Bill Stott, president of PCO UK (the Professional Cartoonist Association), has alerted on Twitter and Facebook the world of cartoonists about the case of Eaten Fish, pen name of a young Iranian cartoonist (Ali Durrani), who has fled his country to Australia in 2013. In accordance with the policy for migrants from that country, as he did not obtain the status of refugee, he was interned on the island of Manus in Papua New Guinea, in a camp where the Australian government holds migrants smuggled by sea. In February 2017, he started a hunger strike because the Australian authorities denied him health care, had suffered sexual abuse and his days were in danger.

Relaying Bill Scott, Pierre Ballouhey (member of the Scientific Council of LIBREXPRESSION), mid-February 2017, alerted the community of French cartoonists and members of his association France Cartoons, and initiated a collective action. Then, as Bill Sott did for PCO UK, he wrote to the Australian Ambassador in Paris on behalf of France-Cartoons. “We do not understand why he is not allowed on the Australian territory. Eaten Fish has fled the Islamic Republic of Iran where there is little regard for human rights, I do not think that this is the case of Australia. ”

Bill Stott of PCO UK and CRNI (Cartoonists Rignts Network International https://cartoonistsrights.org) have asked the cartoon community to draw fishes to protest the fate made to Eaten Fish and to post them on Twitter with the hashtags #EatenFish #addafish #ManusIsland @DIBPAustralia @govAU @ France-Cartoons .
The goal was to cram Twitter of fish claiming a better fate to Ali. The result was surprising by the number of drawings that have been retweeted by PCO, CRNI and other internet users, which mad them reappeared several times. Twitter’s home page smelled like fish as well as those of the State Department of Immigration, the Australian Government, Manus Island and EatenFish.

Then Pierre opened a twitter account from France-Cartoons to speed up the snowball:
https://twitter.com/FranceCartoons
Adene, Alain-Julien, Babache, Ballouhey, Battì, Bauer, Biz, Bonfim, Cambon, Cointe, Daullé, De Angelis, Delucq, Djony, Fidèle Castor, Gibo, Gouzil, Govin, Gruet, Ali Hamra, Pesso, Jak, Jépida, Lounis, Luc, Man, Marzio Mariani, Miss Lilou, Nagy, Nardi, Notto, Olive, Phil, Placide, Puglia, Rafagé, Renault, Rousso, Izel Rozental, Savignac, Sondron, Syl, Trax, Tym!, Véesse, and many others participated to the operation Eaten Fish on the account @France-Cartoons.

The Guardian has published a nice paper summerising the story of Eaten Fish :
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/dec/19/eaten-fish-manus-islands-refugee-cartoonist-moves-to-northern-europe
As well as excerpts from eaten Fish’s book that documented his detention, including the death of one of his friend and co-national, Faysal Ishak Ahmed:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/20/the-terrible-true-story-of-mr-eaten-fish-manus-island-cartoonist

Through all these cartoonists actions as well as the efforts of the International of Refuge Network (ICORN – a network of cities and regions that offer long-term residency to writers and performers: https://www.icorn.org), of the lawyer Janet Galbraith and Guardian’s First Dog on the Moon (pen name of the Guardian’s cartoonist Andrew Marlton), of CRNI, Ali Durrani/EatenFish was finally released. He found refuge, for two years, in a place still kept secret in a member city of ICORN of northern Europe. Ali Dorani is the second person to be rescued from the Australian Offshore Detention Camp. In November, the 24-year-old Iranian refugee, Amir Taghinia, was granted asylum in Canada with the help of a citizen’s group from British Columbia

Cartoons gallery of the operation “Eaten Fish”