Formation 2 September 2015 | Type Social Media | |
 | ||
Purpose Helping refugees and tackling European refugee crisis Founders Alexis Stearns
Fuad Alakbarov
Marie Claire Lacey
Adam Stearns
Joshua Brown
Shirley Ellen Clain
Micha Streibelt | ||
Europe Sees Syria is an international activist movement that began in Glasgow, Scotland after the death of Alan Kurdi whose image made global headlines after he drowned in the Mediterranean Sea, as part of the Syrian refugee crisis. The Europe Sees Syria movement campaigns to help refugees and tackling European refugee crisis.
Contents
The movement was co-founded by activists: Alexis Stearns, Fuad Alakbarov, Marie Claire Lacey, Adam Stearns, Shirley Ellen Clain, Joshua Brown and Micha Streibelt. Although the activists run a stable social media pages, the overall Europe Sees Syria movement is a decentralised network, and has no formal hierarchy or structure.
Description and events
The movement began after the death of Alan Kurdi whose image made global headlines after he drowned in the Mediterranean Sea, as part of the Syrian refugee crisis. As a result, thousands of people have attended candlelight vigils across Scotland and Europe's cities to show solidarity for Syrian refugees and the victims of war. The events gathered two million people worldwide in 39 cities.
Alexis Stearns, one of the founders of the campaign stated that "as a wealthy country, many of our citizens want to register their disgust at how little our government is doing to tackle a very serious situation. We hope that other towns and cities will now be inspired to launch events so that we can send a message from every corner of the world."
Fuad Alakbarov, human rights advocate, stated that "there is a Scotland that is represented by people of compassion and people of welcome and people who believe in the fundamental principles of human rights."
Marie Claire Lacey, human rights advocate and one of the co-ordinators of the Europe Sees Syria, said that "it has been amazing that people have approached us from all over Europe and this has become a worldwide show of solidarity."
More than 200,000 people have signed a nationwide petition calling on the UK Government to accept more asylum seekers and increase support for refugees. The Catholic Church in Scotland, the Church of Scotland, the Muslim Council of Scotland, and the Scottish Council of Jewish Communities have issued an Interfaith statement on the refugee crisis part of which reads ‘We welcome the UK and Scottish governments’ willingness to offer a safe haven to these desperate people. We urge them to back this with practical action to help as many refugees as possible, and we call on our communities to support this and make them welcome’.
Influence
St Mary's Cathedral in Glasgow hosted "Glasgow Hears Syria", a musical response to the refugee crisis. Funds raised by the event split between Amnesty International and the Migrant Offshore Aid Agency.