It started with a lie and ended with the image of a
small drowned boy on a beach in Turkey. Except it hasn’t ended, of
course. In many ways the crisis caused by the invasion of Iraq is only
beginning.
There were no weapons of mass destruction. We know
that now but don’t know the real reasons why the West invaded Iraq. It
might have been oil, ego or some dark Orwellian global power play. But
whatever the reason, its impact has been catastrophic.
Hundreds of thousands have been killed in various wars that are the
bastard children of that initial conflict. Disease and misery followed
but worst of all, ancient enmities were stirred by the sectarian
governments imposed by the West on Afghanistan and Iraq.
Out of this hornet’s nest, ISIS appeared, Syria was thrown into Civil War
and the rest as we know is history.
I don’t have all the answers. Sometimes I struggle
to even know what the question is. But the image of a small dead child
on a beach in Turkey had an effect on me like nothing has before. I was
heading to bed when I decided to have one
last flick through the TV channels. I happened upon the BBC news and
the image of a Turkish policeman carrying a lifeless bundle filled the
screen. I had clearly missed the “some viewers may find these images
upsetting” message at the beginning of the report
and the images hit me with no warning. I turned the TV off straight
away and instinctively went to check on my own three year daughter. She
was lying on her stomach breathing gently but in the same prone position
as poor Aylan Kurdi was in that picture. A
picture that has become as evocative as that of Kim Phuc, the napalm
girl in that haunting photograph from the Vietnam War. I didn’t sleep
well that night. I tossed and turned as though on a stormy sea and thanked
God for my own healthy daughter.
Photos and TV helped to change public opinion in
America and bring an end to the Vietnam War. Hopefully, that picture of
Aylan will do the same to public opinion in Europe. It’s easy to
demonise Asylum Seekers when they are a large unshaven
mass of young men clinging to a barbed wire fence in Budapest. It’s
harder when a photo shows that these are ordinary people desperate to
escape war and find a new life.
Two weeks ago, I listened to Playback, a weekly
summary of the best of Irish radio. They reported on two stories and
failed to see the irony that connected the tales.
The first story concerned Walli Ullah who made his
way from Afghanistan to an Irish motorway in July. He was picked up and
despite not having committed a crime, was immediately put in Cloverhill
Prison. He was then attacked by other prisoners.
As far as I know he’s still in prison.
The second story related to an Irish girl who had
overstayed her Thai tourist visit. You get 60 days to see Thailand,
which you’d think would be more than enough for a student with limited
funds. I’m assuming she had limited funds because
she was unable to pay the fine that the Thai Police tried to impose on
her when she pitched up at Bangkok airport. She was relaying the story
to the Joe Duffy show, a daily staple on Irish radio that provides the
lost and deluded with free airtime. She was
laughing as she recounted her tale. She had called her Mother in tears
to protest that those nasty Thai Police were threatening to throw her in
Prison until she came up with the cash.
The Irish Mammy was outraged and demanded that her
daughter put the Chief of Police on the phone, so that she could give
him a piece of her mind. The daughter said, “There’s no point Mam, they
just don’t get it”. A quick whip around the
other Europeans in the airport departure lounge yielded sufficient
funds to release the young Irish student from the clutches of her
barbarian hosts.
When she said “They just don’t get it”, I assume
she was referring to the God given right of white Europeans to go
wherever we like in the world and to stay for as long as we like. As
long as it not to another Western country. An Irish
person who overstayed their visa in America and was thrown into prison
there would receive no sympathy. But Asia, Africa and South America are
seen as our natural play pens, to use and abuse as we see fit.
So the tale of an Irish girl who thought a Thai
visa was an option rather than an obligation and a poor Afghan who was
slung in jail as soon as he arrived in Ireland tells you all you need to
know about how we see our right to the rest
of the world and the rights of others to come to our country.
Like I say, I don’t have all the answers. But it
seems to me that Europe was capable of the Berlin Airlift in 1948/1949
and was capable of raising millions for African Aid in the 1980s through
Live Aid and other rock star ego stroking event.
But most importantly to this argument, was able to raise an army of
thousands to invade Iraq and waste billions in the process. So if we
have the will, we can house and accept the thousands of war displaced
refugees from Syrian, Eritrea and Libya. A fraction
of the money spent on the Iraq War would be enough to solve the whole
refugee issue.
And if we don’t have the will, then look again at that picture of little Aylan Kurdi lying dead on that Turkish beach. If that doesn’t stir us to action, then part of us is also dead. Our humanity has been drowned and tossed into the Aegean Sea.
