This marks the second episode of a two-part series on the war in Ukraine. For this episode we speak with Jana Kalaaji, a Syrian national who fled the war in her country to study medicine in Ukraine, only to become a double-refugee after the outbreak of another war in her new home, along Ukraine’s border with Russia.
Aram AlSaed was a paramedic and a student of fine arts before he left Syria in 2015, traveling by bus, plane, boat, and by foot to reach Germany, while stopping along the way to provide medical and translation support for other refugees.
In this first of a two-part interview, I speak with him about life in Syria before the war, when things began to change, his work as a paramedic in Syria, when he realized that it was time for he and his brother to leave, and his journey up to the German border.
Be sure to browse the additional content provided below for current information on the state of the refugee crisis in the Middle East, North Africa, and Europe.
And be sure to catch the second half of the interview in the next episode.
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Are You Syrious provides daily news digests from the field, mainly for volunteers and refugees on the route, but also for journalists and other parties.
Information resources for refugees & asylum seekers...
There are more than 60,000 refugees in Greece and an overwhelming demand for information to understand what is happening to them. Refucomm is a nonprofit registered in Germany and working in Greece to provide multilingual instruction materials and videos that inform people about their rights, asylum procedures, and how to prepare for their interviews.