Iris Oppelaar is a Belgian journalist. She focuses mainly on Central Asia and Russia.
She writes about (and photographs) people, cultures and traditions that interest or amaze her — Or both. Her stories and photographs mainly cover the countries of the Former Soviet Union with a particular focus on Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Russia.
Her interest in the region began when she accidentally started to learn Russian in 2006. To become fluent in Russian, she decided to move to Moscow for half a year in 2008, studying Russian and Economics as part of an Exchange Program. Soon after moving to Moscow, Central Asian labor migrants attracted her attention. Sweeping the streets, working as a cashier in the supermarket or cleaning cars in underground carwashes. Men and women from the former Soviet States of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan come to Russia in search of work to provide for their families at home. It made her wonder: Who are these men and women and which place do they call home? Following her interest, she graduated with a Masters in Politics, Security and Integration from University College London / School of Slavonic and East European Studies in 2011 writing a thesis about the role of religion among Central Asian labor migrants in Moscow.
From September until December 2016 she spent time in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Russia. Central Asia is very much uncovered in the mainstream media in Europe. Therefore, the overall goal of spending three months in the region was twosided: to tell the story of the Central Asian labor migrants and secondly, to cover other interesting stories from the Central Asian region for publication in mainstream media.
For several weeks she followed labor migrants from remote areas in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan in their hometown, on their journey to Russia and their first weeks in Russia. By following labor migrants and their families she intended to shed light on both the social and wider economic situation in the homecountry and the situation that Central Asian labor migrants face upon arrival in Russia.
