'A bloody method of control': the

struggle to take down Europe's razor

wire walls
Spain is removing lethal razor wire from its borders in north Africa,
but elsewhere the controversial ‘concertinas’ stay put
Mitrolidis/AFP via Getty Images

You could barely see that it was a finger. “The wound was large, with several deep cuts
into the flesh. He had tried to climb the fence and was up there when he was caught by
police in the middle of the night,” says András Léderer, advocacy officer for
the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, a Budapest-based NGO.

“He lost his balance. The wound was so horrific because as he fell, he tried to grab the
razor wire – and also, he said, touched the second layer of the fence, which is electrified.”

The unnamed Pakistani refugee in his 30s had attempted to cross the fence near
Sombor, Serbia, to get into Hungary in 2016. The coils of metal that lacerated his finger
are ubiquitous at the perimeters of “Fortress Europe” and can be found on border fences
in Slovenia, Hungary, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Spain and France.

Razor wire is cut from galvanised steel, and unlike barbed wire, which was devised to
tangle and impede movement, it is designed to maim.

It is one of the most visible symbols of the fortification of the EU’s borders. Thousands of
migrants have already paid with their lives while attempting to get around those borders:
by crawling through pipes, suffocating in the back of lorries, or drowning in the
Mediterranean.

In September 2005, a Senegalese man reportedly bled to death from wounds inflicted by
deadly razor wire coils topping the fence in Ceuta, one of Spain’s two exclaves on the
north African coast.

Migrants from African countries regularly attempt to scale the six-metre

high barriers separating these port cities from Morocco. They do so at great
personal risk; after mass attempts to cross, Spanish medical staff regularly attend
to deep cuts from razor wire, from which migrants’ bloodstained clothes are
sometimes left dangling.

Like the rest of Spain, Ceuta and Melilla have been under lockdown during the
coronavirus pandemic. But tighter Moroccan border controls linked to the
pandemic have not stopped migrants and refugees from coming: 1,140
people succeeded in crossing the frontier into Ceuta and Melilla in the first three
months of this year.

Spain’s humanitarian policy has become largely redundant, though, given that
Moroccan authorities have started installing razor wire along their own border
fence with Ceuta. And Grande-Marlaska announced recently that fences around
the two Spanish exclaves would be raised by 30 metres to deter incomers.

These apparent double standards are part of a pattern, says Karl Kopp, of the
German NGO Pro Asyl.

“The European style is to outsource this more vicious, older style of border
control with its razor wire and multiple fences to third countries. At home, it’s
about drones, surveillance and technical cooperation to identify migrants
approaching the EU border before they even reach it. Meanwhile, violent border
policing is kept farther afield: out of sight, out of mind. So the Moroccans build an
‘ugly’ fence which can be criticised, while the Spanish create a more
‘humanitarian’ alternative,” says Kopp.

Public pressure elsewhere has led some governments to reconsider the use of
razor wire as experts brand it both inhumane and ineffective. Others even wonder
about the legality of its use.

“On the one hand, legislation about borders states that crossing anywhere other
than an official checkpoint is illegal. On the other hand, the notion of crossing a
border illegally is usually voided under international refugee law if making an
asylum claim,” says Bernd Kasparek, a researcher at Border Monitoring, a
German NGO that tracks pushbacks of refugees. “So there is a legal tension at the
EU’s borders. Sometimes it is very necessary to cross the border irregularly in
order to lodge an asylum claim. Fortified borders like these interfere with that
legal right, particularly in places where it’s an open secret that 99% of asylum
claims lodged with border guards are rejected,” Kasparek adds.

Recent successful attempts at removing razor wire from Europe’s borders have
not been motivated by legal or humanitarian concerns but by ecological ones. In
Slovenia, environmentalists’ fears of the impact of razor wire on wildlife led in
2016 to the removal of the coils from sections of its border with Croatia. In light of
legal constraints in several European states on the deployment of razor wire in
rural areas, some manufacturers even indicate the wildlife-friendly credentials of
their razor wire.

One difficulty in mounting a challenge is the near impossibility of establishing the

true scale of the injuries inflicted specifically by razor wire at borders. According
to Kate Dearden, project officer at the I nternational Organization for
Migration’s Missing Migrants Project, many governments only keep records on
deaths at borders, rather than deaths that occur later as a result of injuries during
attempts to cross them.

