{"product_id":"my-fourth-time-we-drowned-isbn-9781685890575","title":"My Fourth Time, We Drowned","description":"\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\"A magnificent, engagé investigative report… [an] act of  witness...It  is clear from [Hayden’s book] that the current politics of  immigration  have turned \u0026amp; twisted human nature against itself and  our own kind  and are fostering unimaginable maltreatment of those who  wish only to  survive and live a better life… [It] strongly convey[s]  the urgency of  fundamentally rethinking immigration policy… It is  already late to act, but that is a poor reason for inaction.” - The New  York Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eWinner Terzani Prize\/Premio Terzani 2024\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eWinner ‘journalist of the year’, Irish Journalism Awards 2023\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eWinner best ‘foreign coverage’, Irish Journalism Awards 2023\u003cbr\u003eFinalist in the 2023 BookTube Prize \u003cbr\u003eNominated for the Jan Michalski Prize for Literature 2023\u003cbr\u003eFinalist for the \u003ci\u003eNew York Public Library’s Helen Bernstein Book \u003c\/i\u003eAward for Excellence in Journalism \u003ci\u003e2023\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eA Sunday Times \u003c\/i\u003e‘one to watch’ 2023\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of The Orwell Prize for Political Writing 2022\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of The Michel Déon Prize 2022\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eWinner of the An Post Irish Book of the Year Award 2022\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of the An Post Irish Book Award for Nonfiction 2022\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eA \u003ci\u003eFinancial Times\u003c\/i\u003e Best Political Book of 2022 \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eA\u003ci\u003e Kirkus \u003c\/i\u003eBest Nonfiction Book of 2022 \u003cbr\u003e A \u003ci\u003eNew Yorker \u003c\/i\u003eBest Book of 2022 \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eA \u003ci\u003eGuardian \u003c\/i\u003eBest History and Politics Book of 2022\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Western world has turned its back on migrants, leaving them to cope with one of the most devastating humanitarian crises in history.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Reporter Sally Hayden was at home in London when she received a message on Facebook: “Hi sister Sally, we need your help.” The sender identified himself as an Eritrean refugee who had been held in a Libyan detention center for months, locked in one big hall with hundreds of others. Now, the city around them was crumbling in a scrimmage between warring factions, and they remained stuck, defenseless, with only one remaining hope: contacting her. Hayden had inadvertently stumbled onto a human rights disaster of epic proportions. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom this single message begins a staggering account of the migrant crisis across North Africa, in a groundbreaking work of investigative journalism. With unprecedented access to people currently inside Libyan detention centers, Hayden’s book is based on interviews with hundreds of refugees and migrants who tried to reach Europe and found themselves stuck in Libya once the EU started funding interceptions in 2017. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt is an intimate portrait of life for these detainees, as well as a condemnation of NGOs and the United Nations, whose abdication of international standards will echo throughout history. But most importantly, My Fourth Time, We Drowned shines a light on the resilience of humans: how refugees and migrants locked up for years fall in love, support each other through the hardest times, and carry out small acts of resistance in order to survive in a system that wants them to be silent and disappear.\u003cb\u003eTerzani Prize\/Premio Terzani 2024 Winner\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eA\u003ci\u003e New Yorker \u003c\/i\u003eBest Book of 2022\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003eIrish Journalism Awards\u003c\/b\u003e named Sally Hayden \"Journalist of the Year\" for 2023\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"A deeply researched and harrowing chronicle of the experiences of many  refugees fleeing dictatorships, violence, persecution, and war. The book  is the culmination of a one-woman fact-finding mission to uncover the  myriad abuses faced by migrants hoping to make a better life for  themselves in Europe.\" \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e-- Foreign Policy\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\"[A] landmark work of reportage about the migrant crisis.\" \u003cb\u003e-\u003ci\u003e- The New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A magnificent, engagé investigative report… [an] act of witness\" \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e- - New York Review of Books\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"A magnificent, engagé investigative report… [an] act of witness...It is clear from [Hayden’s book] that the current politics of immigration have turned \u0026amp; twisted human nature against itself and our own kind and are fostering unimaginable maltreatment of those who wish only to survive and live a better life… [It] strongly convey[s] the urgency of fundamentally rethinking immigration policy… It is already late to act, but that is a poor reason for inaction.” \u003cb\u003e-- \u003ci\u003eThe New York Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Hayden’s powerful book relays the harrowing stories migrants have shared  with her from their experiences in various Libyan migrant detention  centers, from enduring near-starvation conditions to torture and even  death...an accessible, critically reported account...