REFUGEE AND MIGRATION
THE REFUGEES İN EUROPE HAVE COMMUNİCATİON AND İNFORMATİON NEEDS
Since 2015 more than a million woman men and children have undertaken prilous journeys to reach
northern European countries using unofficial migration routes across the Mediterranean sea and
South –east Europe Not all of them have reached their preferred destination and many have died
or gone missing on the way These people reflect diverse nationalities, languages and levels
of literacy, income, social status and access to technology. But they have one overwhelming aspect in
common – they require information to make decisions about their next steps, to remain safe and
meet their minimum survival needs. And yet, even in this age of digital technology, they often cannot
get the reliable information they need due to a lack of online or mobile connectivity and limited
consistent information that they trust.
What refugees said they need
1. Have focal points within the camps who speak the right languages, can communicate people’s
needs and concerns to agencies, and provide answers to their questions.
“We need someone to translate for us, to communicate our needs and give us answers to our
questions.”
2. Have more legal advisers in the camps (with translators), who can consider people’s individual
cases and advise them on their options. “We need one-to-one appointments with legal advisers, to help us understand our rights and our options.”
3. Hold regular meetings within the camps to update refugees on the current situation,
preferably led by EU/government officials.
“They could gather everyone together in meetings to share important updates.”
4. Although free wi-fi is available in some camps, all camps need it to enable people to be
connected to the internet, so they are also connected to their families and other sources of
information.
“We need access to the internet to find information and communicate with our family at home.”
For more information visit: www.bbcmediaaction.org 3. Lyman, R. (2015) Bulgaria Puts Up a New Wall, but This One Keeps People Out. The New York Times, 15 April [online]. Available from:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/06/world/europe/bulgaria-puts-up-a-new-wall-but-this-one-keeps-people-out.html [Accessed 23 May 2016].
4. As of 11 April 2016: Amnesty International (2016) Trapped in Greece: an avoidable refugee crisis [online]. Available from:
https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/eur25/3778/2016/en/ [Accessed 19 May 2016].
