Reduction and new child for asylum household of kid suffocated in Channel crossing

[ad_1] Andrew Harding Reporting from Rouvroy, northern France

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/6d1a/live/226e7150-9dff-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/6d1a/live/226e7150-9dff-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/6d1a/live/226e7150-9dff-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/6d1a/live/226e7150-9dff-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/6d1a/live/226e7150-9dff-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/6d1a/live/226e7150-9dff-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/6d1a/live/226e7150-9dff-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/6d1a/live/226e7150-9dff-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.jpg.webp" loading="eager" alt="BBC Ahmed with his wife, Nour and teenage daughter, Rahaf. They are all happy and focused on a sleeping newborn baby, being held by Ahmed and wrapped in a cream coloured blanket. " class="sc-5340b511-0 bGQwLJ"/> BBC First got here an e mail. Then, a month later, a child.

Every arrival, in its personal manner, marked a pointy swerve within the fortunes of a grief-bludgeoned Iraqi household that has spent the previous 15 years darting round Europe in a state of authorized limbo. Unable to safe asylum, or to work legally, or to name wherever residence.

The Alhashemi household scraped the depths of distress in April 2024. Threatened with imminent deportation from Belgium to Iraq, they tried to cross the English Channel in a small boat. Their seven-year-old daughter, Sara, died in a suffocating crush onboard – an incident we witnessed from a French seashore.

A bit of greater than a yr later, a life-changing e mail from an official French refugee company reached the household at their momentary lodging in Rouvroy. It's a quiet city surrounded by World Battle One memorials and by the tall coal slag heaps that litter this stretch of northern France. The far-right French politician, Marine Le Pen, is an area MP.

"We all know our path now," says Ahmed Alhashemi, 42, scrolling by the e-mail, a small smile breaking throughout his careworn face.

Throughout the hallway, in her bed room, his oldest daughter, Rahaf, 14, writes in a neat pocket book, fastidiously practising her fourth language, French.

"It is fairly exhausting. I can perceive greater than I can communicate," she says in fluent English, her third language after Swedish and Arabic.

Asylum repeatedly denied

Ahmed and his spouse, Nour, 35, met in Belgium once they have been of their 20s, having each fled Iraq. Nour says she and her brothers and sisters needed to go away due to their household's ties to Saddam Hussein's deposed regime. Ahmed fled due to alleged loss of life threats from an area militia.

Nour's siblings shortly moved to Sweden, the place they have been all granted asylum. However Nour stayed again as a result of she had met Ahmed at a relative's residence in Antwerp, and was instantly struck by his calm, thoughtful manner.

"It was love," she acknowledges with a tragic smile, that stopped her from following her siblings to Sweden.

"If I would gone with them, my whole life would have modified. It may be my destiny, or future," she says.

As a substitute, a special life unfolded. The couple utilized for asylum in Belgium, have been married there and went on to have three youngsters – daughters Rahaf and Sara, and a son known as Hussam.

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/500e/live/45e1df10-9dfe-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/500e/live/45e1df10-9dfe-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/500e/live/45e1df10-9dfe-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/500e/live/45e1df10-9dfe-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/500e/live/45e1df10-9dfe-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/500e/live/45e1df10-9dfe-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/500e/live/45e1df10-9dfe-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/500e/live/45e1df10-9dfe-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp" loading="lazy" alt="Three siblings stand together posing for a photo - Hussam on the left, Rahaf in the middle with her arms around her brother and Sara, on the right. They are smiling and all have the hoods of their coats up. They are standing against the backdrop of the sea." class="sc-5340b511-0 bGQwLJ"/> Sara (proper) together with her brother, Hussam, and sister, Rahaf

The household did ultimately make their manner, by way of Finland, to Sweden as a result of they have been denied the appropriate to remain in Belgium. However early final yr, they have been instructed that they needed to go away Sweden too.

European immigration officers had repeatedly dominated that their residence metropolis of Basra, in southern Iraq, was now not a battle zone and their requests for asylum have been all declined.

However Nour and Ahmed insisted that their lives could be in peril in the event that they have been deported again to Iraq – a rustic that their youngsters had by no means identified.

"If we thought we might really reside [safely] in Iraq, we'd have gone a very long time in the past," says Nour.

