Refugee Week: Hadiya and Shadi Ahmed, from Syria, who live in a refugee camp close to Erbil, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
Hadiya and Shadi Ahmed were forced to leave their one-week-old daughter with family in Syria to get urgent cancer treatment for the mother (Picture: Hadiya Ahmed)

Across the world, one in every 97 people are forcibly displaced due to conflict, persecution, and economic disasters. Most stuck in refugee camps have little hope of ever going home.

At the end of 2019, there were an ‘unprecedented’ 79.5 million displaced people worldwide, according to figures released on Thursday by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR). The organisation said it has never seen a higher figure.

In the 1990s, on average 1.5 million refugees returned home each year but over the past decade that number has fallen to around 385,000. Filippo Grandi, of the UNHCR, said forced displacement is ‘no longer a short-term and temporary phenomenon,’ adding: ‘People cannot be expected to live in a state of upheaval for years on end, without a chance of going home, nor a hope of building a future where they are.’

Teachers Hadiya and Shadi Ahmed, and their two young children, are part of that statistic. In 2013, the couple were forced to leave their one-week-old daughter with family in Syria, to get Hadiya urgent life-saving cancer treatment in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.

But the young parents never envisioned they would still be living in an 8,400-strong refugee camp seven years later, with their daughter, seven, and son, one, who have never known a life where they can play in the streets carefree.

Despite the obstacles the family have overcome, Hadiya and Shadi, who teach languages through online platform NaTakallam, never give up hope that one day they will give their children the future they had planned.

Hadiya, 31, told Metro.co.uk: ‘The necessities of life aren’t available in the camp. It is very difficult, especially because the camp doesn’t have places for the children to play.

Refugee Week: Hadiya and Shadi Ahmed, from Syria, who live in a refugee camp close to Erbil, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
The family live in a camp close to Erbil, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (Picture: Hadiya Ahmed)

‘It is our dream to give them a good quality of education – kids are the future of us and for the country.’

‘Right now, it’s still just a dream,’ added Shadi, 39. ‘But we should be patient and never give up.’

When the pandemic spread across the world, fears were raised that refugees would perish in insanitary camps with many suffering shortages of vital essentials.

Despite more than 25,000 confirmed coronavirus cases in Iraq, Hadiya and Shadi’s camp has miraculously emerged unscathed. According to the couple, there have been no confirmed cases after it was closed off to the outside world from early March.

Still, the pandemic has affected those inside the camp. Food has been scarce, while many have lost jobs and the small sources of income they desperately rely on to buy basic necessities. Hadiya, who has a weakened immune system, has been worried about catching the virus and her hospital check-ups have been put on hold amid lockdown.

Refugee Week: Hadiya and Shadi Ahmed, from Syria, who live in a refugee camp close to Erbil, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
The family never envisioned they would still be living in a refugee camp seven years later (Picture: Hadiya Ahmed)

Hadiya said: ‘We have a lot of dust here, so it affects me and I get the flu a lot. We can’t go outside the camp because of coronavirus. Everything is expensive in here, so simple things are difficult to pay for.’

‘I never thought we would be here more than six years,’ Shadi, a former music teacher, added. ‘I don’t feel I belong to this place. We want to change our circumstances and travel for our children.’

In 2013, Hadiya, an English literature graduate, gave birth to their first child. But days later she became seriously unwell and doctors feared the worst.

At the same time, her husband Shadi – who had previously served in the army – was being called back to fight on the frontline of the country’s brutal civil war. 

‘I decided not to go,’ Shadi said. ‘I will have to kill people. How can I do that? These are my people.’

Due to the ongoing conflict, not many hospitals could offer his wife the diagnosis or treatment she desperately needed. The doctor gave the couple two options – travel to Damascus city and risk being caught in crossfire between ISIS, the Syrian army and rebel fighters, or cross the border to Erbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan, and become refugees.

Refugee Week: Hadiya and Shadi Ahmed, from Syria, who live in a refugee camp close to Erbil, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
The camp remarkably has not had a single case of coronavirus, say the couple (Picture: Hadiya Ahmed)
Refugee Week: Hadiya and Shadi Ahmed, from Syria, who live in a refugee camp close to Erbil, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
But the pandemic has caused many refugees to lose the small source of income they desperately rely on (Picture: Hadiya Ahmed)

They chose the latter and set off on the journey almost immediately, but were forced to leave their new born, Soma, behind in their home city of Qamishli for safety.

