A Palestinian refugee from Jenin in the West Bank, Ibrahimi navigated his way through war-torn Syria travelling “from one mosque to another and not talking about politics or showing any opinion.” He is now seeking funds in Istanbul to travel on to Bulgaria.
“When we have nothing to lose, we take a lot of risks,” he said. He intends to cross the Turkish-Bulgarian border on foot in the east, taking advantage of dense forest cover, before carrying on to Serbia, Hungary and Austria.
He could well fail: Austria signed an agreement with Serbia and Hungary in 2011 to reduce what they called “illegal immigration” into the European Union. A number of EU countries engage in what has become known as “externalisation” - making deals with EU frontier countries like Morocco, Libya or Serbia to ensure migrants never reach their country.
According to Deputy Prime Minister Tsveltin Yovchev, 5,815 persons tried to cross the border unofficially into Bulgaria in the first nine months of 2013. This marks a seven fold increase on the same period last year. In September alone, 2,377 persons were detained on the Turkish-Bulgarian border; of these 1,635 were Syrian.
