West, part and parcel of refugee crisis: Activist

Press TV has conducted an interview with Massoud Shadjareh, head of the Islamic Human Rights Commission in London, to discuss ongoing refugee crisis in Europe.

What follows is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: Well we already know that Germany has played an exemplary role when it comes to handling the refugees, opening its borders to people impoverished by war and poverty. Why do you think Germany has now decided to control its borders?

Shadjareh: Well I think it sort of highlights how disastrous the response from the European nations and indeed from the West has been towards this crisis of refugees. And the reality is that Germany at one stage last week welcomed the refugees and now it is putting these restrictions, which is against the EU rules.

What really needs to be done is that the whole of the Europe and indeed the West will decide how to share the burden of these refugees and trying to actually push the burden on one country is totally unacceptable. For example Britain after all the cries regarding they are going to come forward and help, they eventually offered 20,000 for the next five years which is peanuts really looking at the level of the refugees coming across and indeed what was said by the United Nations that in the next year there will be another million added to the refugees from Syria alone.

So I think the number of things that needs to take place, there has to be fair share of taking the refugees but I think also what has not been even discussed is what to do to stop this flight of refugees coming across i.e. help to create safety and security in Syria itself which unfortunately is not being done.

The reality is that many of the refugees who are coming across are running away from Daesh and ISIS and they are living in areas controlled and protected by the Syrian government and those areas need to be strengthened from security point of view and so that there would be no need for them to escape and come to Europe and actually many of them perish on the way to safety in Europe.  

Press TV: It looks like nobody is actually talking about the main cause of the refugee influx but they are talking about, we have Viktor Orban blaming Berlin for the refugee crisis and saying these migrants are not coming out our way from war zones but from camps looking to actually live in a dream world. What do you think about the stances of these hard liners in Europe?

Shadjareh: This is what is really outrageous. The reality is that no one was coming and trying to flood so-called European cities from Syria before this conflict was created and I use the word “created” because if you put that many arms by the West and their allies - Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey – into any country in the world, any country in the Middle East, then you are going to have this sort of civil war and indeed you are going to end up with a huge crisis and humanitarian disaster and there will be huge number of refugees as we can see.

So really the West has been part and parcel of the problem and still does not recognize that and does not want to admit that and does not want to find the solution.  

So I think this is really outrageous to blame the refugees who have really got no role to play in this except trying to escape and live somewhere with the level of security that they are not finding in their own country due to the fact that West is pouring so much arms into that region.

Press TV: Well unfortunately the warmongering policies of some super powers has led to this disaster but now this disaster is already there. What is a long-term solution to the crisis and what is to become of these refugees?

Shadjareh: Well the solution is actually very simple. We need to find the political solution. We need to abandon the military solution and actually recognize that the only solution forward is political solution and the reality is that those who are running away from Syria are mostly running away from areas which was controlled by the government but it is falling in the hand of extremists and it is the extremists which are actually putting pressure and creating these havocs and those are being funded and armed by the West.

So really recognition of reality that there needs to be and there has to be a political solution is at heart of this and everybody knows that but everybody ignores it. I should say everybody ignores it with the exception of Jeremy Corbyn which is a breath of fresh air. He has actually acknowledged and actually spoken out very bravely on this issue.  

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