Satisfied they may quickly be pressured to return to Basra, Ahmed reached out to an Iraqi Kurdish smuggling gang and paid them €5,250 (£4,576) to move the household by small boat to England, the place a few of their family have been already residing.

Early on 23 April final yr, I used to be ready with BBC colleagues on Wimereux seashore, after we noticed a smuggling gang battling towards French police. Moments later, within the early daybreak mild, we noticed a person hoist a toddler onboard an inflatable boat. The woman was seven-year-old Sara. As extra folks clambered onboard, she grew to become trapped beneath her father's legs and suffocated at nighttime, together with 4 different folks.

"I'll by no means forgive myself. However the sea was the one probability I had," Ahmed instructed me quickly afterwards.

A fortnight later, Sara was buried in a cemetery within the close by metropolis of Lille.

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/ccf1/live/611295a0-9dfd-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/ccf1/live/611295a0-9dfd-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/ccf1/live/611295a0-9dfd-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/ccf1/live/611295a0-9dfd-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/ccf1/live/611295a0-9dfd-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/ccf1/live/611295a0-9dfd-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/ccf1/live/611295a0-9dfd-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/ccf1/live/611295a0-9dfd-11f0-92db-77261a15b9d2.png.webp" loading="lazy" alt="Sara stands smiling and doing a 'peace' sign with one hand, and holds a pink stuffed toy with the other. She wears a blue waterproof jacket and a top with Minnie Mouse on it underneath. " class="sc-5340b511-0 bGQwLJ"/> Seven-year-old Sara suffocated as folks pushed on to a ship heading throughout the English Channel

The household was shortly moved to a migrant transit hostel in a tiny village south of Lille. There have been no retailers and little public transport. Different migrants spent solely an evening or two on the centre earlier than leaving - typically to move again to the coast to aim one other crossing. The Alhashemis remained there for nearly a yr.

We first visited the household on the hostel in Could final yr. Sara's sister, Rahaf, spoke tearfully of her craving for a "regular" life. She had stayed in contact with college pals from Sweden the place she had flourished, successful prizes for ice-skating.

Because the months started to slide by, it appeared that the Alhashemi household had turn into trapped within the eddies of a bureaucratic whirlpool, struggling to get the youngsters into an area college, to obtain any type of monetary assist or to depart the crowded hostel.

Weighed down by grief, Nour struggled to depart her mattress.

"I ate there. I slept there. I sat there. I simply did not have the power to get out of that routine," she says.

"It was the worst yr of my life."

The hostel's speedy turnover of recent migrants left the youngsters reeling, and Nour haunted.

"Every time new (migrants) arrived, they wished to speak concerning the sea, how they bought there, who they got here with. I did not need anybody to ask me questions or to listen to something," she says. She compares the hostel to a jail.

The household utilized for asylum in France quickly after Sara's loss of life.

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/b64c/live/786bd500-9e15-11f0-b741-177e3e2c2fc7.png.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/b64c/live/786bd500-9e15-11f0-b741-177e3e2c2fc7.png.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/b64c/live/786bd500-9e15-11f0-b741-177e3e2c2fc7.png.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/b64c/live/786bd500-9e15-11f0-b741-177e3e2c2fc7.png.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/b64c/live/786bd500-9e15-11f0-b741-177e3e2c2fc7.png.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/b64c/live/786bd500-9e15-11f0-b741-177e3e2c2fc7.png.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/b64c/live/786bd500-9e15-11f0-b741-177e3e2c2fc7.png.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/b64c/live/786bd500-9e15-11f0-b741-177e3e2c2fc7.png.webp" loading="lazy" alt="A colourful child's drawing, by seven year-old Sara of her family holding hands in a row, smiling. The first initial of each family member's name has been written above their heads." class="sc-5340b511-0 bGQwLJ"/> Sara's final image of her household earlier than they made their fourth try to succeed in England

In response to EU guidelines (the Dublin Conference), they may have been despatched again to Belgium, the place Ahmed was first registered as an asylum seeker and the place they'd already been instructed they confronted imminent deportation to Iraq. That did not occur – presumably as a result of the French authorities took pity on them after Sara's loss of life. However it nonetheless took a authorized problem, and lots of months, for the household to safe education and different help in France.

