Following the chaos of 2015, Europe decided the best way to handle migration was to ensure it never reached European shores. By pushing its borders deep into the deserts of North Africa and the Middle East, the EU attempted to outsource a human reality to regions lacking stable states or legal safeguards.

But what happens when a continent pays armed militias and regional autocrats to act as its border guards? How did the pursuit of "secure" borders lead to a €6 billion deal with Turkey, the funding of violent detention centers in Libya, and the empowerment of dictators who now use human lives as geopolitical leverage?

In Episode 03, Tarek Megerisi decodes the brutal era of European migration deals and the devastating realities of border externalization.

By following the money and the shifting smuggling routes, Tarek exposes a vicious paradox: Europe's desperate attempt to cut off migration at the source didn't stop the movement of people—it simply created a highly lucrative, state-sponsored industry of exploitation, safely hidden from the European public eye.