LIFE LINE EZIDI - Life Jackets
Life Line Ezidi is no longer operational. Thank you to all our donors and supporters for your generosity and solidarity.
While we can't stop families going to the sea, we can try to prevent them from drowning by giving them good quality (SOLAS approved) lifejackets suitable for non-swimmers in rough seas.
Most families travel to Istanbul or Izmir to meet up with traffickers who put them onto boats and dinghies (sometimes forcibly) then send them out into the Agean sea with no regard for their saftey or survival.
Unscrupulous traders in Turkey are selling fake lifejackets to vulnerable refugees. They are often filled with cheap foam or other non-bouyant materials that will quickly saturate and drag the wearer beneath the water (see article).
We try to intercept refugees before they get into the hands of the traffickers to give them good quality life jackets that will increase thier chances of survival.
You can see the difference between the lifejackets we give to refugees (see demonstration videos) and the flimsy life jackets refugees often have to resort to.
Number of Life Jackets given to date:
646
Information about who needs life jackets is sent to our volunteers in Istanbul by Ezidi volunteers in the Sirnak and Batman camps. They send the names and ages of each person going to sea. There is a name to every life jacket.