"It is like a labyrinth. They're trapped by the procedures," says Claire Perinaud, a French lawyer who has been serving to the Alhashemis.

"There is no doubt they have been entitled to get assist as asylum seekers."

She describes the complicated laws, the struggles to guide appointments and the difficulties dealing with these unable to talk French.

"All these legal guidelines and obstacles are made, in a manner, to stop folks to come back [as if] to say, 'you are not welcome'," she says.

However in March 2025, the household have been lastly moved to their very own two-bedroom residence in a social housing unit in Rouvroy.

Rahaf instantly arrange what she known as "a shrine" to her sister Sara, with pictures and mementoes, together with her watch, fastidiously laid out on a bookcase.

"I can breathe now," Nour says after we go to, her hand on her neck.

At the moment the couple nonetheless dreamed about reaching Britain, the place they produce other family. However not by small boat.

"By no means," Nour tells me, firmly.

Then, on a summer time's day in late July, a long-awaited e mail from the French authorities arrived in Ahmed's inbox.

It defined that he and his youngsters had been granted provisional asylum and permission to stay in France for the following 4 years. Nour has been instructed she's going to obtain the identical information quickly. After that, they'll all be capable of apply for everlasting residency, paving the best way in direction of French citizenship.

'Now I may also help my youngsters obtain their goals'

"Ca va?" says Ahmed, testing out his shaky French, with a smile, as he welcomes us on the entrance of the residence block, just a few weeks later.

It's a heat Monday morning in early September, with shouts and songs drifting throughout the car parking zone from the close by main college.

Upstairs, sitting on her mattress and glancing at a poem by Victor Hugo, Rahaf contemplates the truth that her future is safe for the primary time in her whole life.

"I used to be frightened we have been going to get expelled. However now I am completely satisfied we're settled right here in France," she says.

Ahmed, a tiler by commerce, is already planning to open his personal small firm and has been making use of for jobs within the meantime. Nour wish to open her personal bakery.

"We have now suffered for 15 years. All the time on the transfer," says Ahmed.

"However now I really feel as if my entire life has opened earlier than me. I can work, I can hire, I pays taxes, and I may also help my youngsters obtain their goals."

And there's another excuse for the tangible sense of optimism now surging round their residence.

"It was so quiet earlier than," says Rahaf with a smile, on the sound of a crying child in the lounge.

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/f9d7/live/543f2b60-9e00-11f0-928c-71dbb8619e94.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/f9d7/live/543f2b60-9e00-11f0-928c-71dbb8619e94.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/f9d7/live/543f2b60-9e00-11f0-928c-71dbb8619e94.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/f9d7/live/543f2b60-9e00-11f0-928c-71dbb8619e94.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/f9d7/live/543f2b60-9e00-11f0-928c-71dbb8619e94.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/f9d7/live/543f2b60-9e00-11f0-928c-71dbb8619e94.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/f9d7/live/543f2b60-9e00-11f0-928c-71dbb8619e94.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/f9d7/live/543f2b60-9e00-11f0-928c-71dbb8619e94.jpg.webp" loading="lazy" alt="Nour sits on a dark coloured sofa, smiling as she cradles her newborn baby. Her husband, Ahmed stands over them both and carefully adjusts the baby's white hat. " class="sc-5340b511-0 bGQwLJ"/> "God prepared, Sally shall be fortunate in life", says the new child's mom, Nour

Not lengthy earlier than our newest go to, Nour gave start to a wholesome child woman. Rahaf had wished to call her Lara, however the household agreed on Sally. Each carried deliberate echoes of the kid that they had misplaced.

Months in the past, Nour had frightened it was "too quickly" for one more child. However now she beams with delight on the presence of a brand new woman within the household. "It means I can see Sara in her," she says, wiping away a tear. "God prepared, Sally shall be fortunate in life and obtain all the things that Sara might need accomplished."

And with that, Nour locations Sally in her pram and takes her outdoors, previous the varsity, for her very first journey round their neighbourhood.

There shall be some, studying this, who will disagree, maybe sharply, concerning the decisions the Alhashemis have made lately. Ahmed has already confronted livid criticism on-line for risking the lives of his youngsters in a small boat.

However after so a few years of uncertainty and remorse, the household now have what so many others nonetheless crave - a way of stability, and a protected place to name residence.