Actualidad

©My name is Jamal and I am 49 years old. I am Kurdish from Iran, but for 12 years I lived and worked as a university professor in Erbil, Iraq after I fled my home country because of my activism. I have a wife, Zahra, in Iran, and my two grown children live in Germany. They are 25 and 20 years old. I fled Iran in 2005, after the authorities there imprisoned me because of my political beliefs. The regime threatened my wife, telling her that either she convinced me to return to the country — so I could be thrown back into jail — or she would lose her job. I decided the only way out for her was for us to divorce, even though in my heart she is still my wife and we still love each other very much. Even in Iraq my safety wasn’t guaranteed. In 2016, Tehran asked the Kurdistan regional government to deport me, reporting the fact I’d been arrested many times in Iran since 1984. I really had nowhere else to go but Europe. Turkey, as you know, isn’t a safe country for Kurds. I came here to Samos in September 2016, feeling like a bird freed from its cage. But ever since then, I’ve been waiting for permission to go to Athens. I had been dreaming of living the rest of my life in a country where human rights are respected, where there is democracy. But less than 24 hours after I arrived in Greece I knew it was a pipe dream, and that I had simply gone from one cage to another. I live in a tent now, for one person. Inside, I have my clothes, a heater to keep me warm and to heat up my bread, and a toy that reminds me of my children. I also keep all my dreams and memories with me, in my mind. One could call Samos the most beautiful jail in the world. It’s a lovely island, the weather is beautiful. But that’s only for tourists. For us, Samos is a detention centre. I wish people would understand: no one leaves his country for a packet of juice and a biscuit. We’re going to be stuck here for months. I can’t go back, but I am not allowed to move forward either.