"All the suffering I've seen, I don't know if it will ever go away from my head. I dream about it every night."
A year has passed since that cursed night but for Firas El Ghazi, 41 years old, Syrian, it is as if it had just happened.
In the shipwreck of the gulet Summer Love on the beach of Steccano di Cutro on 26 February 2023 - 94 deaths including 35 minors and at least a dozen missing - he lost his 6-year-old nephew, Sultan, who died from the cold in the water.
He now lives in a refugee center in Hamburg.
In Germany he had requested international protection which is valid for three years and would allow him to be reunited with his family, but the German authorities only granted him humanitarian protection valid for one year.
"What do I ask? - he says now from Germany, waiting to return to Crotone for the initiatives promoted to remember the tragedy - Give us the opportunity to reunite with our families to help us overcome this suffering. Our rights have diminished so I cannot ask the reunion. We feel cheated, no one has kept the promises made after the shipwreck in Calabria."
"I regretted coming to Germany. I did it - he explains - because there were family members and many friends here and I hoped that in Germany they would have given me international protection to work and help my family in Turkey. Perhaps the Could Italy have given me more? I don't know. My dreams are now linked to helping people and I don't know if they will come true. I also regretted coming to Europe."
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