Moreover, it can be hard to discover exactly which portions of Europe’s fences are
topped by razor wire and who supplied it; in recent years many governments have
classified detailed information about fences as state security issues. Nevertheless,
some manufacturers have refused to sell to border fences on humanitarian
grounds. In 2015, Talat Deger, director of the Berlin-based company
Mutanox, refused to do a deal with the Hungarian government. In an interview
last year, Deger’s successor, Efekan Dikici, said that he and his staff have kept to
the principle.

“We want to sell razor wire, of course, but only for the right purposes: to secure
property, factories, jails, or for example on the railings of ships to prevent piracy.
For those purposes it’s justified; but when it’s being used against humans who
need help, that’s awkward,” said Dikici. “Most of our workers have a foreign
background themselves, so I think we all feel this a bit more.”
That stance is costly. Dikici stressed that it can be genuinely difficult for razor
wire suppliers to establish the end use of their product, given that they often deal
with middlemen and procurement agencies. “If you’re selling to a government,
razor wire could be used for a prison or a border. But if a request for a really huge
amount comes in, we do wonder whether it’s for a border fence. Even large
private properties need a few hundred metres, not kilometres. I ask myself, if we
got a request from the US for the Mexico border, would we give them a quote?”

Other companies do not appear to have these scruples – after all, there is a brisk
trade to be done in razor wire, which is not to be confused with barbed wire.
Razor wire is cut from single sheets of galvanised steel, and most commonly sold
in folding coils known in the industry as concertinas. The sharp razors come in
various sizes; most seen by the Guardian at four European border fences are of
the BTO-22, BTO-20 and BTO-10 varieties – straight razor edges affixed to a
metal coil.

There are even more formidable options: CBT-60 includes “harpoon” style
hooked razor heads that can embed themselves in the flesh of those trying to cross
them. Some razor wire manufacturers seemingly flaunt the effects in their
brochures; for example, Chinese manufacturer Hebei Jinshi advertises its CBT-65
long blade as a “vicious product” whose “extra long blade razors produce[s] [a]
frightening effect.”

However, some European producers have discovered that selling razor wire to
border fences comes at the cost of bad press, even in times of rising xenophobic
sentiment.

When Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, decreed in 2015 that a fence be
raised on Hungary’s border with Serbia, the Malaga-based
manufacturer European Security Fencing (ESF) provided the razor wire. ESF, a
subdivision of Mora Salazar, has delivered coils for fences in Austria, Slovenia,
Bulgaria and France, and proudly presents itself as one of Europe’s leading razor
wire suppliers.

Nevertheless, after the installation of its razor wire on the Hungarian border, ESF
spokesmen told the Spanish press that they had been unaware of the product’s
final use by the Hungarian clients. In September 2015, the company deleted its
official Twitter account following the backlash provoked by a tweet boasting of
ESF’s leading role in the European razor wire industry.

Today, ESF appears to have competition in the form of Polish company GC Metal,
which now refers to itself as Europe’s leading seller of razor wire. The company’s
website indicates that it may have been involved in supplying concertina wire for
the Bulgarian-Turkish border fence. Neither ESF nor GC Metal responded to
requests for comment about the end use of their products or their humanitarian
implications.

Europe’s fortified borders are here to stay, even if borders in decades to come may
be unrecognisable in comparison to today’s crude fences. Razor wire, much like
fortified borders in general, is both inhumane and ineffective, concludes Kopp,
though its removal may not necessarily be a bellwether for a more humanitarian
migration policy. Seismic sensors, night vision cameras and surveillance
drones have all come to play a greater role in border policing – with hi-tech
solutions like these, will razor wire become redundant?

“There’s a high symbolic value to razor wire, like fences,” says Mark Akkerman, a
researcher at the Transnational Institute and author of a recent report on
Europe’s border-industrial complex. “Simply put, they allow governments to show
the public, the press, their voters, and the world that they’re ‘doing something’
about migration.”

This article is about the way countries protect their borders from immigrants and how lot’s of
borders do it at risk of a lot of lives. And they hoped that the coronavirus would cause less illegal
immigrants but it doesn’t so now they’re trying to find a better alternative.

Difficult words:

1. Redundant overtollig
 2. Fortifiedversterkt

3. Concertina muziekinstrument of mes gaas

4. Provokeduitgelokt

5. xenophobic sentiment xenofoob sentiment

6. scruples  scrupules

7. affixedaangebracht

8. brisk levendig

9. procurements anbestedingen

10. asylum asiel

‘people are more scared of hunger’; coronavirus is

just one more threat in Nigeria.
The pandemic has left many people in Orile, Lagos state, struggling for
survival – and compounded the risks of the area’s heavily polluted air and
water supply

For Nurudeen Olugbade taking photographs of life in Orile-Iganmu, Lagos

state, during the pandemic is a way to affirm that the disruption it has wrought
on the neglected town does matter.

