Escape

UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency

In the opening episode, we tell the story of two refugees who made very different journeys more than 35 years apart, but who faced many similar challenges in their efforts to escape conflict and persecution – including exploitation, abuse and despair before escape, rescue and renewed hope. Thuy is a refugee from Viet Nam who fled in 1979 as one of the millions of “boat people”. Instead of a swift rescue, she was marooned on an island where she had to hide every night from marauding pirates. We also hear the story of Samrawit, an Eritrean woman who fled her home in 2016 only to be abducted by people traffickers. Once freed, she later survived a shipwreck off the coast of Libya before her odyssey ultimately led her to Sweden.