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تاريخ التسجيل : 07/10/2009
 | موضوع: Dont Deport Iraqi Christians!  الأحد 19 ديسمبر 2010 - 20:15 | |
| Dont Deport Iraqi Christians!  KIDNAPPINGS and murders are rife, and the persecution that Middle East experts predicted would happen if the country was invaded is a daily reality.
Now the 300-strong Iraqi Christian community in Wales is seeking support for a change in policy from the UK Government that would stop asylum seekers from their midst being sent back.
Businessman Raad Halabia has lived in Wales for 30 years, originally coming to study at what is now the University of Glamorgan. After working for Neath Port Talbot Council, he left to run his own catering and property development businesses. Living in Cardiff, he is vice-chairman of the Iraqi Christian Association in Wales.
He said: “Saddam Hussein was, of course, a dictator. But so long as you didn’t involve yourself in politics, you would be left alone to get on with your life.
“Following the first Gulf War in the early 1990s, a lot of Iraqi Christians left for the United States and Europe. Their numbers declined from around five million to about 2.5 million in 2003. Now the figure is about 600,000.“After the invasion in 2003 there was total chaos. The general view of extremists was that the invasion was a takeover by Western powers that were mainly Christian.
“So in revenge they targeted the Christians of Iraq as an easy option. Since the invasion, extreme Islamic fundamentalists and their supporters from both inside and outside Iraq have been bombing and burning churches, kidnapping, torturing, raping and murdering.”
In 2008 Bishop Faraj Paulus Rahho, of the Chaldean Catholic Church, was murdered in the northern city of Mosul. Then on the last day of October this year several militants, calling themselves the Islamic State of Iraq, stormed into Our Lady of Deliverance Cathedral in Baghdad, taking the entire congregation hostage for four hours before murdering 57 and leaving 67 wounded.
Among those murdered was a relative of Raad Halabia, who said: “Since this dreadful massacre, the situation has got even worse for Iraqi Christians. The Iraqi Government is making it difficult for them to get new passports. They are having severe problems selling their homes for a reasonable price, and even if they succeed they are tracked down and killed for the money.
“In these circumstances, we believe the UK Government should not be sending Iraqi Christians back to Iraq. The situation for them is far too dangerous.”
A campaign is under way aimed at persuading the Government to change its policy. It is backed by Cytun, the umbrella body representing churches in Wales, whose chief executive Rev Aled Edwards said: “We believe Iraqi Christians deserve support at this very difficult time. It is not right that people should be returned to face persecution of the kind that is going on in Iraq. Together with other bodies, we shall be putting pressure on the Home Office to let them stay.”
A Home Office spokesman said: “The UK Border Agency continues to undertake removals to Iraq for those individuals who have been found not to have a right to be here.“This position is supported by the UK courts who confirmed on September 20, 2010, that we are able to return people to Iraq.
“If an Iraqi Christian is found to be in genuine need of our protection, we will grant them refuge. However, equally, we expect those who we and the courts find are not in need of our assistance to leave voluntarily. If they fail to do so we will seek to enforce their removal.“Having an enforced route for returns is an important part of ensuring we focus our resources on those who genuinely need our help.”
On Wednesday, a vigil will be held at 6pm in Dewi Sant Church, St Andrew’s Crescent, Cardiff, in support of Iraqi Christians and to commemorate those who have died.Some Christians in Wales see the persecution of their fellow believers in diverse parts of the world as symptomatic of global moves against the religion from which the UK is not immune.
Rev Geoff Waggett, the Rector of Ebbw Vale, said: “For some time we have been conscious of and have been observing the persecution in many countries around the world, not just in those which have a predominantly Islamic faith, but in areas where Christian ethics and morality might be despised by those in authority.
“The great danger of recent Acts of Parliament within our own UK, driven largely by secular humanism, is that they could very well lead to the persecution of Christians and those who seek to uphold the Christian faith,” he added.
“There seems little danger that this could lead to death or violence, but we are already seeing an increasing deterioration of the Christian laws and principles on which our country has been built.
“Particularly over the last 50 years we have seen our Queen, who promised to be Defender of the Faith – that is the Christian faith – promulgating Acts of Parliament that are clearly contrary to Holy Scripture.
“Under the Equality Act 2010, for example, it is conceivable that you could be prosecuted for quoting from the Bible itself or even the words of Jesus.”
by Martin Shipton, Wales Online Email This BlogThis! Share to Twitter Share to Facebook Share to Google Buzz 0 comments   if (window['tickAboveFold']) {window['tickAboveFold'](document.getElementById("latency-1571972679996749416")); } Sweden's deporting Iraqi Christians  The U.N. criticized Sweden on Friday for deporting five Iraqi Christians back to their homeland as Iraq's Christian community comes under severe threat of militant attacks.
Thousands of Iraqi Christians have fled abroad or to the relative safety of Iraq's northern Kurdish region since an Oct. 31 siege on a Catholic church in Baghdad that was taken hostage during a Mass service by suicide bombers who ultimately killed 68 people.
The U.N.'s High Commission for Refugees said the five deported Christians were part of a group of at least 20 Iraqis who failed to gain asylum in Sweden and were flown out on Wednesday.In a Friday release, the refugee agency called itself "dismayed" over the deportation and called on countries to take in Iraqis from Baghdad, Kirkuk and three northern provinces that the U.N. considers unsafe because of repeated attacks, sectarian tensions and human rights violations.