\" \u003cb\u003e-\u003ci\u003e- The Washington Post \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"I frantically underlined journalist Sally Hayden’s first book, \u003ci\u003eMy Fourth Time, We Drowned\u003c\/i\u003e ... Readers should ... let Hayden’s vital reporting make them reconsider their view of what makes a moral world.\" \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—The Baffler\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \"\u003ci\u003eMy Fourth Time, We Drowned\u003c\/i\u003e is journalism of the most urgent kind.\" \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—The Financial Times\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \"There is perhaps no better testament to the racist double standard at the core of European border policy than the accounts of refugees and migrants collected in\u003ci\u003e. . . My Fourth Time, We Drowned\u003c\/i\u003e.\" \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—The Intercept\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"[A]stonishingly detailed... \u003ci\u003eMy Fourth Time, We Drowned\u003c\/i\u003e is not simply a catalogue of misery: it is a meticulously documented record of the complicity of the very organizations that are meant to be forces of good.\" \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—The Times Literary Supplement\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"The narrative is consistently harrowing, revealing the complexities  within a global crisis that lacks an easy solution, especially as the  numbers of refugees mount. An important contribution to the literature  of forced immigration and humanitarian crisis.\"  \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eKirkus\u003c\/i\u003e (Starred Review)\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A meticulous account of the horrifying North African refugee crisis . . . Painstaking details and a roundabout timeline make \u003ci\u003eMy Fourth Time, We Drowned\u003c\/i\u003e informative, while the testimonies from the refugees themselves pulse  with difficult truths that will shock (and maybe mobilize) conscientious  citizens across the globe.\" —\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eForeword Reviews \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\"Intrepidly reported and vividly written, this sobering account shines a spotlight on an underreported tragedy.\"\u003ci\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Publishers Weekly\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"The painful themes from this formidable book are skillfully written  about by Sally Hayden...\"\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e -- New Lines Magazine \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \"Good journalism of this sort should, at the very least, make the reader  angry. Excellent journalism should not only make one angry, it should  make the reader feel the pain and the fear intrinsic to the reportage.  It should make the reader want to act, to yell, to raise their fist, to  do anything but throw up one’s hands in despair. In \u003ci\u003eMy Fourth Time, We Drowned\u003c\/i\u003e, Hayden does all that and more.\" \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Counterpunch Magazine\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e \"...a brilliant, unparalleled investigation of one of the most underreported scandals and monstrous crimes of our time.\" \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Responsible Statecraft \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\"A wrenching account of what people will endure in search of a better life.\"\u003ci\u003e \u003cb\u003e- The Washington Independent Review of Books\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \"\u003ci\u003eMy Fourth Time, We Drowned\u003c\/i\u003e is the most important work of   contemporary reporting I have ever read. Every citizen of the European   Union has not only a right, but also a responsibility, to learn about   the realities described in this book. I hope that Sally Hayden's work   can help to begin a radically new and overdue discussion about Europe's   approach to migration and borders.\" \u003cb\u003e—Sally Rooney, author of \u003ci\u003eBeautiful World, Where Are You\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \"This  book is a comprehensive indictment of the EU’s inhumane  approach to the  thousands of people that come to us seeking sanctuary.  Her stories of  the people trying to get here against the odds are  gripping, shocking  and heartbreaking. Sally Hayden's \u003ci\u003eMy Fourth Time, We Drowned\u003c\/i\u003e is impossible to put down. It should make the plight of its protagonists impossible to ignore.\" \u003cb\u003e—Ben Rawlence, author of \u003ci\u003eCity of Thorns\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\"One of the most important testaments of this awful time in life's  history. It is both heartbreaking and stoic. I cry reading any page of  it. Sally Hayden is a young and brilliant journalist.\" \u003cb\u003e—Edna O'Brien, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Little Red Chairs \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\" 'I had stumbled on a human rights disaster of epic  proportions,' writes  Sally Hayden in the prologue of her remarkable  story of the ongoing  migrant crisis in Europe. Contacted blind, on the  phone, by a desperate  young man locked in a brutal refugee camp in  Libya, Hayden embarked on a  years-long effort to document the courage,  humor, kindness, and  resilience of ordinary people trapped by  circumstance, and the tragic  moral failure of the west to help them.  The refugee who sent her the  first Facebook message in 2018 had no way  to know it, but he had reached  exactly the right person. Read her  book.