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BRUSSELS / BIAŁOWIEŻA / LESBOS - Security agents abandoning people in the desert. Coast guards destroying boats and leaving those on board stranded on the open sea. Slave markets with refugees. Since the start of the “European refugee crisis”, violence at our external borders, and in distant countries that do the dirty work for us, has exploded.

CHELEM - Chelem, a small coastal town on the Gulf of Mexico, recently rebranded by Trump as the “Gulf of America”, is the stage for an unexpected reversal. Where once Mexicans journeyed north in search of a better life, today Americans are heading south, drawn by affordable healthcare, lower living costs, and the promise of a paradise filled with margaritas by the pool.

BIAŁOWIEŻA - Since March, Poland has imposed an asylum ban at its border with Belarus. Officially, there are exceptions for children, pregnant women and the sick, but in practice these are systematically ignored. Only 22 people have been able to apply for asylum since then. 

CAIRO - Cairo Encounters follows the lives of four Western European women who have emigrated to Cairo for love. The documentary explores the impact of their life choices on their Western identities and highlights their interactions with Egyptian society.

OXKUTZCAB - An estimated five million elderly parents in Mexico have been separated from their undocumented children living in the US for decades due to strict border policies, with little hope of being reunited.

CLUJ-NAPOCA / VALENI - As the European Union grows eastward, many children in Eastern Europe are left behind in their home countries while their parents go to Western Europe for better economic opportunities.

TANGIER - When fishmonger Mohsin Fikri is crushed in a rubbish truck, the Riffins have had enough. They demand that their region finally be developed after decades of backwardness: they want more jobs, better healthcare and, most importantly, recognition of their historic struggle against colonisation.

GAZA - Nadia AlHassanat was born in Gaza during the First Intifada. In her twenties, she fled her conservative family to pursue her dream of becoming an actress. Today, she has been living in Belgium for eight years. The only person she stayed in touch with by phone is her older sister Fatma, who remains in Gaza with her two children.

BAKU - In September last year, violence came to a head in Nagorno Karabakh, the disputed area between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Just about all 120,000 Armenians were expelled from the region then. But the conflict has been going on for much longer.

BRUSSELS - In We, Roma there are 99 distinct stories of Roma. The themes are broad, from their own language to their own court, from Iftar to Mary worship, from prejudice to the affirmation of certain stereotypes.

CAÏRO - With the war in the Gaza Strip, negotiations on a billion-dollar deal between the European Union (EU) and Egypt gained momentum. In exchange for more financial support, the EU wants Egypt to keep its borders tightly guarded. The EU envisions a "golden age" of cooperation with Egypt. 

ROME - NGOs carrying out rescue operations in the Mediterranean have been at odds with the Italian government for years. SOS MEDITERRANNEE claims to perform its duty as mandated by international maritime law. Italy fights back with administrative sanctions.

AFRICA - While hatred and fear is sown in Europe about " floating negroes" and "repopulation," the African side of the immigration debate remains underexposed.

DAMASCUS - In No Man's Land, Middle East expert Willem Staes travels across Syria, Lebanon, Turkey, Jordan and Iraq. During nine trips between August 2021 and March 2023, he will see for himself how Syrian refugees find themselves in the most hopeless situation since the Syrian revolution in 2011.

ESSEN/HOOGSTRATEN/PUTTE - Belgian real estate agents are seeing more and more Dutch people moving across the border, in a desperate attempt to find an affordable house in the border region. What does that do to life in a border region. Apache and OC Spit traveled from Essen across Hoogstraten to Putte and spoke with owners.

MOL - Recent research shows that deep in our genes we are easterners. We are largely descended from steppe peoples who crossed into Europe five thousand years ago.

GITEGA / BELGRADO - The Burundi Balkan Route offered several thousand Burundians a way out of their homeland in crisis in 2022.

BAGDAD - Climate change is causing an exodus in Iraq of farmers whose land is drying up. They are moving with their water buffaloes or selling their livestock. The government does not know how to deal with climate migration, environmentalists are threatened and even kidnapped.

