---
title: "Listen: A war on migration, funded by the EU (Libya, Part 1)"
description: "We follow the harrowing story of Aliou Candé — a 28-year-old farmer and father from Guinea-Bissau — whose dream of a better life ended in one of Libya’s brutal migrant prisons."
type: "NewsArticle"
publisher: "Daily Maverick"
site: "https://www.dailymaverick.co.za"
section: "THE OUTLAW OCEAN PROJECT"
author: "The Outlaw Ocean Project"
author_url: "https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/author/the-outlaw-ocean-project/"
canonical_url: "https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2025-06-06-listen-a-war-on-migration-funded-by-the-eu-libya-part-1/"
published: "2025-06-06T13:07:19"
updated: "2025-06-06T13:07:20"
lang: "en-ZA"
word_count: 173
---

# Listen: A war on migration, funded by the EU (Libya, Part 1)

> We follow the harrowing story of Aliou Candé — a 28-year-old farmer and father from Guinea-Bissau — whose dream of a better life ended in one of Libya’s brutal migrant prisons.

By The Outlaw Ocean Project · Published 6 June 2025, 15:07 SAST · Updated 6 June 2025, 15:07 SAST

## Key points
- The Libyan Coast Guard has become the EU's unofficial enforcers, rounding up desperate migrants and locking them away in a hellish underworld where extortion and abuse reign supreme.
- The Libyan Coast Guard is executing the EU's immigration policies by intercepting migrants and detaining them in secret prisons.
- Investigations reveal systemic abuse, extortion, and even murder within these facilities, exemplified by the tragic case of Aliou Candé.
- The series sheds light on the Mediterranean crisis, highlighting the dire consequences of a shadow immigration system exacerbated by climate change.
- Aliou Candé's story represents the plight of countless migrants seeking a better life, trapped in a lawless regime.

## Content

The Libyan Coast Guard is doing the European Union’s dirty work, capturing migrants as they attempt to cross the Mediterranean into Europe and throwing them in secretive prisons. There, they are extorted, abused and sometimes killed.

An investigation into the death of Aliou Candé, a young farmer and father from Guinea-Bissau, puts the Outlaw Ocean team in the cross-hairs of Libya’s violent and repressive regime.

In this stunning three-part series, we take you inside the walls of one of the most dangerous prisons, in a lawless regime where the world’s forgotten migrants languish.

In this episode:

- On our mission to chronicle the anarchy of the world’s oceans, we knew we had to cover the Mediterranean crisis.
- The EU’s shadow immigration system is a harbinger of things to come, as climate change and (often newly illegal) migration create the perfect conditions for a humanitarian crisis.
- The face of that crisis often looks like Aliou Candé, a 28-year-old farmer and a father of three children who hoped to lift his family out of poverty. **DM**

[Spotify audio](https://open.spotify.com/embed/episode/6twMcKFkhxMB5OXgbUacZn?utm_source=generator)

[YouTube video: "YouTube video"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REeWvTRUpMk)