A Swedish student managed to stop a man from being deported to Afghanistan on Monday simply by refusing to sit down on the plane she had boarded.
Elin Ersson staged a protest on the plane, which ended when she successfully got the man removed from the flight.
The plane from the Swedish city of Gothenburg was headed for Turkey, where the man would be connected to an onward flight back to Afghanistan, where Ersson insisted the man would “most likely be killed”.
The young woman filmed her protest on her phone and streamed it live to Facebook, where it has since been viewed more than 2.3 million times.
In the 14-minute video, Ersson explains that “as long as a person is standing up the pilot cannot take off”.
“I am doing what I can to save a person’s life.
“All I want to do is stop the deportation and then I will comply with the rules here.”
The clip shows Ersson calmly argue with cabin staff who try to get her to turn off her phone and sit down. She says that some passengers appeared to be standing up in support, while others can be heard urging the woman, who breaks down in tears at one point, to sit down.
But her persistence paid off when she was told that the pilot had instructed staff to remove the man from the plane, at which point Ersson agreed to leave – as long as she saw him exit. Passengers can be heard cheering before she films herself leaving the plane.
Despite Ersson’s insistence the protest was “perfectly legal”, refusing to comply with a pilot’s instructions can result in a fine and even jail time in Sweden, German media company Deutsche Welle reports. It is not yet known if she will be charged.
It is not clear why the man was being deported, but Swedish authorities have confirmed that he was still in custody and would be deported at a later date.
Top Comments
Although I completely agree that while she was standing up for what is right (although we don’t know why he was being deported) , I don’t see what she achieved here? The man wasn’t about to be set free. He was in custody, and will be put on the next flight they can arrange. All she did was make a whole plane full of people late and miss their connecting flights.
As someone who agrees with the stance she took, may I ask what have you done to demonstrate your opinion on the matter? Do you not see the attention she drew to the issue as an achievement in itself? Sitting by silently achieves nothing.
Moronic. Delaying the inevitable. The Afghan was probably convicted of molesting some child but the girl obviously knows the system better than anyone. Just open the borders and we won't have this problem!!!
He was a legitimate asylum seeker and he was being returned for the same reasons we detain genuine refugees: to send a message. It is against international human rights law, but who cares, right?
How do you know for a fact? Sweden has an extremely generous refugee programme and I doubt they would have had him deported for no reason.
Most people don't want their country to look like Afghanistan