Dream of a secure future turns sour for Florinda

WHEN planeloads of Kosovar Albanian refugees landed in Ireland in June 1999 after fleeing the terror of their war-torn homeland, they were greeted with welcome banners and civic receptions.

A year later, when a frightened mother made the same journey alone and in secret with her two baby daughters, she had to ask a stranger on the street for help.

Florinda Sylaj thought she would be safe and that her children, Eda and Eni, would have a future here, in a country that had loudly thrown open its doors to her people.