Some travel alone; others travel with children or partners. But these camps have always been home to primarily young single men, making women a less visible minority that faces its own challenges. Despite their different backgrounds, displaced women in Calais and Grande-Synthe are linked in their attempt to reach the UK for a range of reasons including family ties such as partners, language pulls and as a last resort after being refused asylum elsewhere in Europe.
The camps around Grande-Synthe neighbouring the city of Dunkirk have been home to many women, who often travel in family units. In mid-September individuals lived within families in Grande-Synthe, including 50 women.
We have witnessed a concerning increase in women travelling alone, mainly from Iraq and Iran. Over the last year, about 35 women have passed through Calais. Few families lived in Calais previously, but this has changed in the last year with more Iranian families and single mothers arriving with children from West Africa. Most women travelling from Africa arrive through Libya to Italy. In , there were more women in Calais around 50 but these numbers fluctuate.
At the moment, many of these women have moved on to Brussels or the surrounding area in an attempt to find better shelter. While people report having less access to food one meal a day and facing brutal police violence, having a stable place to sleep each night is the biggest pull factor for displaced people, alongside access to medical care and legal information.
New arrivals have dropped dramatically since the reinforcement of European push-back operations to Libya and the crack down on search and rescue ships. Camps and makeshift settlements around Calais and Grande-Synthe are systematically evicted, up to every 48 hours, with few long-term and suitable alternatives offered.
