No name

“I come from the north of Syria. I was a teacher, I taught English at primary and high schools until the military forces destroyed all the schools in my district. I fled with my family due to conflicts and civil war, after we faced violence and death. I used to live with my wife and children in a highly dangerous situation when the airforces were shooting everywhere very hardly and killed everything with explosive barrels. You cannot imagine the power of the barrels and the fighter-bombers. They used as well many times chemicals weapons like Phosphor and Sarin, which is the most deadly poison. For the sake of my children’s future, we had to take the risk. First of all, we walked to Turkey. We tried it at least four times because the Turkish Armed Forces called Jandarma caught us and sent us back. On the borders, there is a huge amount of dogs in order to prevent people crossing the borders. We stayed in Turkey more than three months, we were walking through the mountains, it was so difficult, especially with two small kids. Imagine a group of three hundred refugees – a mix of old people, children, women, men. We slept in a forests or old buildings, it was very cold there. Then we entered the district in Turkey – Antakia. We had to pay the smugglers ten thousand US dollars for carrying us to Cyprus. We sailed on a flimsy fishing boat and that was the most dangerous journey we have ever done. The boat was very old and during the travel, a huge storm came. We stayed two days on the sea almost dying. We did not have water, food, anything. The smugglers threw away everything because the boat was too much heavy. Greek part was the promised destination but they brought us to the Turkish part. We spent one night in a forest and it was the worst night ever. We were freezing, without food and drinks. In the morning we crossed the borders with another 30 persons. We walked on the streets and met police corps. They welcomed us very kindly, gave us drinks and food and helped us move to camp at Nicosia, where we got the vaccination and other medical processes. We spent there one week and then they brought us to Kofinou. We would like to move to western Europe, but probably it will be difficult. We hope we will be able to travel after the interview, I mean if we get the international protection. We cannot go back to Syria because if the Assad regime catches me they will likely kill me. We wish to travel more, work, learn English and find a better life to rebuild our future again, especially for our children. We would love to have peace for all the people all around the world. We do not want to see people living under the same conditions we were in. Before the war, we used to live in peace with other religions – Christians, Kurdish people, Armenian people, Druze people, peacefully like brothers and sisters. The only people who are paying the price of the war are ordinary people and at the same time, these people are not the creators of the war.”