"We are not alone" on 11 May 2018 at Minoritenplatz, Vienna

Christoph Riedl, Daniel Landau, Michael Genner and me

Christoph Riedl, Diakonie Austria

Daniel Landau and Choir TrotzAlleDem

Michael Genner, Asylum in Need

My speech

My message to you Ahmad Jan and to all people who feel inside that we should have a different way of dealing with people on the run, in the great hope that we carry on and expand a great movement! #justiceforA #justiceforafghanes Hey Jan! I'll start with this: I will not rest until right is right again and people are so strong that they rise above party lines, reservations, fears, incomprehension, etc. to restore the human order in our country that most Austrians wish for in their hearts. The day I had to watch through the window of the airport restaurant your deportation to one of the most brutal countries in the world, Afghanistan, was one of the worst days of my life.

How many times did I encourage you, did we philosophise about law, human love and justice? How many times did we sit opposite each other at the glass window in the detention centre and try to believe in a good outcome? A few times you told me to smile, because that would help you bear all this...... Countless people in our country, countless, from all different walks of life, asked for the deadly danger you were proven to be facing in Afghanistan to be taken into account. Your case moved and continues to move the public. Firstly, because of your inconceivable fate. And because it so openly shows the vehemence with which those politically responsible ignore the life of a young, innocent person, only to make it clear to all refugees from near and far "we don't want you!" Your line "Doro, this is a political ball game, I am the ball, please catch me" will stay in my memory forever. I still try to carry you, no matter where you are, because I see it as my human duty not to leave my friends, and I count you among them, any human being in such inconceivable distress, hanging. Rest assured, even if it is not always easy, I will stay beside you! No matter where you are! But there are also other reasons why this, your case, must not be forgotten! And these reasons make your case just as much our case. It is about our attitude! And it is about the law and how we interpret human rights and live them in practice.

I have countless cases where the BFA claims that there are no ties to Austria, even though the person concerned goes in and out of an Austrian family. I know of several cases where the BfA official has said out loud that "we", whoever that may be, know that people from Afghanistan are lying. And I personally know office directors of the BFA who have credibly told me that there is a directive to decide negatively on Afghans. You know, Jan, and these are precisely the reasons, among many others, that make these dramas, this unbelievable derailment, this inhuman policy that is currently spreading in our country and in other European countries, also my cause, our cause! When you were deported, under these dramatic circumstances, my mother cried and said she had experienced all this before. That and all my experiences with the BMI, politics, the inflammatory media, who do everything to separate you from us humanly, that is something I simply cannot accept, no, do not want to accept. I am so infinitely grateful that I was born in peace. I am so infinitely grateful that many people, Austrians, people from the former Yugoslavia, Hungary, Turkey, Germany, etc., have helped to make our country what it is, a peaceful, rich country. And where is there a better place to remain human, to live love, goodness, reason and peace than in ours? If we don't stay human here, don't combine reason and justice, then where in the world? I don't want people to be deported at a breathtaking speed from our country, where in principle everyone knows that nothing but war, brutality, bombings and radicalism awaits them.

I don't want to be with those who later have to tell their grandchildren that there was no other way. And I don't want such cruelties, such human crimes to take place here in my/our peace-loving country, whose main religion includes the message of Jesus. No, I don't want that, I want love! And for this I will talk to people, ask politicians for dialogue, walk from door to door, look for allies, loving, sometimes helpless, but loving people in all strata of society, until this understanding has grown to such an extent that these human rights crimes and these cruelties towards you, towards you Jan, are no longer possible. Because they vehemently demand a different solution from politics.