“We are not really seen. There’s very little attention paid to us but the struggle
out here is real,” says Olugbade, 28, who has documented the crisis on his
phone.

In recent months the strict measures to curb the spread of Covid-19 have
changed the character of the town. Ordinarily Orile, as it’s usually known, is a
vibrant town but footfall has waned on the streets lined with makeshift stores
built out from weathered housing units. Many of the businesses that are
allowed to trade as the lockdown slowly eases are open for fewer hours, to
fewer customers.
Informal work such as cleaning and making deliveries, usually serving more
affluent parts of the city of Ikeja, have slowed. For the past two months a
powdered milk factory in Orile that employs hundreds of people has been shut.

An alarming rise in armed robberies, cult killings and gang warfare has
unsettled those in communities that are struggling during the pandemic,
roaming the area in search of work during the day, and too frightened to sleep
at night.

“Everybody is on their guard,” says Olugbade. “For a couple of weeks, a

situation has been going on in the area. One million boys – they’re an
infamous gang that is terrorising places and looting. They haven’t come yet but
people are really afraid.”

Olugbade works for a small business delivering grilled chicken from Orile,
mainly to middle-class customers on Lagos Island. Business quicklydried up
under lockdown. “Most customers aren’t calling for food much because they
don’t want you bringing coronavirus to them. They’re afraid of being infected
but we’re afraid of losing our work.”

Taking and editing pictures absorbs the hours between rare deliveries, he says.
“I just walk around capturing things. I’ve been taking pictures seriously for
about seven years, mostly on my phone, or when I’ve borrowed a camera.”

For Olugbade, taking pictures during a pandemic is not too difficult. He wears
a mask and maintains a distance. A phone is less provocative than a camera, he
says. But not everyone he wants to take photos of permits him to do so. “Most
people find taking pictures intrusive and end up declining, which is
understandable; not everyone wants to be documented,” he says.

Scattered among the trampled plastic in his slum are often the clear sachets
used for drinking water, commonly called “pure-water”. He used shoelaces to
turn some of these into face masks. For the photo series, one evening his
neighbours’ children wear the plastic masks that draw against the mouth when
they breathe.
The children stand against a wall, facing his smartphone squarely and holding
up lined paper with two-line statements: “No face masks”, “no sanitiser”, “no
food”.
“I came up with the idea with a friend . Those are his children in the pictures,”
he says, adding that his intention was to highlight the inequalities exacerbated
by the lockdown measures.

“There’s a rule that says you have to wear face masks but people feel they are
not readily available here,” he says. “I wanted to speak to that because the
government has failed people. They aren’t making any provisions whatsoever.”

A face mask costs 100 naira ($0.26), which many people cannot afford during
the lockdown. Sanitisers, gloves and soap have all become more expensive as
demand has gone up.

Those residents who can afford to mostly stay in their homes, following the
government measures intended to inhibit the spread of the virus. For others,
however, the measures are unfeasible, and the protections too expensive,
fuelling apathy towards the outbreak.

In Orile, constant exposure to dangerous environmental conditions also

compounds the lack of urgency for many residents.

“There are so many chemicals around, you inhale so many things in the
environment. The pollution is bad,” he says. “The borehole that we get water
from is contaminated, it’s surrounded by slums. So when you get the water you
just put lime in it and use it.

“I think many people find it hard to really take this virus as being more serious
than what they experience every day.”

Some people see the masks less as a a precaution against the virus and more of
a licence to be able to leave the area without being stopped by police.
“Someone close by sells them, but people try on different masks, handling
them then buy it and wear it,” he laughs. “Really, I feel it’s just a passport.”

Half of the 4,900 confirmed Covid-19 infections in Nigeria are in Lagos. The

rate of new cases across the country is accelerating, doubling in the last 10
days. But his sense is that in the minds of many local people, the virus itself is
less of a risk than its effects on daily life.

“People are not scared of coronavirus, the thing people are scared of is
hunger.”
When lockdown measures were brought in, the Lagos state government
announced that food packages would be distributed to the poorest areas. But
such help has been limited and irregular, fuelling resentment.

