Russia’s unwarranted invasion of Ukraine causing thousands of its citizens to flee west will likely result in a new refugee crisis on the European Union’s doorstep. We can only hope the EU deals with it better than its other migration emergency; the one from North Africa, and the people whom Sally Hayden gives voice to in this devastating, moving, and damning account of one of the tragedies of our age.
The Ukrainian conflict is resulting in a huge outflux of refugees. Picture by Reuters/Dado Ruvic
Consider this scenario: a person has travelled 3,000km of tough terrain, crossed two hostile borders, survived kidnapping by traffickers, only to end up in a place that resembles hell on earth as bombs fall outside their shelter. Their wish is simple, relatively straightforward, concrete – the chance to make a better life for themselves in another country, a safe country, (in their minds) a civilised country.
Surely things will improve? After all, this person is in Libya, and Europe is within touching distance; a journey across the Mediterranean Sea into Italy, Greece perhaps, or maybe Malta.
Not so. Not if you suffer the misfortune of being one of the thousands of migrants crossing from North Africa.
Hayden is an award-winning Irish journalist who has reported on migration for several years now, and she begins My Fourth Time, We Drowned with a contact made inside a migrant detention centre in Libya, a war zone at the time. From here she tells the sad stories of many others – from Sudan, Rwanda, Addis Ababa – who are fleeing danger or deprivation in the hope of finding a new place to call home. All they encounter, however, is humanity’s hand held distastefully aloft, and in its place: systemic negligence, corruption and brutality, apathy, and journeys filled with terror and a Kafkaesque state of existence.
This is a brilliant, layered testament to the circle of hell where vulnerable migrants find themselves trapped. Hayden never flinches in documenting human nature at its worst – its best is shown here, too – and her calm, considered narrative grounded on facts and solid sources leaves no doubt about one of the largest modern catastrophes playing out before us. She builds the story around the plight of migrants, placing their unfiltered voices at its centre, adeptly threading their emotions through the sharp needle of her reporting.
From the beginning, Hayden’s account of the miasma of despair and dread surrounding that cretinous coinage ‘migrant management’ – with its maze-like structures – that puzzles and pains people in need, is a strong hand to our turned-away faces.
Adding further gut-wrenching weight is Hayden’s painting of migrants’ experiences against a large canvas of NGO negligence and UN corruption. We encounter many bureaucratic bunglers wringing their hands in Brussels at the human rights crisis, with the EU budgeting all the while to fortify borders across a supposed union.
In 2017 the EU made a financial deal with the Libyan coastguard to stop people trying to cross from that country into Italy. The consequences? According to Hayden, this official European policy has effectively provided a conduit for traffickers and people smugglers, a modern-day slave trade, funds filtering to Libyan militias, countless human rights violations. The migrant crisis is also about the monetisation of movement and captivity.
We also learn unpalatable details of the coterie of careerists working in NGOs – those attracted to the field by fat salaries and bottomless funding as much for ideals towards human rights. An aid response worker told her: “People always talk about the crisis of accountability in conflict, but there’s just as big a crisis of accountability in the humanitarian response.”
Refugees from Ukraine take temporary shelter at a school in Zahony, Hungary. Picture by Janos Kummer/Getty Images
In Hayden’s account, this cast of increasingly corporate-identikit characters have an unhealthy fixation on public relations. She documents concerns about how optics can affect the practical manoeuvres of pulling people out of danger zones. An individual who worked with the UN in Libya told Hayden: “The amount of time and money that they spend on visibility and public relations is more than they are spending on the actual work.”
In Tripoli the daily allowances for UN employees on top of their salaries were as high as $335 (€300), and in Tunis $281 (€250) – a monthly minimum wage there in 2021 was $121 (€108). A 2019 audit found the United Nations Refugee Agency bought eight laptops at $5,883 (€5,252) each.
Most damning of all for the UN, however, is Hayden’s report in 2019 alleging UNHCR staff deliberately withheld food and aid to refugees in order to make them leave their Gathering and Departure Facility in Tripoli. The UNHCR denies the allegations.
On rare occasions, she admits it all takes a toll on her mental health; she has faced personal criticism and attacks, and endless ethical dilemmas. She should take solace that she writes beautifully considering the grim subject; and her words have genuine warmth for where she’s visiting, empathy for its people.
My Fourth Time, We Drowned will leave you with little doubt that the system addressing the migrant crisis is not fit for purpose. We need a new discussion and approach to this preventable humanitarian cataclysm. Hayden’s book enriches that debate.
NJ McGarrigle is a writer and editor. He is currently editing a collection of classic boxing writing
