wordpress-seo domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /home2/jxbnbdmy/public_html/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6114breadcrumb-navxt domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /home2/jxbnbdmy/public_html/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6114Lise Ramslog was out for a barefoot amble on the warm day last September that Europe\u2019s refugee crisis came to her remote village in southern Denmark.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The 70-year-old grandmother had planned a simple stroll. What she found in her quiet, coastal community were hundreds of exhausted asylum seekers who had arrived on the ferry from Germany only to be stranded without access to public transportation. Some had begun to walk along the highway in desperation.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Ramslog decided on the spot that she would help: She ended up giving two young couples, a small child and a newborn baby a 190-kilometre ride to their destination in Sweden. \u201cWhen we crossed the border, they rejoiced and cried,\u201d she recalled.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
In another context, Ramslog might be known as a good Samaritan.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
But the Danish government has a different term for her: convicted human smuggler.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The decision by authorities to prosecute Ramslog \u2014 and to charge hundreds of other Danish citizens with a similar crime \u2014 is to many here just the latest evidence of a society that, when faced with an unparalleled influx of migrants and refugees, has taken a nasty turn.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
In that respect, Denmark has company: Across Europe, a once-tender embrace has evolved into an uncompromising rejection.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Last week, authorities in Greece began sending new arrivals back across the sea to Turkey, as part of a policy intended to permanently close the path via which more than 1 million people sought sanctuary last year.<\/p>\n
But as Europe walls itself off, the continent is left to reckon with what\u2019s become of its long-cherished humanitarian beliefs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re losing respect for the values upon which we built our country and our European Union,\u201d said Andreas Kamm, secretary general of the Danish Refugee Council. \u201cIt\u2019s becoming very hard to defend human rights.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
This Scandinavian nation of compulsively friendly people is known as a social-welfare utopia, one that was recently judged the world\u2019s happiest place. Ranking high in the country\u2019s pantheon of heroes are those who protected Jews during the Holocaust or who helped the oppressed escape from behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
But when it has come to those fleeing 21st-century conflicts on Europe\u2019s doorstep, Denmark has gone into overdrive to broadcast its hostility.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The government advertised cuts to refugees\u2019 benefits in Lebanese newspapers. It has enabled police to confiscate refugees\u2019 valuables, including cash and jewelry. And authorities have made it far more difficult for those already here to reunite with their families.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Now ordinary Danes are getting caught up in the crackdown, punished for what many saw as a quintessentially good deed. \u201cI\u2019m proud of what I did and will never regret having done it,\u201d said Ramslog, her grey hair highlighted by plastic pink heart barrettes and her clear blue eyes welling with tears. \u201cBut I don\u2019t want to be known as a criminal.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Yet that\u2019s exactly what she is, following a March conviction. And according to the far-right party that holds the balance of power in the Danish Parliament, it\u2019s what she deserves.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cThese people broke the law,\u201d said Peter Kofod Poulsen, a recently elected member of Parliament from the anti-immigration Danish People\u2019s Party. \u201cHuman smuggling is not all right \u2014 not if it\u2019s done by the train company and not if it\u2019s done by private individuals.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Poulsen, who at 26 is Parliament\u2019s third-youngest member, has helped push the country\u2019s weak center-right government to take a less-forgiving line on asylum seekers since the once-fringe DPP surged to second place in elections in June.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The number of refugees taken in by Denmark, he said, should be \u201cas close to zero as possible.\u201d The alternative, in Poulsen\u2019s view, is the end of everything Danes hold dear \u2014 including low crime rates and high-quality government services. Welcoming Syrians, Iraqis, Afghans and others fleeing war, he said, is just too burdensome.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cWe used to have a safe, monocultural society,\u201d said Poulsen, who is slim, blond and self-assured. \u201cNow our welfare state is under huge pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The notion that Denmark can\u2019t adequately look out for its own if it is also giving sanctuary to asylum seekers has found wide appeal here. Anti-refugee positions once considered extreme are now embraced by a broad cross section of the country\u2019s politicians.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The hardening of public attitudes has been underway for at least a decade. But a key turning point in popular opinion may have been that day last September when asylum seekers took to the highways to walk.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Many had been blocked a week earlier from leaving Hungary, leading to a bulge in numbers on the migrant trail.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
When they arrived in Denmark, on Sept. 7, they were initially barred from using public transportation unless they agreed to be registered \u2014 something few were willing to do because they wanted to travel onward to more hospitable destinations, especially Sweden.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
When Danes turned on their televisions that day, they saw highways clogged with people in need.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cThat was an eye-opener for many Danes,\u201d said Kasper Moller Hansen, a University of Copenhagen political scientist. \u201cThey thought, \u2018Wow, that\u2019s a lot of people. We can\u2019t help all of them.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Other Danes took a different lesson, jumping in their cars and driving to the small ferry terminal in Rodby to offer asylum seekers a lift.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Lisbeth Zornig, a well-known child-rights activist and author, was in the area and decided she couldn\u2019t imagine driving back to Copenhagen with an empty car.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cI\u2019d never seen people in need that way in Denmark before,\u201d she said. \u201cThey were hungry. They were thirsty. They didn\u2019t have anything but the clothes they were wearing.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
She opened her minivan\u2019s doors to a small group of Syrians, and four adults and twin 5-year-old girls hopped in. \u201cTwo minutes later, they were sleeping in the back seat,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
In Copenhagen, her husband, former journalist Mikael Lindholm offered to let them spend the night. But they were eager to get to Sweden, so he drove them to the train station.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Both Zornig and Lindholm were convicted last month of human smuggling. Each was ordered to pay a fine amounting to about $4,300<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Ramslog had her fine cut in half because she\u2019s retired and lives on a small pension. It\u2019s still far more than she can afford.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
She said she responded that September day from instinct, not from any plan. At most, she thought she would drive the refugees a few miles up the road. \u201cBut then I kept thinking, \u2018Oh, I\u2019ll just go a little further,\u2019\u201d she recalled.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The baby slept the whole way, pressed tight to her mother\u2019s breast. The young boy nibbled on biscuits and sipped apple juice.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Ramslog was still barefoot when, as night fell, she steered her car across the bridge linking Denmark to Sweden.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cThank you! Thank you!\u201d her passengers exclaimed when she pulled over to drop them off.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Before they parted, Ramslog dug from her pocket a small charm \u2014 a four-leaf clover encased in glass that she had been given to remember her daughter, who died last year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
She pressed it into the boy\u2019s palm.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cMay you have better luck,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
For more information about Denmark<\/b>\u00a0Immigration<\/strong>\u00a0programs, please visit the company\u2019s site at\u00a0http:\/\/www.immigrationexperts.pk Immigration Experts Lise Ramslog was out for a barefoot amble on the warm day last September that Europe\u2019s refugee crisis came to her remote village in southern Denmark. The 70-year-old grandmother had planned a simple stroll. What she found in her quiet, coastal community were hundreds of exhausted asylum seekers who had arrived on the ferry from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4797,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-image","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-denmark-immigration","post_format-post-format-image"],"yoast_head":"\n
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