MELILLA - In June 2022, dozens of people were killed when a large group attempted to storm the border fence near the Spanish exclave of Melilla in Morocco. European leaders are particularly keen to stop migrants, and to that end, they are turning to Morocco, among others.

REYKJAVIK - "No one will end up on the streets," Thorir Hall says decidedly. He works for the Red Cross. "In Iceland, sleeping on the streets is not an option." It is a beautiful day today. Outside, it is freezing at minus four. In central Reykjavik, the aid agency has just opened a new emergency shelter. Last year, some 4,000 refugees applied for asylum in the country. It seems a ridiculously small number when compared to countries like Greece, Lebanon or even Belgium, but for Iceland it is 70 times more than a decade ago. "Finding housing for everyone is now the biggest challenge," Thorir adds. The island is three and a half times the size of Belgium, but 30 times fewer people live there. Journalists Majd Khalifeh and Roel Nollet travel to Iceland to document the increase in refugees.

BRUSSELS - Suddenly Eva finds herself face to face with a portrait of her Congolese great-grandfather François. Retrieved from the AfricaMuseum in Tervuren. In the unfamiliar portrait, Eva recognises traits of herself.

AMSTERDAM - At the beginning of World War I, 1 million Belgians fled to the Netherlands. About a hundred thousand stayed throughout the war, the majority in large camps. The Netherlands showed hospitality, but conditions in the refugee camps were much to be criticised.

GOMBE - Is return an answer to racism? Youth worker, activist and opinion maker Don Pandzou (34), a Belgian youngster with Congolese roots, finds out. Growing up in Belgium was not an easy experience for Don. Racism and discrimination left emotional scars.

ANKARA - One image that will undoubtedly mark 2021 is that of the tens of thousands of desperate Afghans drumming outside the closed gates of Kabul airport to get away. The borders were sealed tight, yet hundreds of thousands of Afghans managed to flee. A number of them reached Turkey in the hope of being able to ask for international protection there. An illusion, as it turns out. After the fall of Kabul, Turkey, with the help of Europe, also sealed its borders and stopped registering Afghan asylum seekers. And the waiting lists for resettlement to Europe are endless, so there is little relief to be expected there either.

ANTWERPEN - In 2017, Francis Njotea is rushed to hospital. He is in a coma for a week. When he wakes up, confused, he shares a secret with his son Raf. That contrary to what his children and ex-wife have always thought, he is not 63 but 73 years old. He later dismisses his claim as a hallucination. Francis’ children and ex-wife have no idea if what he said is true or not. It shows how little they know about his life story, a story that has been shrouded in mystery for as long as they can remember.

MELILLA - The Spanish enclave of Melilla, geographically part of Africa, politically part of the European Union, is located on Morocco's northern coast. The border between the continents here consists of a triple fence with countless pits and guard posts.

What is the involvement of Belgian jihadists in the genocide that IS carried out against the Jezidi community? Now that the Belgian parliament has acknowledged the genocide, Brenda Stoter Boscolo and Bruno Struys went to Iraqi Kurdistan with that question in mind. They talked to official sources, but above all had hours of interviews with the Yezidis themselves.

BRUSSELS - The thirty glorious years after the Second World War, that manic period of reconstruction and economic boom, have been decisive for the Belgium of today. The whole country was turned upside down. New jobs, habits and ideas replaced the old ones. At the end of those triumphant decades, Belgians were richer, freer and better educated than ever before.

SAMOS - The harrowing conditions in the hotspots of the Greek islands of Lesbos, Samos and Chios have created a mental health crisis. Depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and self-harm are the most common mental health problems reported by NGOs in the field.

ANTWERP - The 40-year war in Afghanistan is pushing more and more Afghans to become refugees. Their numbers are also increasing in Belgium. In the port city of Antwerp, Afghans have become the fifth largest nationality group. Gie Goris went to Antwerp and listened to older and younger, male and female, Pashtu and Dari-speaking refugees and migrants from the war-torn country.