There have been two recent cases of failed asylum seekers here in the Netherlands who 'blew a fuse'. A 36-year-old Iranian set himself on fire in Amsterdam’s Dam Square on 5 April. And on 13 April a 25-year-old man from Benin killed his girlfriend and a police officer. He is said to have become psychotic as the result of a protracted asylum procedure.

These two individuals, it seems, are not the only ones who have arrived in the Netherlands already traumatised only to become involved in highly stressful, protracted asylum procedures.

Asylum seekers often suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (or PTSD) as a result of torture, rape, murder attempts or other violent incidents in their country of origin. Research by Pharos, an organisation which specialises in refugee issues, shows that the psychological problems affecting many refugees are exacerbated by protracted asylum procedures and the resulting insecurity about their legal status. Some refugees grow so desparate they see murder or suicide as the only way out.

Thrown out
Alice Beldman of the Amsterdam Refugee Centre (Amsterdamse Steunpunt Vluchtelingen) recalls the case of a man from Sierra Leone who came to see her: “He had been released from a detention centre with nowhere to go. A psychiatrist told him it was really important he go out and 'socialise'.”

Alice Beldman says the Netherlands is changing: "Failed asylum seekers are increasingly turned out onto the streets without any further assistance. Even when they’re sick, they are just simply thrown out.”

Terrified
Jeska is a young woman from Uganda who has found shelter with the privately-funded MOO medical project for unregistered refugees here in the Netherlands. Her room has only a bed and a chair. Boxes of different kinds of drugs are lying on the floor under the bed. Jeska is reluctant to tell her story for fear compatriots or the Dutch police will find her, and that talking to the press might harm her case.

“I fled after my husband was killed. I was tortured, raped and left for dead. I managed to escape. A man helped me flee by plane. He left me behind at an airport, Schiphol, without money or papers. I was taken to an asylum seekers centre. They turned me out onto the streets. I ended up at MOO via a number of different people.”

Suicidal
Jeska suffers from constant headaches and feels weak. She can't shake off the past.

Alice Beldman says most refugees have low expectations about the future and are facing growing problems here as the result of increasingly strict immigration and asylum rules.

“They often no longer see a way out when they are again rejected and told to return to their country of origin. All 12 people here have suicidal tendencies.”

Jeska is often close to despair or suicide, she says.

"I’m thinking about it and I think one day I’ll actually do it. They tell me to leave the country, but I cannot go back to my own country because there they want to kill me. If they won’t do it here I might as well do it myself because I no longer have hope. I have nowhere to go.”

Rising costs
Reliable data on the number of refugees in the Netherlands suffering from psychological problems are not available, but the numbers are far higher than the 12 the Amsterdam project can provide shelter for. Sometimes cases make headlines when a person can no longer handle the situation and he or she commits an act of desperation.

Alice Beldman says she hopes that facilities for refugees with psychological problems will be created across the Netherlands. “Failing to look after these people will only cost society more.”

(gsh/nc/tf)