Opinon: The EU struggles to place Syrian refugees

By Ines Kagubare     

It’s been more than five years since the Civil War in Syria began during the Arab Spring uprisings. Unlike other countries such as Tunisia, Egypt and Libya who successfully overthrew their dictators, Syria has been unable to depose its current leader, Bashar al-Assad. Instead the revolt has led to a refugee crisis that’s now spreading throughout the region and across Europe.

Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. Courtesy of Wikimedia.

More than 1,000,000 refugees and migrants are currently seeking asylum in the European Union. Before I go on, let’s make a distinction between refugees and migrants. Refugees are fleeing their country of origin usually because of war or a natural disaster whereas migrants are choosing to settle in another country for economic opportunities.

Syrians make up one of the largest populations of refugees seeking asylum. Most of them are fleeing their country to escape the Assad regime and the ongoing violence caused by Muslim extremist groups like ISIS. According to Eurostat, “Syrians accounted for almost a third [of refugees] with 362,775 people seeking shelter in Europe, followed by Afghans and Iraqis.” According to the IOM, roughly 1,011,700 migrants arrived by sea while 34,900 arrived by land in 2015. Those arriving by sea usually cross the Mediterranean from Africa to Italy or Greece. While those arriving by land usually pass through Turkey from the Middle East to Europe. More than 3,770 migrants died trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea in 2015, according to IOM.

Syrian refugees strike in front of Budapest Keleti railway station. Courtesy of Wikipedia.

The European Union has tried to implement refugee-friendly policies that would make it easier for refugees to receive asylums. According to the BBC and Eurostat data, “Germany received the highest amount of new asylum applications (higher than any other EU nation) in 2015, with more than 476,000”. They were closely followed by Hungary and Sweden in numbers.

Although it seems that the EU is taking a step in the right direction in terms of helping refugees find new homes, they haven’t taken as many migrants as countries such as Italy, Greece, and Hungary. Since these  are the first nations where migrants arrive by sea and land, they have incurred more people hoping to find refuge than other countries. The EU is planning to relocate 160,000 migrants to some of its nations that have fewer refugees in order to lessen the burden of countries that have an abundance of them.

The new EU refugee policy hasn’t come without controversy or backlash from far-right groups across Europe such as Pegida, Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West, who portray refugees and migrants as “invaders.” They believe that refugees settling in Germany will take over and destroy their culture. They have been very critical of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision of granting asylum to more than 100,000 refugees.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Courtesy of Wikimedia.

As of 2015, the EU has granted 292,540 asylums to refugees mostly coming from Syria, Eritrea, Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

An Op-Ed: What makes young foreign fighters want to join ISIS?

By Ines Kagubare

In recent years, several young men and women from western countries such as the U.K. and the U.S. have traveled to Syria and Iraq to join the terrorist group known as ISIS. According to the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence, there are currently more than 20,000 foreign fighters who have joined ISIS in the past year. About 150 foreign fighters are American citizens while another 4000 are from Western Europe. Most of these fighters are in their late teens and early 20’s. Most of these foreign fighters are crossing the Turkish border in order to join ISIS camps in Syria and Iraq. ISIS leaders have promised these young fighters that they will be treated well once they arrive there and that their lives will be much better than where they are coming from. They also remind them that they are fighting for a just cause and that they should be willing to do anything, even if it’s geared towards violence, to protect the religion of Islam.

 

The question still remains, why do all these young fighters, especially women, want to leave their somewhat comfortable lives to join ISIS. I use the word “somewhat” because some of these young fighters who are leaving countries such as the U.K. and the U.S. might not necessarily live comfortable lives. Most of them live in poor neighborhoods that are racially and ethnically segregated. Some of them drop out of school and are unemployed. They have limited opportunities to succeed in life, which leads them to have no hope, no ambitions or goals for their future. There are some exceptions of those who are successful and have a bright future ahead of them but still choose to join terrorists groups such as ISIS. Those who are impoverished don’t feel appreciated and are sometimes discriminated against by the country they call home, which leads them to despair and that’s why these young fighters think they will find comfort from their struggles when they join ISIS. They believe that ISIS will provide them with opportunities they lacked back in their home country.

 

For them, ISIS is an exciting, adventurous group that has a mission and a purpose that they previously did not have. ISIS “preys on a recruit’s sense of identity,” said CNN writer Holly Yan. They feel that they finally belong in a community that appreciates them compared to the western society where they felt isolated and treated as outsiders in their own country no matter what how hard they tried to assimilate. One can also argue that they feel a sense of patriotism and pride of their Muslim heritage that they cannot fully express living in western countries since they are a minority compared to the majority who are Christians.

 

One aspect of this issue that has been raised is the role of women in ISIS. There has been an increasingly number of young girls in their late teens traveling to Syria and Iraq to join ISIS. Why do they willingly decide to join this terrorist group and what purpose do they serve is still unclear at this time. Many of these young girls are still in school and they have never been in trouble with the law. Their families are as shocked as law enforcement about their daughters’ decision to join a terrorist group such as ISIS. The parents were unaware of their daughters’ plans and did not notice any red flags that could have indicated that they had become radicalized. They may or may not know that their freedom will be restricted and that they will have to submit to men. Most of these Muslim nations, especially Saudi Arabia, treat women as second-class citizens and not as equals. It’s difficult to determine if these young girls are simply naïve or if they know exactly what situation they’re getting themselves into and that they are ready to face the consequences once they join ISIS.

