European leaders are grappling with what’s being called one of the worst migrant and refugee crises in two generations. On Thursday, in a hastily formed summit in Brussels called after an estimated 800 people died in a capsizing off Libya while en route to Europe, leaders pledged new support to cap the rising death toll in the Mediterranean. But aid organizations and humanitarian officials said Europe is still “lagging far behind” of what’s realistically needed to ease the tragedy.
The crisis along the Mediterranean’s coastlines, from Libya to Morocco and Greece to Italy, is not new. Photographers have worked over the last decade to raise awareness as conflict and poverty in the Middle East and Africa have displaced millions. Last June, one image crystallized the scale of this movement. Shot by Italian photographer Massimo Sestini aboard a helicopter taking part in Mare Nostrum, an Italian-led search and rescue operation largely funded by the European Union and abandoned late last year, it showed one boat with hundreds of people looking up, waving their arms. “You could see their desperation,” Sestini said last year. “And, concurrently, their happiness at being saved.”
The photograph, which TIME named one of the top 10 images of 2014, went on to win a World Press Photo award, but it told only one part of a much larger story.
“The only way to really tell the story is to spend time with them in their home countries, see how they live, learn why they leave and then just go with them on their way,” says Daniel Etter, a German photographer, who has documented migrants in northern Africa and across Europe. He called that “almost impossible” to do. Security risks, travel obstacles and financial barriers get in the way, leaving most photographers unable to build the kind of all-encompassing narrative that could help people understand the true nature of the crisis.
Shining a Light on the Plight of Europe’s Migrants, From Rome to Brussels
17-year old Ali from Algeria lives in the old train station of Corinth, Greece. He hopes to be able to board a boat to Western Europe.Alessandro PensoA group of migrants spends the night in the railway station of Orestiada, Greece, after crossing the border with Turkey.Alessandro PensoA group of Afghans in abandoned factory in Patras, Greece – one of the main escape points from Greece due to the numerous cargo ships that dock in the port and are bound for Italy.Alessandro PensoThree young Afghans spend the night in an abandoned building near the beach of Patras, Greece. Alessandro PensoMohammed from Algeria lives inside an old Columbia records factory in Athens, Greece.Alessandro PensoYoung Afghans cooking in an abandoned factory in Patras, Greece.Alessandro PensoView from the factory where illegal immigrants live, near the port of Patras, Greece.Alessandro PensoA group of adolescents are trying to board illegally a truck going to Italy. Only a very small percentage succeeds in this desperate attempt. Alessandro PensoMohammed, Ahmed and Nabi from Morocco live in a wagon in the abandoned train station of Corinth, Greece.Alessandro PensoA group of North Africans migrants was attacked by three locals. Mostafa El Mouzdahir, a 20-year old from Morocco, was hit by a car and sustained multiple injuries. When I went to see him in hospital, he had a police form requesting him to leave the country within 15 days because he was in Greece illegally.Alessandro PensoAfghan boys throwing stones into the sea in Patras, Greece. They are waiting for the evening, when they will try to sneak into the port to board a ship bound for Italy.Alessandro PensoMohamed from Morocco and his friends hiding and waiting for the right moment to illegally board a ship to Italy. 2012. Corinth, Greece. Alessandro Penso
Some photographers have attempted to piece together the stories of migrants who risk their lives on these journeys. Alixandra Fazzina, a photographer with Noor, followed Somali migrants’ arduous trip across the Gulf of Aden in search of a better future in her book A Million Shillings, published in 2010. One in 20 who attempted the crossing lost their lives, their bodies washing up on Yemen’s shore.
She wanted to go deeper, she says, than the “small paragraph you find in a newspaper detailing the number of people that have died… I wanted to find out why they were making the journey. I wanted to find out why these people were willing to put their lives into the hands of smugglers and traffickers? Why would somebody do that?”
Olivier Jobard, a French photographer who followed a Cameroonian man’s trek to France, seeks similar answers. “What’s bothering me when we’re talking about immigration is that we often associate these people with ghosts and shadows,” he says. “They are not human in our minds.”