\" \u003cb\u003e—Mark Bowden, author of \u003ci\u003eBlack Hawk Down\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A must-read for all of us\"\u003cb\u003e —Andrea Elliott, author of \u003ci\u003eInvisible Child\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eMy Fourth Time, We Drowned\u003c\/i\u003e is a veritable masterclass in  journalism. Unexpectedly finding herself a journalistic agony aunt for  migrants being tortured, starved and raped inside horrific Libyan  detention centres, Sally Hayden weaves together their WhatsApp and  Facebook messages to produce the most riveting, detailed and damning  account ever written on the deadliest of migration routes.\" \u003cb\u003e—Christina Lamb author of \u003ci\u003eThe Sewing Circles of Herat: a Personal Voyage Through Afghanistan\u003c\/i\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Irish  journalist Sally Hayden describes one of the great tragedies of our  era, the story of the thousands of refugees bent on starting new lives  in the West, who instead spend years rotting in Sudanese refugee camps,  trapped in Libyan prisons, clinging to sinking dinghies in the  Mediterranean. Her harrowing portrait captures the voices of the  Eritreans, Somalis, Ethiopians, Gambians and Sierra Leoneans caught up  in this pitiless modern slave trade, who constantly remind us that the  desire to better yourself is the most fundamental of human impulses.  This is a remarkable and important book.\" \u003cb\u003e—Michela Wrong, author of \u003ci\u003eIn the Footsteps of Mr. Kurtz\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"This vivid chronicle of the lives and dreams of those who risk all to  cross the Mediterranean to reach Europe, may make you cry, but it should  make you angry. It is not just a blistering rebuke to those who  torture, rape and imprison, but to the rest of us, who turn a blind  eye.\" \u003cb\u003e—Lindsey Hilsum, author of \u003ci\u003eIn Extremis: The Life and Death of the War Correspondent Marie Colvin\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \"Sally Hayden's heart-stopping account of the plight of contemporary refugees is both a compelling epic and an intimate encounter with exact personal experience. She achieves what all great writing hopes to do—the restoration of humanity to those who have been deprived of it. This is a vital book for anyone who wants to feel what it means to be human in the 21st century.\" \u003cb\u003e—Fintan O'Toole, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Politics of Pain\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \"Kafka retold by an Irishwoman in Africa. Read this great book shedding light on a monstrous crime.\" \u003cb\u003e—John Sweeney, host of \u003ci\u003eHunting Ghislaine with John Sweeney \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eMy Fourth Time, We Drowned \u003c\/i\u003eis compassionate, brave, enraging, beautifully written and incredibly well-researched. Hayden exposes the truth about years of grotesque abuse committed against some of the world's most vulnerable people in all of our names. After this, none of us can say we didn't know.\" \u003cb\u003e—Oliver Bullough, author of \u003ci\u003eMoneyland \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \"This is a brilliant book, powerful and emotional—Sally Hayden is a superb journalist and through her incredible courage and eye witness testimonies, paints a compelling picture of the poignant and horrific lives endured by so many refugees and migrants. A must read for anyone with a conscience.\" \u003cb\u003e—Miriam O'Callaghan, presenter for Prime Time (Ireland) \u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eSally Hayden is an Irish journalist  focused on migration, conflict, and humanitarian crises. She is currently  the Africa correspondent for the \u003ci\u003eIrish Times\u003c\/i\u003e. Sally’s work on Libya has been featured by the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e, the \u003ci\u003eGuardian\u003c\/i\u003e, Channel 4 News, CNN International, \u003ci\u003eAl Jazeera\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eTIME\u003c\/i\u003e, BBC, \u003ci\u003eDie ZEIT\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eDer Spiegel\u003c\/i\u003e, the \u003ci\u003eSunday Times\u003c\/i\u003e, the \u003ci\u003eTelegraph\u003c\/i\u003e, ITV News, and other outlets across the world. She has reported on other international stories for the \u003ci\u003eWashington Post\u003c\/i\u003e, the \u003ci\u003eFinancial Times Magazine\u003c\/i\u003e, and the Thomson Reuters Foundation. In 2019, Sally was named as one of \u003ci\u003eForbes\u003c\/i\u003e ’30 Under 30’ in Media in Europe, in part because of her work on refugee issues.On Sunday, August 26, 2018, I was browsing through Netflix, in a sublet room in north London, when I received a Facebook message. “Hi sister Sally, we need your help,” it read. “We are under bad condition in Libya prison. If you have time, I will tell you all the story.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOf course, this did not make sense to me. How did someone thousands of miles away find my name? How did they have a working phone if they were locked up? I was skeptical, but I replied quickly to see what would come next. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“I’m so sorry to hear that,” I wrote. “Yes, of course I have time, though unfortunately I can’t do much to help.” We exchanged WhatsApp numbers. The sender explained that his brother knew my journalism from Sudan, a neighboring North African country, and had traced my contact details online. He needed them because he was trapped in Ain Zara, a migrant detention center in Libya’s capital, Tripoli, alongside hundreds of other refugees. Conflict had broken out around them. Smoke rose above the walls outside. They were watching the city smolder and burn.