Sunday, May 23, 2021

Iraq refugees

CNN INTERNATIONAL anchor Michael Holmes Tweeted:


"Ali" and "Yassin" are just two of the translators who spent years working with the US military in #Iraq and are STILL waiting for the US visas they were promised. In hiding and fearing for their lives while the US leaves them behind. And it's happening in #Afghanistan too.

1:48 AM · May 23, 2021 


The Iraqi refugee crisis continues with little press attention.  Since 2014 alone, the UN notes, 3 million Iraqis have left the country.  Little attention is given today to the fact that in the first years of the Iraq War, the largest refugee crisis in the Middle East since 1948 had taken place.  Since then, each year the numbers have risen.  A low estimate of the total is nine million Iraqis have been turned into refugees who were displaced in Iraq and/or who had to seek asylum in other countries since the strt of the Iraq War.   


Instead of helping the refugees, the 'answer' is always to push them around and push them off.  Luis Martinez (ABC NEWS) reported a few days ago:


The top U.S. military commander in the Middle East is optimistic that next week's planned repatriation of a hundred Iraqi families from a large refugee camp in Syria could be the first step toward reducing the threat of a resurgence of the Islamic State emanating from the camp that is home to 65,000 mostly women and children, including many ISIS supporters.

Gen. Frank McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, made his comments to ABC News and Associated Press reporters accompanying him during his visit Friday to several U.S. bases in northeastern Syria.

[. . .]


McKenzie sees the repatriation of families to their home countries as a solution to that nightmare scenario, though he feels that process is moving too slowly.


Well isn't he just all heart?


Imagine what its like to be in need of help and be given none.  Rosalie MacEachern (SALT NEWS) reports on one family:


In a tiny, two-bedroom apartment in a crime-ridden neighbourhood in the sprawling city of Istanbul, a family of six wearily waits for word that its journey to Pictou County can begin.

The Al Qass Matte family is accustomed to waiting, being Iraqi refugees for nearly eight years. Theirs is a story of persecution, terror and deprivation but for the family’s eldest daughter, 23-year-old Rahma, it is also a love story. For the past two years, she has been separated from her fiance, Sinan Al Shaltan, a continuing care assistant at Glen Haven Manor.

Sinan and Rahma both came from the town of Bartella, near the city of Mosul in Iraq but they met in Istanbul where they struggled daily to help their families, exchanged memories of happy childhoods and worried about the future. They parted in March 2019 when the Al Shaltan family immigrated to Westville under the sponsorship of the Warm Hearts Society. For Sleaman and Selma Al Shaltan the sponsorship was an answer to years of prayers but their youngest son Sinan’s heart was torn.

“For myself and my parents, I was very happy to come to Canada but it broke my heart to leave Rahma and her family. I was able to help them when I was there so now their lives are even more difficult.”

As he scrambled to leave Istanbul with his parents, whose five other children are in Sweden, England and Australia, Sinan made a promise he is still trying to keep.

“I told Rahma if there were people in Canada good, kind and generous enough to sponsor my family I would somehow find such people to help her family.”

Although Warm Hearts disbanded after bringing the Al Shaltans to Westville, its core members joined with First Presbyterian Church in New Glasgow to form FAIR (Friends Assisting Iraqi Refugees) Hearts with the mission of resettling the Al Qass Matte family.


They flee for safety and instead of assisting people, we try to prevent them from leaving Iraq or we work to send them back.  Maggie Baska (PINK NEWS) reports:


The 32-year-old man, who wished to remain anonymous, told Leeds Live that he grew up in the city of Sulaymaniyah, in the Kurdistan Region, in northern Iraq. He has been living in Leeds for a month now, and he said cried when he arrived in the UK because he was “in a safe country”. The man said he is a “very strong person”, but it’s still “not easy to talk about what happened”.

“I had a very very bad life, I [was in a] bad situation with bad suffering,” he said. “Three times I was [put] in prison just for the reason that I’m gay.”

He said nobody “accepted you” or “supported you” if someone came out as part of the LGBT+ community. The man said he was subjected to horrific abuse when he lived in Sulaymaniyah. He said people called him “stupid”, “sick” or “street boy” and people would spit in his face or threaten to tell other people that he was gay.

The man told Leeds Live he was arrested one time for just sitting in a park that was “known for gay people”. He said the police came and started “slapping me all over and kicking me” before demanding the man humiliate himself and ask to be forgiven.


The following sites updated:


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