Italian photographer Alessandro Penso, who has been following migrants around Europe, focusing on hotspots like Greece, Italy and Malta, says he seeks moments of spontaneity to expose the humanity of his subjects.”There are simple gestures and habits in daily life that, as banal as they can seem to our eyes, hide the simple truth that we are all humans and vulnerable.”
Humanizing the people making these dangerous and harrowing journeys is important, Penso and his colleagues argue, especially when photography can lead to misconceptions. Cases in point are the widely published photographs of “hordes” of people scaling border fences in Melilla, a Spanish enclave on the edge of northern Morocco. “[When] people see these images,” says Santi Palacios, an Associated Press photographer who has taken such pictures, “they [think] we’ve been invaded.”
The people portrayed in these images are often seen shirtless and shouting, Jobard says, deliberately assuming a provocative stance. “They actually choose to behave like ‘wild animals’ in these situations—to impress or to scare people because it’s a real battle to get in [Melilla]. Of course, that also does them disservice.”
Once they’ve made it over the fence, he says, the contrast is striking. “They dress up, they take care of their appearances.” Last year, he shadowed a man named Hassan Adam from the Ivory Coast, who spent hours on one of these fences, alone. His friends had made it across to Melilla, successfully avoiding the police forces, but Adam was handcuffed, beaten and sent back to Morocco. Jobard tracked him down, months later, after he had finally made it across. “I told his story,” he says. “I wanted to show that behind each migrant there’s a person.”
Lampedusa Shipwreck: From the Depths of the Mediterranean Sea
The shipwreck of the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of Lampedusa, Italy, lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORA scuba-diver inspects the shipwreck of the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORA pair of trousers lie on the seabed near the shipwreck of the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORA scuba-diver enters the shipwreck that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORA cabin inside the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORA scuba-diver inspects the shipwreck of the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORThe wheelhouse of the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORThe shipwreck of the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORThe shipwreck of the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORThe shipwreck of the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, on Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa.Francesco Zizola—NOORThe nameless graves in the cemetery belong to unidentified migrants found dead on the beach of Lampedusa in Italy.Francesco Zizola—NOOR
For all of those who made it over the fence, or past border patrols or across the Mediterranean, there are untold thousands who lost their lives in the search for a new or better one. In October, Italian photographer Francesco Zizola dived 59 meters to photograph the wreckage of a boat that had carried some 500 people, and now rests at the bottom of the Mediterranean. He sought to convey the vastness of the tragedy that had occurred one year before, when 360 people lost their lives.
“I wanted to show to everybody that our comfortable, bourgeois homes could turn—as if in a nightmare—into that cabin with the red curtain, which I photographed inside the sunken ship,” he says. “That cabin is the tomb of our collective conscience and a memento of our indifference.”
Alice Gabriner andMikko Takkunen edited this photo essay. With reporting byLucia De Stefani, a contributor to TIME LightBox.
Andrew Katzis a News Editor at TIME. Follow him on Twitter@katz. Olivier Laurentis the editor of TIME LightBox. Follow him onTwitterandInstagram@olivierclaurent.
Refugees from Libya rest in Ras Ajdir, a coastal town on the border between Libya and Tunisia in March, 2011. Davide Monteleone—VIIRefugees run to reach their transport to continue their journey in Libya, near the border with Egypt, May 18, 2014.Giulio Piscitelli—Contrasto/ReduxMigrants get ready to board the boat to reach Italy from the coast of Zarzis, Tunisia, March 13, 2011. Davide Monteleone—VIIA row of corpses line Al-Baida Beach in Bir Ali, Yemen, May 2, 2007. A total of 34 bodies were found. Just one week after an almost identical tragedy saw 30 dead on a nearby beach, Somali smugglers continued to drop their human cargo out at sea rather than coming close to shore and risking detection. Alixandra Fazzina—NOORA group of men look out to the city of Melilla, Spain from a garbage dump in Morocco in Nov. 2004. It is a short distance from North Africa to mainland Spain.
Olivier Jobard—MYOPA smuggler's boat bringing illegal immigrants from North Africa to the Canary Islands capsized near the coast in Nov. 2004.
