For a group of North Vancouver volunteers who spent time this fall helping exhausted Syrian refugees who arrived on the beach of Lesvos, the rubber raft that came ashore on Vancouver’s Sunset Beach Saturday was eerily familiar.
The similarity was intentional, as demonstrators representing refugee families had donned life jackets and climbed into the small craft for the journey across False Creek.
The event, one of two in North America and many around the world, was called Safe Passage, and was intended to highlight the continuing dangers faced by desperate Syrian refugees as they make their way by unseaworthy rafts from Turkey to the Greek islands in hopes of asylum.
North Vancouver volunteers including Laurie Cooper, Erian Baxter, Ellen Fulton and Hannah Dubois are all too familiar with the risks taken by refugees to reach safety.
In November, the women flew to Lesvos and spent two weeks volunteering with local aid agencies who are helping the refugees upon arrival.
They said families pay smugglers for the passage, who rarely make the dangerous journey themselves. More often, one of the passengers is appointed the captain at gunpoint and the refugees are left to fend for themselves during the crossing in often stormy seas.
Many of the life jackets supplied by smugglers – for an additional cost – aren’t even functional, said Baxter. “They have bubble wrap or straw inside of them,” she said. “They wouldn’t float.”
The North Vancouver women are among a group of about 15 Lower Mainland volunteers who have made the trip to Lesvos to help the refugees.
After getting together to share their experiences over a Greek meal recently, the group decided to take part in the international event held Feb. 27 to raise awareness of the ongoing refugee crisis on the Aegean Sea.
“You have the right to seek asylum if your country’s at war,” said Baxter. But for refugees from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, there’s still no right of safe passage for refugees to actually reach a country that would take them in.
On Saturday demonstrators called on governments around the world to rally to that cause. “You can’t let people be dying like they are,” said Baxter.
It was the image of Alan Kurdi, a three-year-old Syrian boy who drowned while trying to make the crossing, that galvanized people around the world into recognizing the Syrian refugee crisis last summer. It also prompted the North Vancouver women to decide to volunteer in Lesvos.
Since then, the refugee crisis and their arrival on the Greek islands has faded from international headlines. But Baxter said the numbers of people arriving is only growing. Last month, over 30,000 refugees arrived on Lesvos alone, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
“The percentage of women and children are increasing in the boats,” said Baxter, and the refugees are coming over “in really horrible circumstances.”
Refugees are still dying on the crossing, she said. Several hundred people have drowned trying to reach Greece in recent months.
On Saturday, Angela Harris, a North Vancouver singer, performed “O Canada,” a song about Kurdi, at Sunset Beach as part of the event.
Baxter said it’s important to keep the Syrian crisis in the minds of the public.
She said while she’s happy that Canada has accepted 25,000 Syrian refugees, there is still much more the international community needs to do to help.
“The reality of the situation is there’s millions of people who need help,” she said. “We all need to step up.”
