InfoMigrants launches 'Tales from the Border' podcast

Senegal, the Mediterranean Sea, the Serbian-Hungarian border or the French-Italian Alps: The podcast 'Tales from the Border' explores the realities faced by migrants who hope to make it into the EU from Africa, the Middle East or Afghanistan. The migrants themselves talk about the many obstacles they face on these journeys, such as violent pushbacks by border guards, the fear of drowning at sea, or freezing to death in the Alps between Italy and France.  

For the podcast, InfoMigrants worked with reporters in various locations and conducted interviews with humanitarian organizations, including SOS Mediterranée, the Hungarian Helsinki Committee and Care4Calais, to gather the sounds, interviews and stories.   

'Tales from the Border' is the first-ever longer audio format by InfoMigrants. They have had shorter podcasts in the past produced in French and Arabic by cooperation partner France Médias Monde. 

"Audio is a medium which can take listeners to the heart of an issue. Where they can get up close and personal with the stories of people who may be more reluctant to tell their stories to camera. We have been reading the stories of migrants on these journeys since InfoMigrants was first launched in 2017, but allowing migrants to speak for themselves and walking their journey with them seemed perfectly suited to the medium of a podcast," says Emma Wallis, producer and presenter of 'Tales from the Border.' 

The first three episodes will drop on November 11. Five additional episodes will be released each Thursday after that on various podcast platforms including Spotify and Apple podcasts. France Médias Monde is running distribution of the podcast. 

InfoMigrants offers migrants reliable and balanced information about applying for asylum in Europe, about the risks on the routes that lead to Europe and about the countries they are heading towards. The joint multi-platform project is headed by three major European media institutions: DW, France Médias Monde (France 24, RFI, MCD) and ANSA, Italy’s news agency. The project is financed in part by the European Union.