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe Libyans in charge at Ain Zara, who had been abusing them for months, fled when the sounds of fighting grew nearer. It was never clear whether the guards—or the “police,” as the refugees called them—left to escape or join in: many had sympathies with those fighting, while others were simply frightened or arrogant young men who signed up because they needed work, felt comfortable being armed, and had spotted the potential for extra profits through exploitation. There were still children and pregnant women inside the building. The refugee men, who had been locked in one big hall for months, broke down the separating door. They hoped the group would be safer if they were all together.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“We see bullets passing over us and heavy weapons in the street,” my new contact typed, before sending me photos he said were from that day. One, taken through a window, showed vehicles with anti-aircraft guns visible outside the center’s gates. Another was an image of himself: an emaciated-looking 28-year-old sitting on the ground with three young children.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEveryone inside the building was unarmed and defenseless: stick thin after months with maybe a meal a day, sometimes nothing. Their bodies were scarred from torture and beatings, inflicted both by the guards who had just left and the smugglers who held them for months or years before they arrived in Ain Zara. The war raging outside had been coming for a long time, and these people needed help—any help, even if it was a journalist in a faraway country with little to offer.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“If there is any United Nations Refugee Agency or human rights organizations near you, contact them. Since yesterday we haven’t eaten any food,” messaged the man. “If you have a page post something on that about this situation.” He said he came from Eritrea, a repressive country in the Horn of Africa where citizens are forced into unending military service by the ruling dictatorship. He had breached two borders, survived kidnapping by traffickers, and traveled nearly 3,000 kilometers to get to Libya. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLike everyone else with him, the man then tried to cross the Mediterranean Sea to reach Europe but was caught and incarcerated. Now they were in trouble. They had one phone between hundreds that the detainees had kept hidden for months. He said it was the phone a smuggler gave him to bring on board the rubber boat so they could call for rescue once it inevitably began to sink. The European Union was responsible for the situation they were now in—it was Europe that had forced them back.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI spent the next twenty-four hours doing all I could to verify his story. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI asked for photos of his surroundings, videos, selfies, GPS locations, and contact details for his family members. I knew people in Libya, and they confirmed there was conflict in the suburb they were in.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI called him numerous times.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs I requested more and more detail, the man I was speaking to told me how, before the fighting got bad, detainees had regularly been taken from the detention center and forced to work like slaves in the homes of wealthy Libyans. Women were raped, and Christians targeted for particular abuse—violently assaulted while their crucifixes were ripped from their necks. Some mornings, around 3:00 a.m., the armed Libyan guards would call hundreds of detainees out to be “counted,” sadistically making them stand in the cold for hours. They probably were not aware, but this ordeal echoed \u003ci\u003eAppellplatz\u003c\/i\u003e, the early\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003emorning roll calls Nazis used to do in concentration camps—a grim ritual carried out with the aim of intimidating and humiliating prisoners. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDespite the UN saying its staff had regular access to the centers, that did not seem to be true. Many detainees who had fled war or dictatorships were never even registered as refugees. That meant there was no list of their names anywhere. They were terrified of being sold back to smugglers, who torture migrants until their families pay hefty ransoms. They were begging to be saved.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI had stumbled, inadvertently, on a human rights disaster of epic proportions.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThere were eight pregnant women and roughly twenty babies and toddlers among the Ain Zara group. As the man and I spoke on the phone, bombs exploded nearby, and I heard the sounds of shrieking. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Now everyone is disturbed, it is becoming worse and worse . . . Look at the women and children, you can post this video for the European people to know.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrantically, I searched for an answer. I contacted the UN and international aid organizations working in Libya, but they said it was too dangerous for their staff to act (“In Libya today, everybody is at risk, so not an easy situation,” one aid worker responded, showing a callous pragmatism I was to encounter again and again). I emailed editors asking whether they would publish a report, but I was a freelancer, and—as often happens—replies were slow.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFeeling unmoored and useless, I began to post screenshots of my messages with the refugees on Twitter, where they were quickly shared, garnering tens of thousands of views, and then hundreds of thousands. Within months, their words would reach millions.