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Irish Times
06-05-2025
- Politics
- Irish Times
Patrick Freyne on Africa's forgotten war
Chad now hosts 1.3 million forcibly displaced people, according to the UNHCR, despite itself being one of the world's poorest countries. More than half of these refugees are Sudanese, mostly women and children, who have fled the fighting between rival militaries which erupted in April 2023. It has been called 'the forgotten war' because of the lack of media coverage and global attention particularly on the plight of the refugees who live in sprawling refugee camps. The reasons why so few journalists have gone to the African country to report on the war and the massive displacement of Sundanese people include the difficulty in getting there and safety issues. Two Irish Times journalists, writer Patrick Freyne and videographer Chris Maddaloni, travelled to East Chad in April to report from the refugee camps there. READ MORE Their trip was supported by the Simon Cumbers Media Fund. They tell In the News about what they saw and heard and explore why the world has turned its back on this war. Presented by Bernice Harrison. Produced by Suzanne Brennan.
Irish Times
01-05-2025
- Politics
- Irish Times
Mount Street residents and businesses feel ‘barricaded in' as anti-tent fences remain one year on
When barricades were erected along Dublin's Mount Street on May 1st last year, there was a sense of 'relief' and even 'celebrations' among some residents and business owners. The barriers were installed around the International Protection Office (IPO) and its surrounding areas by Dublin City Council (DCC) after a significant operation saw the removal of the more than 200 tents which had built up. The encampment had grown due to a lack of State-provided accommodation for male international protection applicants, while the barriers were to act as a deterrent to prevent the erection of further tents or rough sleeping. Some 12 months later, what was initially believed by residents to be a short-term measure has become the norm, with those living and working in the area 'barricaded in' and fighting for the removal of the fences. READ MORE Some residents who spoke to The Irish Times described feeling 'locked up', believing 'it's never ever going to change'. Others described themselves as 'fuming' that the barricades have remained for so long and highlighted a general lack of engagement from DCC and Government departments on the issue. The barriers, installed around the International Protection Office and its surrounding areas by Dublin City Council, have been up for a year. Photograph: Chris Maddaloni/The Irish Times 'It's like I'm living in a prison,' said Fran Nolan, a resident in her 70s who downsized and moved from Sandycove to an apartment on Mount Street 11 years ago. Her building is surrounded by barricades and every morning, she pulls back her bedroom curtains and sees the 'depressing' fencing stretched along her street, behind which weeds grow large and litter builds up. The barricades have become a source of 'embarrassment,' she added. 'Usually, I have American friends coming to stay with me here and I said to them this year, 'Please, don't come'. 'It's so upsetting when I think of what I have to pay in taxes and everything else to live here, and to be treated like this at this stage of my life,' she said, adding that she and others have been 'totally disregarded'. Ideally, those living and working on Mount Street would prefer the barriers to be removed and replaced with security personnel to patrol the area instead. This would be similar to the measures taken by Waterways Ireland at the Grand Canal. While DCC did not respond to requests for comment by the time of publishing, its chief executive, Richard Shakespeare, told business owner Ruth Hamilton two weeks ago that the barricades are 'considered an effective method of ensuring people do not rough sleep or set up camp on the footpaths. '24-hour security is not something that the city council would consider as it would set a precedent for various other areas of the city that experience similar issues,' he said in an email. [ Will dramatic immigration law reforms in Ireland change the number of people seeking asylum? Opens in new window ] Alongside security patrols, Hamilton suggested the installation of planters or poles instead of the fencing. Shakespeare responded, however, that the council did not believe these would be an 'effective deterrent here, albeit they may look nicer'. Hamilton, with her husband Clint, owns Mamma Mia, a restaurant on Grattan Street which is located behind the IPO and surrounded by barricades. 'Any suggestion that I've brought to them, they're not taking them on. As far as I'm aware, DCC is happy to leave them up there,' she says. Describing the encampment which surrounded the IPO as a 'disaster' for her business, she was initially relieved to see the barricades. She believed, at the time, they would be a short-term measure for two months or so until a more practical plan was developed. 'People are not going to come into my restaurant and spend money to look out at a horrific view,' she said. 'It's heartbreaking because our business was booming before the tents and these barriers and, now, we're actually just going month by month at this stage,' she said, adding: 'Our business is on its knees. We just feel like we've been completely forgotten about. It's hard to believe that it's still going on.' Footfall at Mamma Mia has 'completely diminished' due to the barricades, preventing a recovery from an already severe downturn due to the encampment previously on its doorstep. Michael Finlay, the owner of the Punnet Health Store, a shop, cafe and deli, however, describes the barricades as the 'lesser of two evils'. 'For six months, I was dragging tents off the front of my property to try and get into work every day, but the barricades have come with their own set of problems,' he said. While revenue fell by 70 to 80 per cent at the time of tents, it remains at least 30 per cent below what it was prior, which he attributes to the barricades. 'Without fail, every single day, I'll have at least five or six conversations with customers about it. 'Everyone was happy when something was done about the actual tent city, but the longer it's dragged on, it's sapped everyone's energy,' he said. Although he has largely become used to the barricades, it dawns on Finlay how 'abnormal' they are at certain moments, including when he 'tip toes' around them to carry in stock. 'It has a very detrimental effect on the business but also on the psyche of the area. here's quite a demoralised tone at the moment,' he said.
