Refugees in Malta

Every year tens of thousands of migrants and asylum seekers cross the Mediterranean Sea in hope of reaching Europe. Many of them end up on the small island nation of Malta.

Malta is the most southern country in the EU and the smallest with 316m² about half of the slice of “Bodensee”. It has a population from about 400.000. Last year about 1300 Migrants arrived in Malta which means a crisis for this small, crowded country. The number of Migrants coming to Malta is almost half of the birthrate in Malta a year.

Malta is a Catholic country and many people in Malta don’t want the refugees there. They wouldn’t rent their houses to Blacks, Arabs or Moslems, they say. The racism is one of the problems the migrants have to deal with once they come to Malta.

The other problem are the detention centers. Everyone arriving without documents has to stay in a detention center for 10-18 months. The conditions there are not humanely at all. The “residents” hardly own anything and they can’t do anything. Being forced to stay in a detention center is like being in a cage. One migrant form Nigeria describes it as a ”horrible life!”

They tell for example about one telephone for 300 people. They all are supposed to call there families to tell that they arrived in Malta, to keep in contact and to manage issues with documents.

Some of the migrants are staying in Malta forever. So it would be better to integrate them from the beginning, also to deal with the racism-problem.

Furthermore, the migrants have had a traumatic journey. To keep them in this detention centers is just not fair.

Joseph from Eritrea tells about his journey

He left his home for political reasons in the end of 2005. From Sudan he traveled for 1 month through the desert to arrive in Libya. There he stayed for a few months to earn money. Form Libya he traveled over the Mediterranean see and arrived in Malta after all in 9 months.

This is a typical way of traveling, to stop in Libya to earn some money and take the boat to Europe. Many refugees don’t have an idea of any European country. They just want to arrive somewhere they are safe.

One other migrant tells about his journey through the desert, where he and other 76 people got abandoned by smugglers. They were left out there and run out of water and food. About 20 people died in front of his eyes. When he is sleeping, he still sees them alive. He can’t remember how he finally was rescued and brought to Libya.

This story shows the traumatically experiences this people have.

Adiel Mohamed Ahmed from Somalia tells about his trip, when he arrived in Libya. The only way to get to Europe is to cross the see with the help of smugglers / of human traffickers. The refugees pay them to bring them across the see. Adiel Mohamed Ahmed tried three times to arrive to Malta. One time the boat was sinking after 2 days on see. Many people died before the Libyan boat was rescuing them and bringing them back to Libya.

He himself says it is unbelievable how such a large group of people can cross the sea in small fishing boats. Often they run out of water and food quite early because they are told to bring as little as possible to fit more people in the board.

Adiel Mohamed Ahmed is lucky. He got accepted in a program to go to the USA.

The US takes most of the refugees of Malta at the moment. The important days in Adiel Mohamed Ahmed’s journey were:

-The day he was rescued and finally brought to Malta

- The day he was released of detention

- The day he was accepted in the program to go to the US

And it will be the day when he arrives the US and hopefully lives a normal life without being called a refugee but a normal person and build a future.

To be a refugee might mean that you don’t see your family or the place you grew up again. They lose a big part of their life.

During my EVS I got to know some great people with horrible stories and big hopes. - Hopefully they will become reality!