Injured, hunted, lost: mapping journeys of refugee children aiming for UK

Eight-week project by Refugee Youth Service shows danger faced by 22 children, who travelled 11,800 miles across Europe

A new mapping exercise has revealed the extraordinary difficulties and dangers faced by refugee children trying to reach the UK. It traces the routes of 22 children who travelled 11,800 miles (19,000km) in eight weeks, sustaining injuries, sleeping rough or even going missing.

The project, by the Refugee Youth Service, has been carried out with children who arrived in Ventimiglia, Italy, close to the French border. They came to Italy after crossing the Mediterranean from Libya. The organisation gave the children mobile phones so their progress could be surveyed and tried to connect them with local support groups as they travelled.

The children made drawings that showed the reasons for their journeys and the difficulties they had faced – from an image of violence in Sudan to a sketch of stick figures shouting “help” on a flimsy, overcrowded dinghy.

They have faced concerted efforts from border forces across Europe to keep them out. Many of the children are illegally pushed back into Italy by border police after making it into France. Read more here: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/13/injured-hunted-lost-mapping-journeys-of-refugee-children-aiming-for-uk?CMP=share_btn_fb