RÜYA HÜSEYİNOĞLU

İzmir- The Syrian civil war causing thousands of casualties, millions of people to flee their homes, millions of people to live as refugees in countries they don’t speak their languages and know their cultures has influenced the fates of many people and has stolen their dreams. While they were living a normal life, in a short time everything changed for them. Everyone paid very heavy price because of the conflicts and we have witnessed tragic stories of thousands of people. 

Turkey is among the countries where Syrian refugees take refuge because it has borders with Syria. İzmir is always considered as an attractive city for refugees because it is good place for refugees both economic and socio-cultural aspects as well as in terms of their plans to go to Europe. We interview Assoc. Dr. Ayselin Yıldız, known for her successful academic studies on refugees, about the refugee issue becoming more evident day by day and the false facts about it mainly in Izmir province.

• We know you for your studies on Turkey-EU relations, migration, border management, smuggling of migrants, refugees’ access to higher education and adaptation process. In recent years, you have aimed to focus on studies in which you can integrate immigration and law issues a little more. As an active academic who has been working on studies for 15 years about migration, what do you think about the place of İzmir about the refugee issue?

İzmir is actually a region built by migration. In this sense, we can say that İzmir is a city having a strong migration experience throughout history. It offers a passing route over the Greek islands to Europe. While the İzmir adventure lasts a short time for some, some see it as a place to collect money to go to Europe. Another group consists of people who came here on purpose and whose goal is to settle in the region directly. Somehow, they get in touch with their relatives, friends and people from their own ethnic identity. This situation is actually the same all around the world. Everyone goes to a place over their personal network. Among two groups I talked before, there are currently nearly 150 thousand Syrian refugees; however, limiting the refugees in the city with only Syrian refugees is not right because there are many people from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq and Africa who see the city as a transit city. Although İzmir built by migration, it has a very strong identity. It is actually a conservative identity closed for foreigners. People of İzmir define this identity as being friendly and open-minded; however, as a result of my observations, I see that they have a closed and conservative approach to differences.

• In which part of the city are the refugees living? Could you tell us about the lives of Syrian refugees at a social and cultural level according to your observations and researches?

People of any nationality mostly try Basmane area first. There are also Syrians involved in economic life there. For example, they are slowly opening their own restaurants and electronics stores. There are also people using Basmane as passing place. Hotels in the area were always full particularly in 2015 and 2016. Apart from those people, there are those who have settled in certain regions of Izmir where their relatives live. These are mostly are Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen. For example, Kurdish people lived in Kadifekale before, now there are Arabs. People are slowly integrated here. Of course, there are those who love İzmir and live there. Maybe they don't have a wonderful life here; but people are slowly getting rooted where they live in. Some of them got married here, they have children, and their children are now going to school. There are eight-year-old children who have never seen Syria, they speak Turkish.

• What do you think about Turkey’s exam with the refugee issue at the social level?

Actually, Turkey was caught unprepared for the refugees. At that time, the ‘Migration Management’ had just been founded, the laws were new. Turkey actually has the migration experiences; but mass migration is something else as you would appreciate. Actually, Turkey passes this exam successfully in responding to so many people; however, wherever in the world, such an experience shows the feeling of uncertainty even in the strongest countries. People in Turkey are actually hospitable people; but the point is that people saw the refugees as a guest. In the beginning, policies were always shaped according to that. After a while, the refugee camps became insufficient. Syrian people are still under temporary protection status in our country. After nine years of visit, people naturally start to ask, “What will happen?” Thereupon, an economic crisis occurred, people immediately believed in misinformation.

• Recently, a lot of false information has been deliberately given about Syrian refugees and this naturally causes serious polarization or anger in society.  What do you want to say about false facts about migration issue?

Someone posts a tweet reading, “Syrians go to university without taking university exam in my country.” Another comments the tweet as, “Syrians receive salary without working in my country.” We can give more examples. Qualified young people studying at universities in Syria suddenly left their education and started working here, unfortunately, under bad conditions. There was an option for universities only in the first semesters for them to continue their education life. It was for a short time and then it was changed. Now, university access procedure for young Syrian people is same with German people. When the people of Turkey see their children cannot enter the universities, they start talking about how Syrian people enter the universities without taking the university exam and how they are awarded scholarship. There are two factors behind this type of discourse. First Syrian refugees stay here for a long time and the society begin to question more. Second is the existence of an economic crisis, it causes an increase such sentences. 

• Do we start talking about our own issues over Syrian refugees?

Definitely. We try to offer an absolute human rights-based approach to disadvantaged groups; however, if you are unable to offer these rights to your own citizens, problems start to arise. For example, we ask ‘Why don't Syrian girls go to school?’ we start talking about the problems of Turkey while talking about Syrians’ right to speak their native language, to education, about child labor and unregistered workers among Syrian refugees. We start talking our serious problems over Syrians. Then we have realized these common problems that we have talked about. I don't think there is a difference of nationality. As funds and grants started to come for Syrian refugees, we start discussing the needs of people of Turkey. Today, we are talking about ethnic identities and differences that we have been trying to set back for years. When we look at the current data, 1.6 million of 3.6 million Syrian refugees are women; but the number of children is more astonishing. We see that there are 574 thousand children aged between 0-4 and 499 thousand children aged between 5 and 9. We need to shape the adaption policies according to this high number of women and children. This generation should grow up friendly by knowing each other. If women and children do not know each other better, these policies are doomed to remain on paper only.