Syrian refugee camps – fertile breeding ground for Islamic radicals

“Turkey has been dealing with this refugee crisis for several years but Europe is only just waking up to what is a humanitarian tragedy” said EFD Executive Director Roberta Bonazzi while moderating the conference “Beyond Emergency Aid”, held at the European Parliament in Brussels. The discussions were mainly directed towards finding long-term strategies for Syrian refugees, held just days before the EU-Turkey summit on the migrant crisis.

MEP Afzal Khan from the UK was the keynote speaker and repeatedly stressed the importance of solving the problem posed by possible infiltrations by Islamic extremists in the Syrian refugee camps. If nothing is done a “whole generation” might turn against the West and this “would be a disaster”. Khan is also deputy chair of the parliament’s committee on security and defense and has firsthand witnessed the tragic conditions of these camps.

The founder and chairwoman of the Maya Foundation, Esra Özsüer, was also present and spoke about the foundation’s program “Project Lift”, whose aim is to provide therapy to traumatized refugee children through art, in order to give them the possibility to “start a new life and have dreams again”.

This article is in English and can be read here.