"Massacre at Sea" it read. I half rememberca the story from an agency report and fecling guilty as to how easily I'd forgotten it, bought the paper.
280 South Asian migrants died on Christmas Day 1996 off the coast of Greece.
Correction: they had been murdered.
One of the survivors recounted the mind-numbing events. "They forced 318 of us at gun008040 009 W from the big ship to the smaller one. The small ship could only take about 100 people. People jumped overboard in rough weAhmad Shahab then deing that its human cargo was drowning deliberately rammed into the smaller boat wrecking it.
"People were desperately screaming for help. I saw my brother go down. I yelled 'please, picase, he can't swim'. It was to no avail.
These details sounded so familiar to me and then a friend brought it home.
"This is the modern slave trade", she said.
This story broke the same week coverage of the rescue of a lone yacatsman and waca toe sch pud licist Richard Branson ballooned ing and praying. Suffering the indignities and fears together.
The riskiest bits are when they approach the coast of a European Usually the ship keeps a disthey load people onto life-boats way. If they reach the coast without detecion, anoler set or ageals will be waiting for them to guide them to their destination.
How do I know this? Well, because two weeks before a cousin had taken the same route as those on that ill-fated journey.
Happily he survived and is now The British government prides itself on its tough stance in deporting "illegar" immigrants who arrive here There is an elaborate network of ship captains, profit from the desperation of a few COve not none a con Western The migrants aren't the poorest of the pool. It tacy were lacy couldn't afford the cost of the journey. Many have some assets which they sell or mortgage for cash. Others borrow money from relatives and strangers. This all of has to be repaid with interest.
If they make it to their destinaTEN MONTHS ago, three huntion, they hope to find work. They are as The Obserter editorial noted, "officially non-existent, but unofficially hired for the jobs no one else will do at wages no one cisc will take".
There are push and pull factors at work here.
They clean our homes, they guard our work-places, they prepare and serve our food in canteens and restaurants, they are petrol station attendants and fast food workers. But they aren't welcome here.
They work for peanuts and survive on peanuts too. There are are pushed off the land and into debt through cash crop cultivation and The new jobs are for women. The factory owners prefer their "nimble fingers" and their socialisation into tiring and repetitive work. They get paid less, but are made to work harder and They call the migrants economic refugees' but as A. Sivanandan remarks, "that is to miss out on a whole series of steps in the process of how refugees ... your economics is our poliSome flee discrimination and opbe confronted by state racism and racWest. Some will study and train themselves for better jobs but most will remain doing the shit jobs for shit wages. Still it will be bearable.
You know us from news bulletins and travel books and novels. We know you from colonialism and popular music and Hollywood. We are your bastard children born in a loveless tryst Imperialism isn't a swear word for us, We know it. We live it.
We just want a better life than the one we left. We want a taste of that fruit you have so jealously guarded. We come to claim our birthright.
"And the [ship) sailed calmly on".