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“There’s no food, no water. The children are crying. We are suffering, especially the children. We haven’t slept in two days. We are waiting for some miracle. Tell them the people are dying here.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTime stretched out for me, with sleepless nights and nerve-racking days measured in countless moments laden with danger. I barely left the sparse room I was renting, except when I was picked up by a taxi to do TV and radio interviews after BBC producers spotted my Twitter updates. Online, there was a cascade of retweets and likes and shares, but in Ain Zara nothing changed. The refugees would turn off the phone to conserve its battery, silence suddenly interrupted by a flurry of messages at any new development. Eventually, buses arrived. Was this salvation? At first, we did not know if their drivers were Libyan authorities or smugglers (I would later learn there is not always much to distinguish the two). Armed men in uniform said they were taking the detainees to a different area, which was—at least at that moment—farther from the front line.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen, about fifty hours after I received the first message, I watched through WhatsApp as the GPS location of the man’s phone edged across the city. I used it to update the refugees on where they were. “To your left, you will see the University of Tripoli,” I remember typing, and they responded excitedly when they spotted its modern facade. For many of the passengers on board, this was the first time they had seen the city in daylight.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe buses and their occupants reached another compound. Worried that they might have been transferred to a smuggler’s den, my main contact asked me if it was a detention center under the control of Libya’s Tripoli-based government. I, in turn, emailed my new UN sources, who told me yes, it was. Inside, there were already around seventy other detainees who had been moved from elsewhere. Staff with the UN’s International Organization for Migration—wearing fluorescent, garishly branded jackets—turned up to hand out water. Those employees would later message me, too, telling me that things were under control.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAround midnight, the detained refugees were given cake and yogurt: their first food in days. “Get some sleep, it is enough for you too, you were with us the whole time,” read my final messages from that night. “The guys are thanking you so much. They are saying ‘give her some rest.’ May God bless you.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e***\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat does your phone mean to you? Is it a way to chat to friends or swipe through dating apps? Do you take selfies, send voice notes or Snapchats? Is it a vital source of information? Has it saved your life? \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat would it represent if you were incarcerated, its little screen your only window to the outside world? What would it be like to spend months or years in the same building without one? Could you share a phone with five hundred others? Would you risk being tortured to keep it or forego eating to buy data, knowing you would starve without food but could disappear forever if you had no way of sending a distress call? \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat is it like to watch innocent people being shot through Facebook messenger? How would you feel listening to their faltering voices as they mentally and physically withered away? That’s what I was going to discover.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOriginally, I believed these first contacts in Libya were an anomaly, the isolated victims of an accidental oversight. Once these people were helped, I thought, my job would be done. I was wrong. Within days, more and more detained refugees began contacting me. They got my number from friends, or found what I had been posting online. They sent messages through Twitter and WhatsApp. Their stories were eerily similar.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI would learn that roughly six thousand people were being held indefinitely, at that time, in more than twenty so-called “official” migrant detention centers in Libya. These centers were ostensibly run by Libya’s Department for Combatting Illegal Migration (DCIM), which was associated with the UN-backed Government of National Accord in Tripoli—one of two governments vying for power in the febrile North African country. In reality, the Tripoli government was weak, propped up by a collection of militias that operated with impunity. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe majority of those locked up had already tried to reach Europe but they had been caught on the Mediterranean Sea. I researched more and discovered that, in an effort to stop sea crossings, the EU had committed to spending close to 100 million euro on the Libyan coastguard. Libyan sailors—many of whom were former smugglers—were encouraged to patrol the Mediterranean and intercept refugees’ boats. This allowed the EU to circumnavigate international law, which says people cannot be returned to countries where their lives are in danger. Between 2017 and late 2021, more than eighty thousand men, women, and children were captured at sea and forced back to Libya. Most of them were then locked up for being in the country illegally, but there were no official charges, trials, or any way to contest their imprisonment. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCaptives had seen friends escape detention centers only to be killed by militias that patrolled the streets. Others were shot trying to get away. They told me how tuberculosis ended lives and food deprivation left people lying motionless on the ground. They described detainees who stopped speaking after losing their minds through stress and hopelessness, rocking backwards and forwards, their arms tight around their knees. They sent me torture videos of tormented relatives held for ransom by merciless smugglers. They felt abandoned by the UN and cursed the EU for not recognizing that refugees are humans, too. