their position on Sudanese asylum claims, determining the security situation in the region to have improved. The results were far-reaching, impacting even on individuals who had already been awarded refugee status, with many suddenly faced with deportation.
“The IND[1] say Sudan is safe now, but this is not true,” Omar explained. “I like to go back to Sudan, but if I go back they may arrest me – I cannot be sure what they going to do to me.”
In the UK last year, 73% of Sudanese asylum claims were granted on initial decision. Understandably, Omar believed that if he could make it to the UK, he stood a better chance of his claim for asylum being granted, which would put him in a position to find housing and work legally – a prerequisite for the normal life that had been denied to him in the Netherlands. Despite this, refugees like Omar are faced with a paradox: in order to lodge a UK asylum claim, it is a legal requirement that claimants reach the UK, however, there are virtually no means by which the government enable them to do so safely or legally.
Ostensibly, the UK is signed up to the UN Refugee Convention, which states that by law refugees cannot be penalised for entering the country illegally to claim asylum if they have come from a territory where their life or freedom was threatened. Yet government rhetoric would have us believe otherwise. Addressing the increasing number of migrants crossing the Channel last summer, Boris Johnson flagrantly (and erroneously) asserted, “if you come illegally, you are an illegal immigrant, and I’m afraid the law will treat you as such”.
Attempting to enforce this, the home secretary, Priti Patel, recently announced a proposed overhaul of the UK immigration system which will automatically render asylum claims made by irregular arrivals as inadmissible; despite such action contravening international law.
As an individual, were I to be caught enabling Omar’s journey to the UK without correct documentation (which is often difficult or impossible to secure for those fleeing governments responsible for the issue of these documents), I could face up to 14 years imprisonment - a maximum sentence which will be increased to life under the new plans. Cumulatively, this means that despite the deterrences, the irregular and perilous travel routes labelled as “illegal” by the government are the only available options for asylum seekers.
Prior to the pandemic, Omar had been living in squats with the Wij Zijn Hier (We Are Here) collective – a group of Amsterdam-based refugees whose status as rejected or undocumented asylum seekers meant they were prohibited from working legally or accessing government support, rendering them homeless, destitute and in some cases stateless. Most of those within the collective had been told to leave the Netherlands. However, for various reasons, many were unable to return to their country of origin or move on to other European countries due to EU regulations[2].
Image: Guido van Nispen, 2018
As a collective, Wij Zijn Hier sought to highlight the systematic problems in the asylum process that left them stuck in limbo by organising protests and circulating information about the plight of asylum seekers. They realised their objectives by making themselves visible rather than hiding from the authorities and public view – a feat made possible through the safety born of being together. With support from NGOs, they were involved in education programmes and organised cultural events. Most importantly, the squats were a place where Omar and his friends could rest and contemplate their future. Without a safe space for this to happen, Omar explained that homeless asylum seekers were forced to live in survival mode, thinking only about where to sleep that night and what food they might be able to find.
In 2019, Amsterdam’s mayor, Femke Halsema, called for stricter treatment of squatters. Sixty-seven of the seventy-four known squats in Amsterdam were cleared that year, effectively bringing an end to the Wij Zijn Hier squatters movement.
For undocumented migrants made homeless by these evictions, the arrival of COVID-19 put them in an increasingly perilous situation. While the rest of the country was advised to “stay at home”, no such luxury existed for this group.
Most spent the lockdown in emergency night shelters set up by the government. In Amsterdam, the majority of these shelters were located in sports halls, made vacant as a result of the nationwide ban on indoor sports.
Each sports hall housed around seventy-five to a hundred homeless people. No partitions were provided for privacy or protection – instead 4m x 4m squares were marked out with masking tape on the gymnasium floors. Within these taped boxes, each resident was issued with a camp bed, a small table and a chair. Washing facilities were shared and showers did not have individual cubicles or curtains.
Reasoning that 24-hour shelters would encourage close contact indoors and exacerbate the spread of the virus, occupants of the night shelter were dispersed each morning. Regardless of the weather or the state of their health, residents were forbidden from re-entering the sports halls until early evening. With libraries and day shelters closed, Omar and his friends faced daily uncertainty over where to go, exacerbating the cycle of stress born of having no place to call home.
They gathered in parks, exercising and playing football to create some façade of normality but always needing to be vigilant of the police. Without documents, there was the ever-present possibility of arrest, which often resulted in migrants being incarcerated in immigration detention centres, even when their statelessness might prevent them from being removed from the Netherlands, thus making such detention entirely pointless.
Eventually, a small NGO, Here to Support, was able to facilitate a low-key, COVID-safe day shelter for a fixed group of asylum seekers, including Omar. It was in this space that I met Omar and his friends. Some of the group had been taking photographs and shooting video clips on their phones to document what was happening to them. I began to visit the day-shelter to help them develop their storytelling skills and teach them the basics of filmmaking.
