VOLUNTEER COOK ON THE HORRORS REFUGEES FACE
Barry Fallon helps feed more than 1,000 people a day but says that there is so much more we could be doingg
VOLUNTEER Barry Fallon is helping to feed more than 1,000 refugees a day in Serbia. He and about 15 other volunteers have been working in Belgrade helping men living in an abandoned barracks.
The conditions inside are dreadful. The building is usually full of thick black smoke as residents struggle to keep warm.
There are concerns that bullying, extortion and sexual assaults have all taken place in the enormous space.
“It’s a very sad situation,” Barry said.
“The work is very hard, we work from eight to six at night, that is the cookery work.”
As well as feeding about 750 people in the barracks they are looking after about 550 others at a temporary facility in Obrenovac.
Barry and the volunteers feed people from a mobile kitchen bought from Argyll council.
“We bought it in the UK and brought it here,” he said.
After dishing out food there is more to do. “I deal with the office side too, donations and sponsor- ship and that is highly demanding,” he said.
The 31-year-old is working with a group he co-founded called Hot Food Idomeni. It’s named that because they were previously working in Greece’s Idomeni refugee camp.
“It’s unpaid work but you could not pay me enough to do this,” he said. It was not about the money. “It’s about what these people need and how we can get it to them,” Barry said.
“The barracks could be evacuated at any point and it is unclear where these people would then go.
“As we know from Calais and other site evictions, what happens after their home is taken is not always a priority.”
There are only two places to get running water in the Barracks.
“The worst thing is the smoke from the fires they are lighting in there.
“It’s freezing cold and can get down to minus 18 or 20.
“Other organisations tried to put in heaters but that only made a small difference.”
The refugees are burning sleepers from the nearby railway.
“They’re full of tar, so when you’re inside there is thick black smoke,” Barry said.
“There have been efforts by individual organisations to provide firewood that burns more cleanly but that is not a solution to the problem.
“We are very much a sticking plaster on an open wound. We are not solving the problem. What we are doing is making things better in the short term.
“But in the long term Europe does not want these people.”
Thefts are heard about “all the time”.
“A lad came up to me recently and was like, ‘ someone stole my shoes,’” Barry said.
“While there is a degree of solidarity and people taking care of one another the place is pretty lawless.
“Save the Children and Médecins Sans Frontières are doing some work but it is still a bad place to live. there.”
The refugees used to camp in a city park before they were kicked out by the authorities.
Child prostitution was said to be rife.
“A girl I was working with said there was a lot of prostitution,” Barry said.
“Young boys waiting around in the parks for older men.”
Barry, from Newport, feared “a generation of people” were losing their lives in places like the Belgrade barracks.
“There are so many of them and they are coming from countries where as Europeans we sent troops or bombs and they are feeling the repercussions of this.
“We have turned our back on them, that is the really sad thing.”
It felt like “no one really wants these men”.
“They are not all young,” Barry said.
“Some look to be in their mid to late 60s.
“The reason they are stuck in Belgrade is because the border with Hungary is so heavily protected, they have no means of going I wouldn’t want to live through.th h
“They are stuck here until a smuggler decides to take them across.”
Even then there is “a good chance” they will be caught by the Hungarian Police.
“We have had many reports that the police are violent, setting dogs on people and taking their shoes and jackets,” Barry said.
“Some have water thrown on them and then they are taken back to Serbia.
“People return with dog bites, broken arms and broken legs.”