Irish Times
24-04-2025
- Politics
- Irish Times
Patrick Freyne: Returning home from Chad, I feel there's a glitch in western empathy
Recently, I was in east Chad , where most of the people I met had seen loved ones murdered or had been raped or had been shot or saw bodies piled along the road from el-Geneina to Adre on the border with Sudan. I was travelling with Irish Times photographer Chris Maddaloni and we were visiting refugee camps for Sudanese refugees. The week we flew into the capital, N'Djamena, Gen Yasir Al-Atta from the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) declared the airport 'a legitimate target'. Sudan might retaliate against its neighbour Chad, he said, for allowing the UAE smuggle weapons across its border to its enemy the Sudanese Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The SAF, in contrast, gets its funding from Russia, Iran and Egypt. This threat seemed worrying when we were flying, but it turned out nobody in Chad believed the SAF would risk a full-scale war. They have plenty of other things to worry about. The Sudan war is the biggest humanitarian disaster in the world. 150,000 people have been killed. Twelve million people have been displaced. Some 760,000 of them have crossed the border into Chad, mainly Masalit people being targeted by the RSF. Most of them are women and children because the RSF stop young men from leaving the country and frequently murder them. There is a city of straw huts in the desert at the border town of Adre where 237,000 people live. I have said this elsewhere, but that's the population of Cork. It's a hot, arid climate where poor Chadian farmers already struggle to get enough food and water. In 2024, funding for aid was at 30 per cent of what was needed to supply the basics. We met aid workers from the UN Refugee Agency UNHCR, UN World Food Programme (WFP), Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), Acted and Concern who are doing hard and important work in difficult circumstances but the international aid situation is just getting worse. READ MORE A local chief walks to the barren village of Sira in Chad. Photograph: Chris Maddaloni/The Irish Times After returning home I can't help feeling like there's a glitch in western empathy. Because I have been in eastern Chad and spoken to people brutalised by the war – children, young women, old men, refugee aid workers helping their people – I feel deeply moved by their situation and I can't stop thinking about them. I am also troubled that it takes meeting these people to make me feel so strongly. The eyes of the world should be on this war, but they're on other things. At best they're on the humanitarian disaster in Gaza where 51,000 people have been killed by the Israeli army and countless face deprivation. And they should be on that. But possibly due to the overstimulation of social media, I think we have an empathy crisis. We can only do a handful of news stories and one humanitarian disaster at a time. Many are capable of feeling deeply for that one crisis and are doing amazing things in support. In the US, people are risking their livelihoods and freedom to speak about what's happening. But there's something wrong if the West cannot extend that genuine compassion to other places where people are also suffering. [ 'A lot of children die': Patrick Freyne reports from inside Chad camps for Sudanese refugees Opens in new window ] Part of this is a narrative problem. Sudan is an underreported war. It's bureaucratically complicated and very expensive to travel there or to the countries around it. We managed to do so after a couple of false starts and a generous Simon Cumbers grant. It cost more than €8,000 for two journalists to travel there for 12 days to produce five articles that will, most likely, be less widely read than a column I might write about Room to Improve. The nature of the story is also complex. With Gaza it's clear – at least to most people in Ireland – that there is one main aggressor and one group of people who are primarily suffering. In the Sudan war there are just, to paraphrase an American commentator, bad guys and worse guys. Both the SAF and the RSF have committed atrocities but the RSF is also trying to ethnically cleanse Darfur of the Masalit people (in January, the US accused the RSF of committing genocide). Neither side is fighting for any reason more noble than power. This doesn't prevent millions of innocent people getting caught in the crossfire but it's easier for people to care if they can couple their compassion with righteous anger. A group of schoolgirls at a market in the old Farchana camp in eastern Chad. Photograph: Chris Maddaloni/The Irish Times This is not whataboutery. The world's eyes should be on the murderous actions of the Israeli government in Gaza and they should be on the aggressive Russian invasion of Ukraine and they should be on the venality of the Trump government and the mundanity of Irish political bickering. But human empathy should be capable of stretching beyond the limits of the algorithm to other tragedies. I know that this is preachy and I haven't exactly earned that right. I am as guilty of ignoring this tragedy as anybody. But right now, I don't really care. I can't stop thinking of the Sudanese people I met – the mother fanning her malnourished baby in an MSF hospital, the electrician bouncing a baby on his remaining knee, the human rights lawyer who was raped, the 16-year-old who saw his father murdered and asked could we get him a football. They are generous and dignified and kind and they once had a different future to look forward to. And I am now deeply troubled by my own inability to think beyond a handful of news stories at one time. When it happens to us, we will expect more people to care. Supported by the Simon Cumbers Media Fund