“Last week a couple of people were going house to house to count people
because the local government wanted to give provisions. Later there were
rumours that they gave the food to a few people and split it among themselves.
We didn’t see any of the help they promised.”

The pandemic has been draining and left many people feeling more
withdrawn, Olugbade explains. “It makes it harder to connect to people but
even so there are so many stories to tell here.”

This article is about how the poor people in Lagos and surroundings really are suffering from the
coronavirus because they don’t have work anymore hat causes them to not being able to buy
face masks and sanitizer. The camera man captures pictures to show the world that these
people really are having a hard time and that the government has let their people down.

Difficult words:

1. withdrawn ingetrokken

2. resentment wrok

3. provisions voorzieningen

4. accelerating  versnellen

5. contaminated vervuild

6. fueling tanken

7. exacerbated verergerd

8. borehole  boorgat

9. provisionsvoorzieningen

10. neglected verwaarloosd

Coronavirus latest: at a glance

A summary of the biggest developments in the global coronavirus
outbreak
Spain records lowest single-day death toll in two months

Spain has recorded its lowest single-day death toll in two months. According to
the latest figures from the health ministry, 87 people have died from Covid-19 in
the past 24 hours, down from 102 the day before. The country has confirmed
231,350 cases of the virus using PCR tests, and reported 27,650 deaths.

Brazil’s outbreak now fourth largest in the world

Brazil’s health ministry announced 14,919 new cases, taking the country’s total to
233,142, ahead of Spain and Italy, making theirs the fourth largest outbreak in the
world. Mainland China reported five new confirmed Covid-19 cases for 16 May,
down from eight the previous day, the National Health Commission said in a
statement. Two of the five confirmed cases were so-called imported infections,
while three were locally transmitted in northeastern Chinese province of Jilin.
Japan also confirmed five new cases.

Greece to announce restaurants reopening on 25 May

Greece is continuing to make headway in its return to normality with the

government poised to announce that restaurants and other eateries can now open
on 25 May, one week ahead of schedule. Shopping malls and department stores
will also be allowed to open tomorrow, two weeks ahead of schedule. By law staff
and customers will be obliged to wear face coverings.

Massive scale of infection found at Peruvian markets

Four out of five merchants at a major fruit market in Peru have tested positive for
coronavirus, revealing shocking levels of infection – and prompting fears that
Latin America’s traditional trading centres may have helped spread Covid-19
across the region. Seventy-nine per cent of stall-holders in Lima’s wholesale fruit
market tested positive for Covid-19, while spot tests at five other large fresh food
markets in the city revealed at least half were carrying the virus.

China asks producers to boost food stocks

China has asked trading firms and food processors to boost inventories of grains
and oilseeds as a possible second wave of coronavirus cases and worsening
infection rates elsewhere raise concerns about global supply lines. Both state-run
and private grain traders as well as food producers were urged to procure higher
volumes of soybeans, soy oil and corn during calls with China’s Ministry of
Commerce in recent days, three trade sources told Reuters.
Barack Obama attacks Trump administration’s response to pandemic

Barack Obama attacked the Trump administration’s response to the Covid-19

pandemic during a speech on Saturday. The comments are a rare rebuke of a
sitting president from one of his predecessors, and come in the midst of a
pandemic that has had devastating and disproportionate effects on communities
of colour in the United States.

This article is a summary of all the things that are going all around the world right now with the
corona virus.

Difficult words:

1. transmitted verzonden

2. poised klaar

3. rebuke berispen

4. devastating verwoestend

5. disproportionate onevenredig

'Llamas are the real unicorns': why they

could be our secret weapon against
coronavirus
Researchers hope llama antibodies could help protect humans who
have not been infected

The solution to the coronavirus may have been staring us in the face this whole
time, lazily chewing on a carrot. All we need, it seems, is llamas.

A study published last week in the journal Cell found that antibodies in llamas’

blood could offer a defense against the coronavirus. In addition to larger
antibodies like ours, llamas have small ones that can sneak into spaces on viral
proteins that are too tiny for human antibodies, helping them to fend off the
threat. The hope is that the llama antibodies could help protect humans who have
not been infected.

International researchers owe their findings to a llama named Winter, a four-

year-old resident of Belgium. Her antibodies had already proven themselves able
to fight Sars and Mers, leading researchers to speculate that they could work
against the virus behind Covid-19 – and indeed, in cell cultures at least, they were
effective against it. Researchers are now working towards clinical trials. “If it
works, llama Winter deserves a statue,” Dr Xavier Saelens, a Ghent University
virologist and study author, told the New York Times.

