Category: Iraqi refugees

Church World Service bringing Iraqis to Amish country

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Here is some news from Lancaster, PA.  Church World Service is bringing 50 Iraqi refugees such as the Sunni Muslim in this article to the hometown of the plain folk.  Church World Service is one of the top ten volags contracted by the US State Department to resettle refugees.

Previously the Virginia Council of Churches, a government subcontractor of Church World Service, had brought Meshketian Turks (Muslims who had been living in Russia) to Lancaster, something went wrong there and the resettlement was stopped.  We think it was some crime issue, but we never did find out. That failed resettlement resulted in our receiving the Meshketians in Hagerstown.

Here then is the news from Lancaster today:

“[Omar] is one of the first Iraqis we’ve resettled,” McGeehan [Church World Service employee] said. “Many more are going to be coming.”

CWS is a cooperative Christian ministry that provides relief with mentorships, living arrangements and English education courses to refugees in more than 80 countries.

About 50 more Iraqi refugees will be resettled by the group in the Lancaster area by the end of 2008, McGeehan said.

From now until September 30th you will see one story after another about hundreds of refugees arriving in the US.   The Presidential Determination for this fiscal year set the ceiling at 80,000 refugees and the agencies will scramble from now until the end of September to bring in as many as possible.   As a matter of fact, in Hagerstown at this time last summer I attended a meeting in which some of the county agency heads (such as the health department) expressed how difficult it was to process refugees in large groups at this time of year when school was starting and everyone was swamped.   It fell on deaf ears.

Refugees International et al: We need more Iraqi refugees in America

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

This is a statement telling the US government what it needs to do about Iraq’s displaced people (and our 213th post on Iraqi refugees) signed by groups, many of which will financially benefit from the flood of Iraqis they want to bring here.   Read it all and note signatures. 

The primary author is Refugees International, read my earlier post about how their chairman of the Board, Farooq Kathwari,  is involved in various Arab groups in the US and is also mucking around in the Muslim separatist movement in Kashmir.  Oh, and Refugees International has testified to Congress that we should bring Rohingya Muslims to the US.

This “statement” does do one good service, it helps clarify all the numbers floating out there about how many refugees are here and expected this year.  

Besides the “drumbeat” issue (bring more Iraqis now), I suspect this statement has a twofold purpose.  First, it is the season of the year for drafting the annual Presidential Determination Letter (see 2008 letter here) in which the President sets a ceiling for refugees for the next fiscal year, so they are getting their licks (lobbying) in now.  And, secondly, the refugees are the last thing these anti-war folks (George Soros and friends) have to wrap around the Bush Administration’s neck leading up to the Presidential elections this fall.  Afterall, if Iraqis can’t go home then Iraq is still a mess.

So below is some of the information about numbers of Iraqis here now and how many might come if these groups have their way  (I take back what I said above about this document clarifying the numbers, they are still confusing!):

The United States Government has since made some progress in addressing the crisis. To date around 10,000 refugees have been resettled into the U.S.

While the U.S. may achieve its goal of resettling 12,000 Iraqi refugees here in the current fiscal year, the needs are much greater. We ask the U.S. to reconsider resettling 105,500 refugees from Iraq and, if necessary, to reassess this number for the next few years. As part of that request, we ask for U.S. government support, including financial support, to enable the U.S. to build the international and domestic capacity necessary to quickly resettle this substantially larger number of Iraqi refugees.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that 88,000 Iraqi refugees need immediate protection through resettlement next year. The U.S. generally resettles 50% of all refugees resettled in the world each year, bringing in the U.S. share for 2009 to: 44,000.

Oh, and here is a good suggestion (not!)!  Lets process refugees on American bases, territories, or even on our soil.  Aside from the security issues can you see the publicity advantage to airlifting thousands of Iraqis to someplace like Guam.

….such as processing Iraqis with US affiliations at a U.S. base or an alternative location in the region or even further away. In the past the U.S. has moved large numbers of refugees to Guam or even to the continental U.S. for processing.

The statement also calls for the US to up its support for the displaced Iraqis (including all those that were escaping the Saddam Hussein regime) and for rebuilding Iraq while Iraq has a budget surplus according to recent reports.

We recommend that the U.S. commit $1.35 billion in 2009 to help meet the basic needs of Iraqis in Iraq and sanctuary countries as long as the displaced population stays at the current level.

This NGO statement is so chock full of interesting stuff I could go on and on, so please go read the whole thing.  Note they are trying to head off the international enthusiasm for Iraqis returning home, saying its not safe yet.

P.S.  There are some Iraqi Christians in serious need of help, but these groups are not focusing on the Christians.

You gotta laugh! Translator’s fortunes have improved

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Wow! Just goes to show what is possible with a little publicity!  Just two days ago the Baltimore Sun published a story about the deplorable living conditions of an Iraq War translator.   We, actually Chris Coen, told you how Lutheran Social Services was falling down on the job.   Well, check out this update on Ahmed’s story. 

Today is moving day for Saad Ahmed, a wounded Iraqi interpreter who lost both legs to a roadside bomb last year while working for the U.S. military.

Ahmed is moving to a high-end apartment in North Bethesda that is wheelchair-accessible, with a spacious bathroom and an elevator to the lobby. 

“I saw it. It was nice, beautiful, like a hotel,” he said after being shown the apartment by Lutheran Social Services of the National Capital Area, the nonprofit agency that is coordinating his resettlement.

The change of address is one of several positive developments for him this week. A donor has contributed a motorized wheelchair to improve his mobility.

And the nonprofit agency says he will see a doctor within a week and already has referrals to medical specialists. 

The article goes on to tell about other good things coming Ahmed’s way —many thanks to private charity.   Americans are famous for their private charity and its only when people start expecting government (and these non-profit government contractors) to be the charity that we lose sight of the real meaning of the word.

Endnote:  Be sure to click on the comment by Chris Coen, Friends of Refugees, at the Baltimore Sun article.

Iraqi Palestinians going to Iceland, among other non-Muslim countries

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update:  Going to Sweden too.

We have written on several occasions about the Palestinians favored by Saddam Hussein who attempted to get out of ‘Dodge’ (Iraq) when the people Saddam had persecuted came to power there.  However, Jordan and Syria, the countries that have taken the largest number of Iraq’s displaced people refused entry to the Palestinians, once again demonstrating that Muslim countries do not help resettle Palestinians.   According to Reuters some are packing up for Iceland.

AL WALEED, Iraq, Aug. 4 (UNHCR) – More than two dozen vulnerable Palestinian refugees stranded for the last two years in a makeshift camp in the desert on the Iraq-Syria border are set to leave the camp in the coming weeks for Iceland.

“The group includes some of the most vulnerable women and children with urgent cases, for whom resettlement is the only option” says Daniel Endres, UNHCR’s Representative in Iraq.

Iceland takes 25 to 30 refugees for resettlement every year and in recent years has focused on resettling single women and single mothers with their children.

In addition to Iceland, Palestinians are going to Chile and Brazil, demonstrating again that suffering Palestinians are more important to Islamic countries as a political club with which to beat Israel.  So much for Muslims helping Muslims.

UNHCR has repeatedly called for international support for the Palestinians but with few results. Few Palestinians in the border camps have been accepted for resettlement or offered shelter in third countries; only some 300 Palestinians left to non-traditional resettlement country such as Brazil and Chile.