Ibrahim’s story: ‘They’re my angels, my guardian angels’
The first British voice Ibrahim heard was the ferry’s recorded message.
Freezing and hungry, the teenager was hiding in the dark, face to the floor, crammed in a 2ft gap between fridges full of peaches, as the lorry rolled on then, seven hours later, off the ship.
It wasn’t the end of journey that had started four years earlier and thousands of miles away but the beginning of the end.
He said:
Outside, we heard a voice on the loudspeaker outside saying, Welcome to Dover. I couldn’t believe it. No way, I thought,”
“I had a little phone but there had been no signal for hours. I opened it and checked my location, I was in the United Kingdom.
“It was the 28th of June 2019. I was 16 years and seven months old and my life changed forever.
Ibrahim is six years older now and speaking in the offices of Guardianship Scotland, the support service helping unaccompanied children seeking a safe haven in Britain after fleeing danger at home.
His journey to Scotland had started in Daraa, in the very south of Syria, 3500 miles from the bright top-floor offices in the centre of Glasgow but, he says, the true distance cannot be measured on a map.
Daraa was a turbulent hotbed of opposition to the regime of Bashar al-Assad where armed groups, including Russian and Iranian militia, fought for more than a decade with the bloodshed including the targeted murder of civilians, bombings and kidnappings.
The first serious protests against the Assad government began there in 2011 but Ibrahim, who lived with his parents and seven brothers and sisters, remembers violence being rife before then.
He said:
The war started getting a lot worse in 2010, people being killed without reason,”
“The army was killing people, kidnapping people, hundreds of people. I was just a little boy but all the time, it felt dangerous.
“We only had electricity two hours a day, sometimes one hour, no fridge and no food to put in one anyway. We had nothing at all.
“We would all stay in the flat in the dark for days because soldiers were everywhere. It got worse and worse.
In May 2014, his father, who could no longer work in construction because of the army roadblocks isolating towns, decided to flee leading his family to Lebanon.
Ibrahim said:
We hid from the Syrian soldiers and sneaked into Lebanon. We settled but it was difficult there,”
“It was better and safer than where we had come from but there was a lot of racism towards Syrians there. A lot of threat. Some people were nice but many treated Syrians very badly.
In 2018, Ibrahim's father could no longer work because of back problems and the family was forced to leave their flat and move to a refugee camp.
He said:
I was nearly 16 and felt like I had no good choices,”
“I couldn’t stay in the camp and if I went back to Syria, I would be forced into the army, killing people I used to live beside or being killed by them.
Describing Daraa, the European Union Agency for Asylum, which advises governments on refugee claims, says it is a region riven by violence, unrest, armed groups, and civilian deaths, concluding: “Substantial grounds are shown for believing that a civilian, returned to the governorate, would, solely on account of their presence on its territory, face a real risk of being subject to the serious threat.”
Ibrahim cannot imagine safely returning to his home country, then or now, adding:
I was scared but my father told me I had to leave, to find a new life.
“My brother was older and had already made the journey to Britain rather than be enlisted by the Syrian army or killed by them. I aimed to join him.
In 2019, Ibrahim, now 16, travelled to Turkey before crossing into Greece illegally after a perilous boat crossing and a brutal reception from border guards.
They were hitting and hitting. I thought I was going to die. I thought that was the end.
After being released from custody in Greece, he would travel to Germany, Belgium and into France where, in Dunkirk, he tried to reach Britain.
He said:
I was there for a month and tried two or three times to sneak into the back of lorry before it went onto the ferry,”
“Then I met a man, who could open the doors so quickly and without any noise. We sneaked in, four of us.
“After getting off the ferry, the lorry was on the motorway but getting colder and colder, until we were worried the cold would kills us. We called the police. Three minutes later the doors opened.
After being interviewed, he spent two months in a hostel in Kent and began his application for asylum. Covid and lockdown meant its progress was repeatedly delayed.
In 2020, he came to Scotland as part of the national transfer programme where he was offered the support of Guardianship Scotland, a statutory service offering unaccompanied children support while navigating the asylum process.
He said:
By then, my mental health was really bad. I was so stressed, depressed, full of anxiety.
“I had my brother but couldn’t live with him because his flat was too small. I was taking anti-depressants and seeing a psychiatrist. The doctor said I had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
“But my guardian was always checking on me, all the time. Was I eating? Drinking? Sleeping? How was I feeling?
“She was there for me and on my side. Such a kind, kind person.
“The Guardians have been my angels, my guardian angels.
On March 4, 2021, Ibrahim heard his refugee status had been confirmed, allowing him to live and work in Scotland. Even better, a little over two years later, in a rare decision after a long application process, his mother and father were allowed to come to Scotland to be reunited with their son.
Today, looking back at his journey to safety, he hails the expertise and support of his immigration lawyer and Guardianship Scotland for helping him secure his family’s future free from fear.
Studying English at college, he hopes to work in cyber security and begin repaying the country that has offered him a safe haven.
He said:
I will study and study. Cyber security is one of the most important jobs, a job that would help people here, the way they have helped me.
“My life is in Scotland and my future. Scotland supported me and I want to support Scotland, to say thank you to Scotland. I needed Scotland and one day, I hope, I will have skills that Scotland needs.
“That’s all I want now.
This article was written for The Sunday Post and published on Sunday 31st August 2025.
*Stock photo used.