Swedish campaigner stalls man’s deportation
A Swedish campaigner has been hailed a hero after preventing the deportation of an elderly Afghan asylum seeker single-handedly by refusing to sit down on the plane until he was removed from the flight.
Elin Ersson, a student at Gothenburg University, bought a plane ticket after discovering that the man would be sent home from her country.
She then streamed her protest to the internet, speaking English, standing on her own in the aisle of a plane holding dozens of passengers.
Staff tried to persuade her to sit down, while others tried to take her phone from her. The Swedish woman remained steadfast.
“I don’t want a man’s life to be taken away just because you don’t want to miss your flight. I am not going to sit down until the person is off the plane,” she said in the video.
“I am doing what I can to save a person’s life. As long as a person is standing up the pilot cannot take off,” she said. “All I want to do is stop the deportation and then I will comply with the rules here. This is all perfectly legal and I have not committed a crime.”
Ms Ersson becomes overwhelmed by the situation and cries on camera before a group of passengers applaud her actions.
That was only after an English passenger challenged her in an angry tone and tried to take her phone away, to which she replied: “What is more important, a life, or your time? … I want him to get off the plane because he is not safe in Afghanistan. I am trying to change my country’s rules, I don’t like them. It is not right to send people to hell.”
Plane staff declined to remove the student by force and, in an emotional scene, they proceeded to remove the Afghan man from the flight to applause. Ms Ersson left the plane with him.
Swedavia, the company in charge of operating Gothenburg airport, said the plane was delayed by two hours. It was unclear what will happen to the Afghan asylum seeker after his departure was prevented.
He is in Swedish custody and will be returned to Afghanistan regardless of her protests, according to German media reports.
Sweden deems Afghanistan a safe country for denied asylum seekers, despite a years long insurgency by the Taliban and now ISIS.