Image: Annette Kouwenhoven
As I lay in bed each night I couldn’t help but reflect on the safety afforded by the walls of my home and the security I felt with my family safe by my side. Omar had sent me footage of his nights – his attempts to sleep disrupted by the screams of someone having a nightmare, tormented by their past and the horrors they’d endured. I imagined the sound of a cough echoing from across the hall and the fear and uncertainty born of it.
In the UK, many asylum seekers were moved into hotels during the pandemic when other accommodation was considered ineffective in maintaining social distancing. The former UKIP and Brexit Party leader, Nigel Farage, manipulated the situation by falsely claiming that 48,000 “illegal” immigrants were being housed in luxury hotels and given forty pounds a week whilst refusing to work. These assertions incited members of the fascist group, Britain First, who took it upon themselves to go “migrant-hunting” in hotels across the country, banging on doors and intimidating unsuspecting and vulnerable asylum seekers.
Compared to the conditions they faced in the sports halls, Omar and his friends considered hotels to be a better option. On the surface at least, hotels offered privacy and 24-hour shelter, alleviating some of their greatest concerns. In reality, both measures failed to protect the dignity of the asylum seekers they housed.
A joint investigation by The Observer and ITV News found that nine asylum seekers died in Home Office run hotels last year and there are multiple allegations of sexual exploitation inside the hotels. The investigation also uncovered evidence that residents were unlawfully prevented from leaving hotels, with many trapped in rooms with windows that could not be opened. Ultimately, the conditions created an atmosphere akin to prison, denying residents their fundamental right to liberty, which was egregiously detrimental to their mental health.
In Amsterdam, Omar and his friends also likened their accommodation to jail. Nights in the sports hall were cold and the thin blankets provided little warmth. At seven each morning, they were woken by guards kicking their camp beds, announcing “hey, time’s up, wake up”. They could not comprehend this hostility and found it deeply humiliating. Their breakfast – white bread with a slice of cheese – was the same every day and would not be served for another two hours. Instead of being allowed to rest, they were made to wait with nothing to do. This lack of autonomy, heightened by the pointlessness of some of the indignities they were subjected to, added to their feelings of oppression and dehumanisation.
I imagined the sound of a cough echoing from across the hall and the fear and uncertainty born of it.
As political discussions began to hint that the end of the lockdown was approaching, the group grew anxious about the uncertainty of what was to come. Whilst far from ideal, the emergency accommodation at least offered some safety at night. On August 1st 2020, their fears became a reality and the emergency night shelters were closed.
During their time in the day shelter, Omar and his friends shared their experiences via a WhatsApp group they affectionately named “Better Together”. The closure of the shelters meant the members of the group were forced to disband, continuing on their journeys towards safety and refuge alone.
Omar did eventually make it to the UK, traversing the Channel on a small dinghy. Though his long-term chances of asylum appeared better in the UK, as the conditions for asylum seekers continue to deteriorate under the UK’s increasingly draconian Hostile Environment, he may soon be wondering if he has jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire.
Ultimately, as long as the refugee issue continues to be viewed in political rather than humanitarian terms, objectives of home, safety and belonging will remain absent in the minds of policymakers. Under the guise of protection and security, authorities have drawn up Corona measures that have robbed the little liberty and dignity asylum seekers like Omar had left, dehumanising them to the extreme at every turn. In this climate, European asylum systems and procedures simply perpetuate the potential for human-rights abuses. The supposedly universal rules and measures, such as staying at home and maintaining social distancing, that were put in place for the safety of the public did not extend to include asylum seekers. Indeed, the very government mechanisms put in place for asylum seekers necessitated the violation of these protective measures, illuminating the undiminished existence of a ‘them’ and ‘us’ rhetoric.
Instead of approaching the global pandemic as an issue requiring cross-border cooperation, the response of many governments has been insular and protectionist. As we proceed to deal with the impact of COVID-induced recessions, we can expect to see an acceleration in the take up of nationalist discourses which will inevitably play into the hands of the UK’s Hostile Environment strategies and the wider European goals of reinforcing “Fortress Europe”. In the face of this, it is imperative that we hold tight to the safeguards offered by the Refugee Convention and international human rights law, demanding accountability from our governments when (as we are currently witnessing) they attempt to flout their obligations under these most fundamental humanitarian laws.
*Name has been changed to protect identity.
Notes
1. IND - Immigration and Naturalisation Service.
2. ‘The Dublin Regulation’ is an EU law determining which member state is responsible for an asylum application. The rules prevent asylum seekers from starting asylum procedures outside the first European country that lodges their presence for a period of up to 18 months.
Shanthy Milne is a writer, journalist and documentary producer with ten years’ experience producing films focused on marginalised communities for the BBC and Channel 4. Read more of her work on her blog.