Hadiya recalled: ‘As I arrived at the border I couldn’t talk, I couldn’t breathe, I was unconscious to everything.’

The new mother was rushed to hospital in Erbil city where she was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia and started chemotherapy. Four months later they were reunited with their baby girl but soon torn apart again. Hadiya spent the next year in hospital and only saw her baby for short periods every few months.

‘She didn’t know she was my daughter or that I’m her mother. She didn’t recognise me and she didn’t cry for me – just her aunt. It was difficult,’ added Hadiya.

Shadi stayed with his wife almost every night in the hospital and often slept on scraps of cardboard on the corridor floor.

When Hadiya was finally well enough to leave the hospital, the couple and their daughter moved into a refugee camp half an hour from the city in 2014.

Refugee Week: Hadiya and Shadi Ahmed, from Syria, who live in a refugee camp close to Erbil, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
The parents say seven-year-old daughter Soma, and their one-year-old son, have nowhere to play in the camp (Picture: Hadiya Ahmed)

Hadiya’s sister offered to donate her bone-marrow to cure her leukaemia and came with her family to live in the camp. For at least a year, the two families lived together in one freezing tent.

‘We had a lack of electricity, lack of water, lack of everything,’ Hadiya said. ‘We were suffering, especially for me – I couldn’t bear the noise after my disease.’

They made do with just one bathroom for every 15 families. ‘There was a lot of disease at that time,’ Hadiya added, who herself was hospitalised with a sanitary-related infection.

They recalled how tent fires often tore through the camp sparked by dangerous heaters powered by kerosene. They lost their friends, a family of four, who burned to death in their tent. 

But things have vastly improved in the camp for the family, who now live in two small, concrete rooms finished with a roof made from old caravan materials, along with their own bathroom.

Refugee Week: Hadiya and Shadi Ahmed, from Syria, who live in a refugee camp close to Erbil, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
The family remain positive about the future and continue to work hard to change their cisrumstances (Picture: Hadiya Ahmed)

After being pronounced cancer-free, Hadiya was inspired to ‘do something different’ and started helping struggling people inside the camp with clothes, food and teaching English to children.

‘After my disease I changed my point of view. Helping others really makes you happy – more than anything,’ added Hadiya.

In 2017, online language teaching platform NaTakallam – ‘we speak’ in Arabic – gave Hadiya and Shadi a lifeline.

The couple now earn a small income teaching English and Arabic to students of all ages from around the world, and are hosting supper clubs during Refugee Week to share stories about their life.

Hadiya said: ‘[NaTakallam] helps us psychologically and financially. We forget out difficulties and problems when we are talking to students and making friends on the programme.

‘We can buy more things than before. Our life is getting better.’

Shadi added: ‘It gives us wings. We don’t have passports but we can travel to Europe from our room.

‘It’s our window to see the world.’

Refugee Week

Every day, 37,000 people worldwide are forced to flee their homes because of conflict and persecution, estimates the UN Refugee Agency.

This means there are currently 70.8 million forcibly displaced people across the world.

But these are not just statistics, they are people. They have names, faces, families, skills and stories to tell.

This feature is part of our week-long series taking a closer look at the resilience and contributions of refugees living in the UK and across the world.

So far, we have shared the story of Syrian surgeon Mohamad who worked in war zones before helping on the NHS coronavirus frontline, and the refugees leading the way in helping their UK communities through the pandemic.

Ghaida told her story of how she was forced to flee Saudi Arabia or face death for being a bisexual woman.

Director Waad Al-Kateab recalled surviving siege in Syria to film the Bafta-winning documentary For Sama.

Parents, Hadiya and Shadi, told how they have been stuck in a refugee camp for years after leaving home to get life-saving cancer treatment.

Every day this week, we will be sharing stories to mark Refugee Week - taking place from June 15 - 21 - a festival celebrating refugee stories and the safe space that the UK has offered to many.

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, this year marks the first time it is being held as a virtual festival through a programme of online activities and performances, which can be found here.