Few could swim and two men drowned. Olivier Jobard—MYOPAfter a shipwreck off the coast of Morocco in Nov. 2004, only four of 34 men still had their shoes. The others lost everything, including their clothes, and had to make sandals out of makeshift items such as plastic bottles. Olivier Joabrd—MYOPItalian navy rescues asylum seekers traveling by boat off the coast of Africa on the Mediterranean, June 7, 2014.Massimo Sestini—PolarisTwo Afghan boys throw stones into the sea, while waiting for the evening to arrive, when they can sneak into the port and board a ship bound for Italy illegally in Patras, Italy, March 8, 2012. Patras is one of the main escape points from Greece, due to the numerous cargo ships that dock in the port and are bound for Italy. Alessandro Penso—Magnum Foundation Mohamed from Morocco and his friends hide behind the rocks at
the port, waiting for the right moment to illegally board a ship to Italy from Corinth, Greece, Feb. 21, 2012. In Greece, more than 99.5 percent of requests for political asylum are rejected, so these young people are forced to hide from the authorities.Alessandro Penso—Magnum Foundation Sub-Saharan migrants scale a metallic fence that divides Morocco and the Spanish enclave of Melilla, May 28, 2014. Santi Palacios—APRoughly 250 refugees from Egypt and Syria, among other countries, are checked by Doctors Without Borders as they disembark from an Italian ship, after being intercepted and rescued at sea en route to Italy from Egypt to the port in Pozzallo, Sicily, Italy, in Sept. 2014.Lynsey Addario—Getty Images ReportageA family of Syrian refugees holds its identification. Nearly 300 Syrians landed in the port of Catania, Dec. 6, 2014.Alessio Mamo—ReduxAfghan refugees, Kabir and Zaher, sit by a fire in Subotica, Serbia, Nov. 10, 2012. Zaher, who lost his left leg below the knees, made it to Serbia on crutches. Zaher says he is 16 and Kabir 15. The two were traveling together from Greece. The men lived outdoors in Subotica, waiting for smugglers to give the green light to continue their journey. Daniel Etter—ReduxRefugees from Syria inside the Harmanli camp in Bulgaria, Nov. 19, 2013. The biggest of Bulgaria’s “emergency centers” for refugees is in the town of Harmanli, about 18 miles (30 km) away from the Turkish border, where around 1,000 asylum-seekers are being detained on a former military base.Alessandro Penso—Magnum FoundationA young girl from Syria cooks inside the Harmanli camp in Bulgaria, Nov. 19, 2013. People living in tents have no access to sanitation facilities. Although there are four toilets in a building at the entrance of the center, they are frequently blocked and hardly adequate for hundreds of people. The tents are not heated and the residents sleep either on thin mattresses or on old foldable beds.Alessandro Penso—Magnum FoundationNezarisa Sakhi, a 31-year-old Iraqi, in Banya refugee center in Bulgaria on May 16, 2014. Sakhi was attacked on the evening of Sept. 16, 2013 by nine Bulgarians, one of whom Nezarisa says had a knife. He was beaten and pushed off a bridge, breaking his leg. Alessandro Penso—Magnum FoundationNawras Soukhta, a 15-year-old from Damascus, sits in the train traveling from Stockholm to Malmö, Sweden, a few hours after his plane lands in Sweden on Oct. 22, 2014. After 11 days sailing to Italy from Turkey, and another week traveling through Italy, the train ride to Malmö is the final leg of a three-week journey he has made in the hopes of applying for asylum in Sweden. Mackenzie Knowles-CoursinMansour, an immigrant from Mali waits a friend in downtown Sofia, Bulgaria, Dec. 7, 2014. He is in a shelter in south-western part of the city. Giulio Piscitelli—Contrasto/ReduxA pair of trousers lie on the seabed near the shipwreck of the 66-foot-long fishing boat that sank off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa lies at a depth of 164 ft. on the seabed, Sept. 22, 2014. The tragedy that happened a year ago on Oct. 3, 2013 killed 366 migrants from North Africa. Francesco Zizola—NOOR