Day: July 2, 2009

Indictment coming in Minneapolis missing Somali youth case

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

According to Fox News an announcement is imminent in the case of former refugees* gone missing—-a case we have been following since November of last year, here.

A federal grand jury has indicted a group of Somali-Americans on terror-related charges after more than 20 young men from the Minneapolis area were recruited to join an Al Qaeda-linked group in Somalia, according to two law enforcement sources.

The indictments have yet to be unsealed, but an announcement is expected in the next few weeks. One law enforcement source told FOX News the grand jury already has handed up indictments against at least three people.

Among those charged is a man from Minneapolis who went to war-torn Somalia and then, about four months ago, relocated to Seattle, according to the two sources and a leader in the Minneapolis Somali community. The man was then arrested in a Seattle airport and transferred to a jail in Minneapolis, where he is currently being detained, according to the law enforcement sources.

The law enforcement sources said the man, described as in his 20s, has been charged with providing material support to a terrorist group, in this case al-Shabaab, which has been warring with the moderate Somali government since 2006.

Repeating the same line of naive and wishful thinking we heard throughout Senate hearings earlier this year, Janet Reno (oops Napolitano) told reporters it’s all about Somalia and not about the US. 

A source told FOX News in March that “several” recruits had returned to the United States, but counterterrorism officials have repeatedly said there is no intelligence indicating that any such recruits are planning attacks within the country.

“[Their] primary focus obviously is not on the homeland, it’s abroad,” Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano said during a briefing with reporters last week. “But any time you have people who are being trained in terrorist-type activities, that’s something that needs to be monitored.”

Monitor!  Indeed!  If it turns out the mosque was involved in the recruitment then it has everything to do with us.

Jerry Gordon writing at New English Review has more on this story, here.

Note that CAIR has attempted to block this investigation, here.

*To new readers:    

The US State Department has admitted over 80,000 Somali refugees to the US in the last 25 years and then last year had to suspend family reunification because widespread immigration fraud was revealed through DNA testing.

Cultural Orientation abroad: what does it entail?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Nothing earth-shattering to report.  I just wanted to add to our ‘where to find information’ category something we know little about—what sort of cultural orientation do refugees receive before getting on the plane for the US.  I know to some of you—-dealing especially with Somalis—-you are wondering if they had any instruction on how Americans live.

Readers can go to this website, Cultural Orientation Resource Center, and order a “Guide for Refugees.”

This resettlement guide, revised in 2004, was funded by the Department of State, Bureau for Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM). It resulted from numerous meetings and the work of a special Cultural Orientation Task Force convened by the State Department/PRM. The Task Force, comprised of PRM staff, staff of national and local refugee resettlement agencies, state refugee coordinators, overseas orientation implementors, former refugees, and the Center for Applied Linguistics was formed to undertake a review of overseas pre-departure orientation/briefings to make sure the orientation refugees were receiving was relevant to their needs as identifed by resettlement agencies and by refugees already in the U.S.—and to ensure that each U.S.-bound refugee receive consistent information about resettlement.

I hope to have time to look into this further and research this website because I continue to be puzzled by reports that Somalis are trying to set wood fires on top of  kitchen stoves, or that Iraqis are somehow getting such erroneous information about what to expect with American life.  They uniformly say they hadn’t been told about lousy jobs and slum apartments.  Who is doing the teaching?

Utah National Guard seeking to help Iraqis settle in, many still leave

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

According to the Salt Lake Tribune, some members of the Utah National Guard are getting together with Iraqi refugees to help them settle into life in Utah.   I was surprised to see the large number of refugees that have already returned to the Middle East disgusted with life in America,  however, some plan to stick it out here especially as more violence is predicted.

But others have concluded that there is no future for them here. Since arriving in Utah, more than a dozen Iraqis — disappointed by the support system they found in America and often struggling to find work in a bad economy — have returned to their war-torn nation or other countries in the Middle East.

Refugees reported that they anticipate stepped up violence in their homeland as Obama pulls troops out of Iraq.

While Iraq is significantly less violent right now than it was at the time that many of the refugees left, some believe that Tuesday’s withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraqi cities — and a full withdrawal planned for 2010 — will spark a new round of sectarian fighting, including the tit-for-tat murder sprees that marred the nation from 2005 to 2007.

“People are going to start fighting again,” said Niaz Rashid, who arrived in Utah last month. “It is certain.”

Off topic, but I’ve wondered if when Obama pulls us out and if violence returns will Obama be blamed for losing Iraq?  Just wondering.  And, if refugee numbers increase will they be Obama’s refugees?