 

The first step in resolving any problem is to understand the roots of its cause. Once we have a solid understanding of the issue (although it’s not always simple) we can determine the various steps we can take to find effective solutions that will work in the long run. It’s not by using drones to kill ISIS leaders that we are going to stabilize the region and reduce the threat of terrorism overnight. On the contrary, the more we engage with them using drone strikes the more radicalized extremists want to join terrorist groups such as ISIS. Killing one leader will only generate more hatred and bring about more leaders and fighters. It becomes a vicious cycle that everyone is trapped under because we are only focusing on short-term solutions that benefit us in the present and not really looking for long-term solutions that will benefit future generations.

The Ebola outbreaks in West Africa cause a ripple effect in American media

By Jessica Karins

In wealthy countries like Spain and the United States where the Ebola virus is beginning to take hold in a handful of cases, it’s just a disease. A disease with grotesque symptoms, yes, a disease that frightens people, but nonetheless, it’s purely a medical problem.

In West Africa, where the virus claims almost all of its victims, it’s another story entirely. There, it’s one symptom of an ongoing crisis that encompasses governments’ inability to care for their citizens, infrastructures and healthcare systems that dramatically underserve populations, and a world around them that isn’t interested in helping. In Africa, Ebola is a social disease.

As the first few Western cases have emerged, there’s an almost shocking disconnect present in the way the news media covers these two types of crisis.

One article in the LA Times referred to experts trying to stop the virus from spreading in the US as “leading the fight against history’s worst outbreak of Ebola”. For context, almost all of the virus’ nearly 7500 victims died in West Africa. There has probably been more news coverage of the dog Spanish officials decided to put down in case it spread the virus than their has been of any single African person who died of Ebola. Now that Ebola is happening to us, it’s suddenly front-page news.

What is the reason for this gap in coverage? What are we missing that prevents us from seeing each individual life lost as valuable, regardless of national origin?

It’s actually a symptom too – of a deep strain of racism and xenophobia in American culture that prevents us from seeing the deaths of those in other nations, especially those that are predominantly non-white, as equal in value.

There’s nothing like fear as a motivation for journalism, and as a motivation to read the news. Something like the Ebola virus provokes the understandable and human reaction of horror that something like this could happen here. So even when we don’t feel personally imperiled, it’s easier to feel a sense of injustice when the victim is someone like us.

If we want to create change, though, we have to do better.

There are thousands of tragedies like this happening all the time, and no one to tell those stories to the people with the power to help. It’s a breakdown all the way down the line – no leaders demanding more progress on the issue, no public invested in pressuring them to, no media to inform them of what it is that’s wrong.

As journalists, we have a responsibility to the public to help them empathize with stories that are distant and unfamiliar. We can’t expect most people to seek out this information, but it needs to be made available–in the form of front-page headlines and solemn opening segments on the nine-o’clock news. When we focus on only those stories that are already easy to understand, both for ourselves and our readers, we don’t help them understand anything new. Just as importantly, though, we fail the people who could benefit the most from having their stories told.

As the first vaccine trial for Ebola begins, we all need to ask ourselves why it didn’t happen sooner, and why now is the tipping point for change. None of us, whether scientists, journalists, or citizens, are free from bias. Whether or not this crisis becomes one the world shares, now is the time to ask how many lives our failures of empathy have taken, and how many more they may put at risk.

Opinion Essay: Drones reshape modern warfare

by Brandon Jackson

Since recorded human history began, 15,000 violent clashes and approximately 600 significant wars have taken place. However, drones are the new kids on the block as far as the modernization of war.

Although most conflicts do not resort to violence in the international system, war has become a regular feature in international politics because of the size and diversity of the world. Post-WWI, there have been over four billion global casualties due to warfare.

But in current events, we see war changing before our eyes in how and why it is being fought. In both World War I and World War II, conventional warfare was how conflicts that erupted into violence were solved. It was simply army versus army.

Now war has changed at its very foundation.

Opinion Essay: The Vagina Monologues address global issues for women

by Katie Bell

VAGINA.

That word is a word not oft used in common discourse, but around Mizzou’s campus in February, it’s hard to go from one building to the next without seeing a flyer, button, or chalkboard with the word on it.

It’s a magical, or as I like to say, vagical, time of year when the MU Vagina Monologues sweep campus.  But the Vagina Monologues go way beyond Mizzou.  It’s not just a campuswide, or even citywide event.

It’s the true international love, (sorry Pitbull), that extends to women and girls worldwide.

Social Media Use in China: More Facebook than Facebook

by Sifan Ouyang

The Facebook network is over 640 million users strong and still growing, according to the 2011 infographic “World Map of Social Networks.” But there is more to the world of social media than Facebook.

Facebook users rank top three in all parts of the World Map of Social Network except for in a few countries like China and Brazil. Source: Ria Novosti, en.rian.ru

Widely known as the Chinese version of Facebook, Renren, which literally means “Everyone’s Website,” has been leading the country of China into a social media craze among college students since 2005, one year after Facebook premiered.