Erbil: Four-and-a-half years ago the image of a drowned toddler washed up on a beach on the Turkish coast shocked the world and drew attention to the perilous journey many Syrians took to flee civil war and reach the shores of Greece.
On Monday, further north in the Aegean Sea, another child drowned off the island of Lesbos after a boat capsized, the first fatality since Turkey reopened its border to let migrants reach Europe, a move that triggered fears of a new flow of arrivals.
The prospect of more Syrians risking their lives to escape brought back haunting memories for Abdullah Kurdi, father of three-year-old Aylan whose death at the height of the migrant crisis in 2015 brought home its human toll.
Abdullah Ghaleb Kurdi, the father of the drowned Syrian toddler Aylan Kurdi whose dead body was found washed up on a Turkish beach in 2015, distributes gifts to children in Erbil, Iraq February 28, 2020. Photo: Reuters/Azad Lashkari
“The whole world saw this image (of Aylan) and Europe opened its doors to refugees, but unfortunately it was for a very short time, maybe a couple of months,” Kurdi told Reuters, speaking in the northern Iraqi city of Erbil where he now lives.
One photograph of his son showed the little boy wearing a bright red t-shirt and blue shorts lying face-down in the surf on a beach near the resort town of Bodrum. In a second image, a grim-faced policeman carried the body away.
Abdullah Ghaleb Kurdi shows a picture on his phone of his son, Alan Kurdi, whose dead body was found washed up on a Turkish beach in 2015, during an interview with Reuters in Erbil, Iraq February 27, 2020. Photo: Reuters/Azad Lashkari
Also read: Turkey in a Corner as Russia Backs Assad Move to Take on Syria Rebels
Abdullah Ghaleb Kurdi shows a picture of his sons, Alan Kurdi and Galip Kurdi who were drowned in Turkey trying to reach Greece by boat, during an interview with Reuters in Erbil, Iraq February 27, 2020. Photo: Reuters/Azad Lashkari
“Then they closed the doors again,” said 44-year-old Abdullah, a Syrian barber of Kurdish origin who now lives in a part of Iraq populated mainly by his ethnic kin.
“I hope God will open their hearts once again,” he said, his voice breaking with emotion as he recalled the final journey of Aylan, his five-year-old brother and Abdullah’s wife, who all drowned in the crossing.
Abdullah Ghaleb Kurdi carries “The boy on the beach” book written about his son, Alan Kurdi, whose dead body was found washed up on a Turkish beach in 2015, during an interview with Reuters in Erbil, Iraq February 27, 2020. Photo: Reuters/Azad Lashkari
“I hope the world opens its doors to those in need.”
The flow of migrants subsided after a deal between Ankara and the European Union, under which Turkey agreed to take in many refugees from Syria. It now hosts around 3.6 million of them.
But renewed fighting in northern Syria means a million more people are on its doorstep trying to get to safety, and Turkey has told the world it can’t take any more.
Ankara last week opened its border to Europe and more than 10,000 migrants, mostly from Syria, have reached Turkey’s land borders with Greece and Bulgaria.
(Reuters)