Small towns of a small European country show big
humanity in global crisis
The park benches on the aqua blue lake of this
suburb of Austria’s Southern-most provincial capital are occupied by young men
soaking up the sun occasionally jumping into the refreshing crystal clear
water. These young men share the benches with a few locals, some of whom are
there with dogs. At one point two men shyly ask a local to take a picture of
them on their cell phone with the backdrop of the majestic lake and prominent
mountains; the local happily complies and tries to share photographic preferences.
Otherwise, the playing dogs are ice-breakers in due to language barrier (sadly)
limited conversation between the locals and these dozen or so refugees who are
taking a break from the temporary housing offered in tents pitched on the
grounds of the State police compound on the main road of this suburb,
Krumpendorf am Wörthersee.
On July 4th, 2015,
Krumpendorf, population of 2,000, received 240 refugees from countries such as
Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan or Georgia. The Federal Government struck an
agreement with the locality to take in these refugees since the main refugee
camp – the first stop for all incoming refugees - in another province close to
Vienna, Traiskirchen, was overflowing. With a capacity of approximately 4,500
beds, 1,500 additional refugees were cramped-in camping under the sky around
the buildings without a bed and limited access to sanitation.
The Federal Government is scrambling to transfer
these new arriving refugees to other locations throughout the country, in order
for them to find hygienically acceptable shelter. The plan, which was widely discussed
publicly, was to spread out incoming refugees throughout the nine Provinces
proportionally to their population. This was initially met with some resistance
from the more conservative Provincial leaders of the Province of Tyrol, as well
as some mayors. Before anything could be finalized on a national scale, a
handful of small towns the size of Krumpendorf took in a couple hundred
refugees as a temporary solution to the overflow in Traiskirchen.
Since the crisis with warfare in the Middle East
related to ISIS, refugees are streaming in via the Mediterranean Sea into Italy
and more and more into Greece (by July 2015 130,500). Most refugees goal is to
go North to Sweden or to neighboring Germany, which is expecting in 2015,
400,000 applications for asylum, up from approximately 200,000 in 2014; Germany
is also scrambling to find lodging for the refugees. Austria, with a population
of approximately 8 million and ten times smaller than that of Germany, has
received by July 2015, 28,300 applications for asylum, twice the amount of all
applications in 2014. 80,000 refugees are expected to come in 2015.
Since Greece claims it can no longer feed and lodge
refugees, and Hungary (which is one of the countries the refugees travel
through from Greece to Northern Europe) started discussing putting up a fence
to keep refugees from coming in, Austria has experienced an onslaught of
refugees.
While the Austrian Government is scrambling to
solve this humanitarian and logistical crisis in a budgetary restricted time
(for example empty military camps would be ideal sites to lodge refugees but
these are up for sale) and some provincial leaders are not cooperating in
easing the transfer of refugees away from the main camp in Traiskirchen to
other locations around the country, the Austrian population and media is showing
a strong humanitarian side.
Austria has a history of open doors to streams of
refugees, dating back to the Cold War when first in 1956-1957 Austria, which
had just signed its independence treaty from the Post War Occupation, took in
180,000 Hungarians fleeing the Soviet Invasion. Just above ten years later, in
1968, 162,000 Czechoslovakians found refuge in Austria with their invasion of
the Soviet Union. With the war in Yugoslavia, Austria took in 90,000 Bosnians,
of which 60,000 stayed permanently - adding a young and cosmopolitain work
force positively felt in the streets and coffee shops of larger cities.
Many citizens remember these traumatic historical
events right at their borders, and still feel the obligation to take in
refugees from war-torn countries or other areas of crisis. Austrians, who are
typically regulation-driven and law-abiding, are becoming impatient with lack
of problem-solving capacity of the Federal and State Government and their
bureaucracies, and thus their incapacity to get involved individually as
citizens.
“My friends and I offered housing to the Provincial
Government of Carinthia for 10 refugees; they gave us a long list of conditions
so strict we were not able to comply. So we were forced to retract our offer.
This is a big change from when we let in Hungarians and Czechs with open arms
into our homes during the Cold War. Have they forgotten that? We really just
want to help these human beings” says the owner of a publishing company in
Southern Austria.
If they can’t help directly with the lodging
issues, at least they can help in other ways; and many are doing just that. The
Mayor of Krumpendorf prominently hung a "Welcome" banner the day the
refugees arrived. In small town in the Province of Salzburg for example, that
is lodging 6 refugees from Syria, Iran and Afghanistan, citizens are jumping in
to offer language classes, and soccer games with local teams. In the Province
of Upper Austria, citizens groups are hosting cooking nights where refugees
teach their native cooking skills to the locals and other refugees, not only as
a way to approach different cultures, but to ease tensions when psychologically
helping these refugees talk about any trauma they may have experienced.
Krumpendorf has a very dynamic and active group “Lust
auf Gerechtigkeit” (“Desire for Justice”), which organizes not only language
classes given by volunteers, but an informal foster network, where retirees
mentor refugees; also the Catholic Church organizes benefit concerts, as well
as clothes drives, which are all met with enthusiasm and abundance by the
locals. One concert organizer excitedly emailed a newsletter the day after a
concert to highlight the success of the event by quoting one refugee, "I
danced with my new refugee and local friends to the rhythm of African drums and
laughed for the first time in four years. Thank you". The local priest is
proud to share that twenty Muslim refugees regularly attend his service,
although they are not Catholic; in the past year he has also baptized a handful
of refugees; he thus provides mental and non-denominational spiritual shelter
as a means to cultural integration.
There were at least two instances when
Southern-Austrian media reported that employees were instantly fired for
posting on Facebook negative and insulting remarks about refugees. Also,
original reporting of politicians critical of letting in refugees has been
abandoned and replaced by reporting of humanitarian efforts and finding
solutions to the logistical problems, bureaucratic weakness and political
cooperation between parties, governors and mayors. It is currently politically
incorrect to be against letting in refugees. And that is influencing
leaders’ and politicians’ actions.
When some question the fact that all refugees are
young males and may represent a threat to security, interviews with the
Minister of Interior remind us of a study that these are not young camouflaged
mini ISIS cells, but rather were send off by their large family back home
selected as the youngest, healthiest and smartest who would make it to safety
and maybe later on, help bring the rest of the family also to safety.
The length for applications for asylum also
indicate that security issues are not being neglected: the length for
application depends on the country of origin. Asylum seekers from war torn
Syrian have to wait years to obtain asylum status, whereas refugees from Kosovo
wait a few months. And there is open discussion that it might be time to reject
refugees from Kosovo, as these are no longer fleeing war or oppression but
rather mere economic lack of opportunity, and these should make place for the
refugees fleeing war areas or other crisis. That is the extent of open
criticism of liberalism with onslaught of refugees.
On his way home from the lake, a retired Member of European Parliament
makes sure to greet his fellow lake-enjoyers looking each young refugee in the
eye, explaining, “It is my duty to make them feel welcome, not only as refugees
seeking humanity but as potentially future productive citizens of this country.
Hopefully the latter will be soon, because what a waste of talent to have them
wait around for years to receive their asylum status and be able to seek work”.
This resonates well with the mood of many Austrians, whose open arms are their
war against terror.