To any llama aficionado, this news should come as no surprise. The animals have
developed a reputation for healing. Llama antibodies have been a fixture in the
fight against disease for years, with researchers investigating their potency
against HIV and other viruses.

And their soothing powers go beyond the microscopic. Llamas have become
exam-season fixtures at a number of top US colleges. George Caldwell, who raises
llamas in Sonora, California, brings his trusted associates to the University of
California, Berkeley, UC Davis, Stanford, and other northern California
universities and high schools, where their tranquility is contagious, helping
students overcome end-of-term anxiety. “When you’re around a llama, you
become very calm and at peace,” one Berkeley senior said at a campus event last
year.

At that event, I joined the ranks of the converted, having had the good fortune to
receive a “llama greeting”, which involves warm llama breath hitting one’s face. It
was the most pleasant nostril-based salutation I have ever received – all my
anxieties seemed to dissipate in the llama-generated air. (This was long before the
pandemic, which has largely ruined the appeal of being breathed on.)

Humans and llamas are natural allies, said Caldwell, though too few realize it.
“People see the llamas, they all light up,” he said. “Llamas just have that ability –
it’s programmed right into us.” Their hair can be used to make clothing, their
manure benefits crops, and as Winter’s antibodies reaffirm, “even their blood can
help us”. And they are known as pack animals, a skill currently serving them well
in Wales, where these hairy essential workers are delivering groceries.

“Everything about these guys – you’d think that they’d be the most valued
creature in the world,” Caldwell said. His goal is to spread the word about their
gifts: “Llamas are the real unicorns.”

Now they are doing their part inside and outside the laboratory. Caldwell has
discussed collecting antibodies with his vet, but it is not an easy process, he says,
especially for an older person: some llamas are less than eager to become blood
donors, and they can be “ruffians” when the situation calls for it.

They are offering their services elsewhere, however. The pandemic has halted
campus visits for now, so Caldwell has moved some operations online. This
month he offered a live-streamed tour of his llamas’ residence, hosted by UC
Davis.

The creatures’ enclosure was a picture of peace, where Quinoa, Joolz, McSlick and
friends sat munching and gazing out at the world, blissfully unaware of the global
pandemic, or perhaps simply confident that better times lie ahead.

With Winter on our side, they could be right

This article is about how the antibodies of llamas could be an solution for the coronavirus. They
are already experimenting with it.

Difficult words:

1. virologist  viroloog

2. aficionado  fan

3. tranquility  kalmte

4. allies  bondgenoten

5. manure  mest

Polish clerical child abuse documentary

casts shadow on John Paul II centenary
Polish archbishop calls for Vatican to ‘launch proceedings’ after
release of child abuse documentary Hide and Seek

A Polish documentary on child abuse by Catholic clerics has put a damper on

centenary celebrations of the late Pope John Paul II’s birth.

After the film Hide and Seek was seen by almost 80,000 people on YouTube,
Polish archbishop Wojciech Polak called on the Vatican to “launch proceedings”
into the cases in question.

It is the second documentary by Tomasz Sekielski on child abuse within the

church, and focuses in detail on two brothers who are alleged victims of a priest
who was protected by a bishop.
“The film Hide and Seek, which I have just seen, shows that protection standards
for children and adolescents in the church were not respected,” Polak said in a
video broadcast by the Catholic news agency KAI.

The archbishop added that he had asked the Vatican to launch proceedings under
the auspices of an apostolic letter issued by Pope Francis in March 2019 on the
protection of minors and vulnerable persons.

In May 2019, Sekielski released Tell No One, a similar documentary that has been
viewed almost 23.5 million times on YouTube and sparked a national discussion
of sex abuse by Catholic clergy.

The issue then faded however, and neither film explores a lack of action by Saint
John Paul II, who was pope from 1978 to 2005 and who is widely venerated in his
native Poland.

Sekielski has already said however that he will release a third documentary on the
“role of John Paul II in the dissimulation of crimes committed by priests”.

Poland has scheduled church services, events and online concerts to celebrate the
birth of John Paul II, born Karol Wojtyła on 18 May, 1920 in Wadowice,
southern Poland.

this article is about two films that are made about child abuse in the Catholic church and how
people handle with that.

Difficult words:

1. clerics geestelijken

2. centenary  eeuwfeest

3. alleged  vermeend

4. auspices  auspicien

5. proceedings  procedure