Killing fields left their mark

Jul 6 2007

THIS newspaper sent me to Somalia in the early 90s where, for 10 days, I reported on famine deaths.

I stayed with the British and Irish workers of Concern Worldwide and, each morning, we'd wake to find at least three corpses wrapped in straw matting at our door. These were people who had died during the night and their loved ones had no strength to bury them.

In that week, I saw and heard enormous love, appalling brutality and the type of lawlessness unimaginable in Britain. My outlook was changed forever.

But what of the Somalians who had to make the choice between supporting one of the savage war lords or starvation? I ask because this week a 17-year-old Somalian was in court for murdering a talented young footballer.

Refugee Hannad Hasan had a long history of assault, shop-lifting and disruptive behaviour at school and is likely to be sentenced to life imprisonment.

His fate, given his formative years in Somalia, was inevitable.

We open our borders to those from killing fields at our peril. There is no way that children can cast off the horrors that they have seen and simply settle down here.

They are too scarred, too damaged to be let loose in Britain.