The ongoing mass migration from Syria and other places in the Middle East and beyond has also brought with it a surge in violence against women on the trail to a new home. Interviews with migrants, social workers, and others caring for the new arrivals to Germany and other countries in Europe reveal numerous incidents of sexual assaults, sex trafficking and domestic abuse at the hands of fellow refugees, European police officers, smugglers and male family members, reports Katrin Bennhold.
And once they arrive in a ‘safe place’ like Germany? A lack of basic protections for women, like lockable bedrooms and washrooms, in a country struggling to cope with one million new refugees, has inadvertently facilitated more violence.