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThroughout everything that happened, my contacts carefully hid their phones, begging friends elsewhere to top up their credit so they could connect to the internet and secretly charging the batteries on the rare occasions there was electricity. “This SIM card is our life,” one man explained. Groups of tens or even hundreds of people would crowd around a phone to craft messages together, carefully deliberating how best to describe their situation. Each word they sent was a precious cry for help. Raising awareness of their plight might be the only thing giving them hope.\u003cbr\u003e_\u003cbr\u003eIn the course of my reporting, I found many ways to confirm what I was told, and I am grateful to all the people who assisted me but cannot be identified. Over time, I developed many sources in each detention center. This book is based on interviews with hundreds of refugees and migrants who have found themselves stuck in Libya since the EU started funding interceptions in 2017. I also built up a large network of contacts among international and local humanitarian workers who wanted to talk but needed to go unnamed to continue their work. Much of what they said could not be published at the time due to security risks. Instead, my job became passing information between detained refugees and the aid organizations or UN agencies that were supposed to be assisting them. Unexpectedly, my geographic distance from Libya was exactly the reason that refugees trusted me to do this.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe first thing I always say to people who contact me is that I cannot help them directly. I am just a journalist; I don’t have the power to do anything except report. I have been surprised by how many responses are positive. New sources say they understand but still want their stories told. They hope the rest of the world will realize they exist, that for now they are alive and worth saving.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor years after that first message came in August 2018, I messaged refugees and migrants in different Libyan detention centers every day. I imagined the network of hidden phones, the connections between me and them, between them and their families or friends, like lifelines—arteries, pumping blood. I could not fathom the bravery of the people I spoke to. We talked about the dangers of going public, but if a source wanted to take that risk, I respected their choice. Some were beaten up or tortured on suspicion of sending information. Their phones were regularly confiscated. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eStill now, I often receive videos, photos, or audio I cannot share. Missing people and evidence of atrocities accumulate in my phone’s photo album in between pictures of autumn leaves or friends’ babies. I set WhatsApp to save media automatically because detained refugees send me videos they cannot keep for safety reasons, and I do not want to risk them failing to download. I was getting so many messages at one stage that it was almost impossible to read them all.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThese images are a sharp reminder of the world’s growing disparities. People are more able to communicate than ever before, yet routes to safety are being shut down. Citizens in the West can look away, despite windows everywhere—phone screens, TV broadcasts, videos posted online—providing insight into our vast inequality. Anyone who does open their eyes may end up bearing witness to human rights abuses thousands of miles away without any ability to intervene.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis is not a story about me, but it is true that when I received those first messages, I could not have anticipated the personal ramifications of reporting on this crisis. The following years would see my life threatened in North Africa and my freedom on the line in Europe. I would travel across three continents chasing leads, spending weeks on a ship in the Mediterranean Sea and coming face to face with human smugglers accused of torturing people to death. I would uncover corruption, lies, and gross negligence and be denounced by government propaganda channels. My reporting would be referenced in human rights reports, legal challenges, and a submission to the International Criminal Court that called for EU officials to be charged with crimes against humanity.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI wrote this book because I wanted to document the consequences of European migration policies beginning from the point at which Europe becomes ethically culpable: when refugees are forcibly turned away. Until I began writing it, I did not realize how small a book can be. There is a lot I had to leave out, but I hope what is contained here goes some way towards documenting the scale of what we are responsible for. I ignored an initial suggestion by a literary agent to avoid naming detention centers because it could be too confusing for a reader. It felt important that the places where so many people suffered were identified. For length reasons, I was not able to include all the centers where I was in touch with detainees, but each had its own particular definition of hell.","brand":"Melville House","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48233416392933,"sku":"NP9781685890575","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781685890575_566795cb-1e5a-4dba-a495-8441e342e254.jpg?v=1767733287","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/my-fourth-time-we-drowned-isbn-9781685890575","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}