We're not likely to be in the most expensive city in Libya. Garbage and mud are found everywhere on Zuara Martyrs Avenue: clothing shops, cafes, bakeries... Each merchant must clean and adjust its entry if the customer does not lose it. Within 60 kilometres of the border with Tunisia, Zuara is the only Amazon enclave on the coast of Libya for 60,000 inhabitants. At the same time, it is the left bank of the "Lanpedusa Triangle" – Misrata is the one on the right. This is precisely the main focus of Africa’s migration to Europe. And the common grave.

More than ideology, mere geography is the factor that has left Zuara to the government of Tripoli. Eastern Libya has had a new government in which Libya is governed since 2014. Last April, precisely, the Hafian military chief, Khalifa, launched an offensive against Tripoli and, while these lines were being drafted, the capital is still under siege. The third war in Libya over the last decade has not reached Zuara, but nothing has changed since Gaddafi was overthrown and put to power. There are the 2011 bullet holes, the remnants of war and, above all, the sand. The fight against the beach is endless. In addition to the sand, there is a lot of money in the city, as people smugglers and gas dealers have been collecting the profits from their business for years. Meanwhile, Zuara's neighbors used to look away. The luxury cars that crossed the shattered streets indicated the indigenous people: "We are the new masters in Libya," Obama said, "now we are the new masters." However, the economic flow was not used to fix and beautify the city. The zuaratarras soon realized this: the coffee, the new cell box, or the jacket made in China was more expensive than in any other city in Libya, including Tripoli. Inflation is precisely the immediate effect of your neighbour bringing people.

They tried to put an end to this scourge. In August 2015, some two hundred corpses appeared on Zuara Beach one morning. It was half of the passengers of an old boat that had run aground near the coast. Zuara's neighbors picked up the blades and built a common tomb. Then they went to the port. He shouted the bohemian. It was not the first protest against the traffickers, but the scale of the tragedy required it to be the last.

Something had to be done. In Libya, there is no effective government, so we decided to organize ourselves to ensure security," said Sadiq Jiash, head of the Zuara Emergency Committee. The group was established in 2014 with the objective of dealing with the eleven emergencies of the city. It had 35 members: doctors, firefighters, police... Among them, they organized a brigade called Imsuten – "with masks" in the Amazon language. Their aim was to end trafficking in human beings and they did so.

They had barely grown up in their work, when several traffickers were captured and imprisoned.

"At first we sent them to the neighboring city of Sabrata, but soon they returned. Seeing that they were buying freedom easily, we raised our jail in Zuara," Jiash said. Most of the masked were local young people, well known in the city, and they were doing a great job. In 2015, in an interview with this journalist, his leader wanted to send a message to Europe: "If we have help, we are able to end trafficking in human beings," he added. But nobody heard the message on the northern coast of the Mediterranean, and the group crumbled. The zuaratarras then learned the second lesson: means are needed to combat traffic and Europe is not prepared to help.

This failed attempt had a direct effect on traffic perception. - Why waste your time in college or open a store that I'm going to have to close shortly? ". That is the usual question. At the same time, if you get a job in the state administration, the salary stays on a computer screen. At the end of the month, queues are endless in front of the bank operating in Libya. Hopefully, about 200 dollars will be charged from the thousand dinars they charge, as there is a huge problem with cash in Libya. And in Zuara, everyone knows someone who is engaged in smuggling, whether human, gasoline or otherwise.

It can be done in many ways: driving a truck full of fugitives; producing rafts; guarding the road, warning when it is free and when it is not... In November 2018, a 24-year-old appeared with a "solo boy here." His name was Khalid. He explained that until 2017 he worked in gas smuggling: the treatment was done in the middle of the sea, between the boats of Libya and Malta. The inhabitants of the north carried eleven tonnes of fuel back home, and the Libyans, a great deal of euros. Some of them started researching, it was so gigantic the business. The Maltese journalist Daphne Caruana, among them, was murdered with a car bomb. The event shook the Mediterranean island, in which the connection between the politicians and the mafias of the country became apparent. The Government took drastic measures to end smuggling. Khalid, unable to recharge his boat's warehouse with gasoline, moved.

"Today we are about eight people in the group and we ask for rates between 2000 and 8000 Libyan dinars (between EUR 500 and 2000) per passenger. Prices depend on the skin: the lighter, the more expensive. So, Moroccans are the ones who pay the most, and those who come from Eritrea, Ethiopia or Somalia benefit from the discount," said the young trafficker. There were no accidents. "We're in telephone contact with every boat along the crossing and they have enough fuel to reach the rescue boats," he said.

Of humanity

Except for the main square of Avenida de los Mártires, known as Piazza, the streets of Zuara are not yet named. It would be enough to recall the names of the dead, as in other parts of Libya. The mayor of Zuara, Hafed Bensasi, admitted that the City Hall was not working properly.

"We are happy to shut down the bonfires, cover the holes of a sinking boat," Bensasi said in November last year. The mayor recalled the decision taken by Italy: In autumn 2017, in the city of Sabrata, along with Zuara, funds were given to a traffic mafia to interrupt its activity and other teams. The resolution, of course, sparked off a small war between the militias.
"Some 5,000 migrants arrived on foot. For humanity, we had to give them clothing, some food and something basic, but it's hard for them to come to us," the mayor said. He then underlined that the City Council allocates "half of its budget" to "security". Most of the migrants interviewed by this journalist agreed: You and Misrata were the safest cities for them, and Tripoli was one of the most dangerous. Unlike the capital, they can work in the center of Zuaran Street, search for work or simply walk quietly.

"Do you see that kid listening to music from his cell phone?" In Tripoli it would be impossible, because they would soon steal the apparatus," said a Nigerian named James. On the other hand, the young man continued, in Zuara there is no need to worry about armed groups. If you are not involved in the traffic, there would be no problem in the back of a van that is on the beach or at the disposal of embarking. The latter are transferred to an old army building in Zuara.

Last November, the director of the detention centre, Anwar Abudi, said that there were about 300 people on site "from Africa." The participants included 25 women and one newborn, all born in the last year. Abudi repeated the same sentence that was heard in official offices across Libya: "We don't have the means." International aid, whether medicines, ambulances or negligible blankets, is sent to Tripoli and does not leave. "Nothing never comes here," the officer said.

One million migrants and refugees are in Libya, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM). It is difficult for a country with a population of six million to manage and shoulder this burden. A simple rule of three helps to understand the situation: by using the same proportion, Euskal Herria should welcome 500,000 refugees after two wars and in the middle of another.

A brick

In addition to an abandoned hotel and the seat of a political party, the only psychiatric clinic in the district is located in the main square of Zuara. Akram Idrisi is the owner and director of the film. In the UK he studied medicine and decided to return to his country in 2011. He says that casuistry and the theory of mental illness in Libya do not match.

"After a war, the most frequent cases are depression and post-traumatic stress, but in our case psychosis predominates. These cases make up almost half of our 680 files," the psychiatrist said in his office. According to Idris, one of the causes was the consumption of hashish, which has not suffered damage. The expert, however, believed that everything was "much more complex":

"There is a tremendous identity crisis among the Libyans: there are people who have gone from a lot of money to poverty, and vice versa; or those who have felt “heroes” for a while and cannot connect with the current reality. The latter justify their actions with a “I was in war but you didn’t”, whether it’s human trafficking, fuel trafficking or a violation,” Idrisi said.

There's more. Regarding Zuara's Emergency Committee, Sadiq Jiash recognized us as "embarrassing." "Do you know how we buried the corpses that the sea brought us in recent years? exclaimed before inviting him to ride his van. Then he took the road to the west.

"At first we decided to bury him on the outskirts of the city, but in Zuara there are few fertile lands and farmers did not want any dead bodies on their land. It's understandable," Jiash said. On our right you could see the remains of a Roman city discovered in 2001. They say that in Pisindo it could have been an ancient city, but there is little chance of demonstrating it. "A brigade of the Government of Gaddafi had banned access to the combat zone for several days. After loading the objects they found there, they slid," Jiash said. They say there is nothing left.

Twenty kilometres west, in view of the border with Tunisia, our driver cut off the car by the road. He pointed to the Bukamash chemical plant. That's what seems to be behind most cancer cases in Zuara. Doctors in the area say there is a lot of malformation among newborns and many abortions. For decades, the chemical remains were thrown into the sea without any kind of control. At present, many of the plant’s deposits are full of dangerous chemicals, but there are no cleaning plans in the area, no possibility of doing so. Plants, olive trees, fish -- everything is contaminated and almost everything is eaten by locals.

Around the plant there is a plot of orchard type. Instead of letxugas, there are bricks. The tombstones of over 2,000 people buried here: one brick for every man. They were buried by volunteers like Jiash, on leaving work, on weekends or on public holidays. In 2017 it was a project to build a real cemetery, "even fenced by a wall," according to Jiash. But the project was abandoned. No money.

"Do you know of any institution that can help in Europe? "Oh, yeah! ", he said, in the middle of the orchard, that it only gives bricks.