"We have heard many accounts of people fleeing their homes after receiving direct threats," said Melissa Fleming, a Geneva-based spokeswoman for the U.N. agency. "Many of the new arrivals explain they've left in fear as a result of the church attack on Oct. 31.""Some were able to take only a few belongings with them," Fleming said.
Wednesday's deportations come less than a week after an Iraqi-born Swede blew himself up in a botched bombing in central Stockholm, killing himself and injuring two people. They also come as fears steadily grow due to attacks by Islamic extremists on Christians and churches across Iraq.
An al-Qaida-linked group claimed responsibility for the October church massacre, threatening even more violence against Iraq's remaining Christians.Fleming estimated 1,000 families have left Baghdad and the northern Ninevah province since the October attack. She cited a "a slow but steady exodus" of Christians headed abroad or to the relative safety of the self-rule Kurdish region in northern Iraq.
U.S. officials in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon also reported a growing number of Iraqi Christians arriving and asking the agency for help, Fleming said.In Syria, the agency estimated about 133 families — or about 300 individuals — have reached out to applied for refugee status since November. Most cited the church siege as their reason for fleeing.
The number of Christians who applied for asylum with the U.N. in Jordan also doubled in the past two months compared to the same time last year, the agency said.
Also Friday, a roadside bomb in southeast Baghdad exploded as Shiite pilgrims were returning home from the holy city of Karbala in the south, after final ceremonies ended for Ashoura, the Shiite Muslims' most solemn religious event of the year. Eight pilgrims were wounded, according to police and hospital officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
To voice your opposition to the actions carried out by the government of Sweden, please direct your protests to:
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Iraq army fails minorities
CHRISTIAN Iraqis are again fleeing to other parts of the country and abroad amid growing fears that the security forces are unable or, more ominously, unwilling to protect them from sectarian attack.
The flight - involving thousands of Christians from Baghdad and Mosul, in particular - followed an October siege at a church in Baghdad in which 51 worshippers and two priests were killed, and a subsequent series of bombings and assassinations singling out Christians.
This new exodus highlights the continuing displacement of Iraqis despite improved security overall and the near-resolution of the political impasse that gripped Iraq after elections in March.It threatens to reduce further what Archdeacon Emanuel Youkhana of the Assyrian Church of the East called "a community whose roots were in Iraq even before Christ".
Those who fled the latest violence - many of them in a panic, with only the possessions they could pack in cars - warned that the new violence augurs the demise of Christianity in Iraq. Several compared it to the mass departure of Iraq's Jews after the founding of the state of Israel in 1948.
"It's exactly what happened to the Jews," said Nassir Sharhoom, 47, who fled last month to the Kurdish capital, Irbil, with his family from Dora, a once mixed area of Baghdad. "They want us all to go."Iraq's leaders, including prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, have pledged to tighten security and appealed for tolerance for minority faiths in what is an overwhelmingly Muslim country.
"The Christian is an Iraqi," he said after visiting those wounded in the siege of the church, Our Lady of Salvation, the worst single act of violence against Christians since 2003. "He is the son of Iraq and from the depths of a civilisation that we are proud of."
For those who fled, though, such pronouncements have been met with growing scepticism. The daily threats, the uncertainty and palpable terror many Christians face have overwhelmed even the pleas of church leaders not to abandon their historic place in a diverse Iraq.
"Their faith in God is strong," said the Reverend Gabriele Tooma, who heads the monastery of the Virgin Mary, part of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Qosh, which opened its cloisters to 25 families in recent weeks.
"It is their faith in the government that has weakened."Christians, of course, are not the only victims of the bloodshed that has swept Iraq for more than seven and a half years; Sunni and Shi'ite Iraqis have died on a far greater scale.
Christians and other smaller minority groups here, however, have been explicitly made targets and have emigrated in disproportionate numbers. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, these groups account for 20 per cent of the Iraqis who have gone abroad, while they were only 3 per cent of the country's pre-war population.
More than half of Iraq's Christian community, estimated to number 800,000 to 1.4 million before the American-led invasion in 2003, has already fled.The Islamic State of Iraq, a scion of the insurgent group al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia, claimed responsibility for the suicidal siege and said its fighters would kill Christians "wherever they can reach them".
What followed last month were dozens of shootings and bombings in Baghdad and Mosul, the two cities outside of the semi-autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq. At least a dozen more Christians died, eight of them in Mosul.
Three generations of the Gorgiz family - 15 in all - fled their homes there on the morning of 23 November as the killings spread. Crowded into a single room at the monastery in Qosh, they described living in a state of virtual siege, afraid to wear crucifixes on the streets, afraid to work or even leave their houses.
The night before they fled, Diana Gorgiz, 35, said she heard voices and then screams; someone had set fire to the garden of a neighbour's house. The Iraqi army arrived and stayed until morning, only to tell them they were not safe there any more. The family took it as a warning - and an indication of complicity, tacit or otherwise, by Iraq's security forces. "When the army comes and says, ‘We cannot protect you,'" Gorgiz said, "what else can you believe?"
The Kurdish Regional Government in northern Iraq offered itself as a haven and pledged to help refugees with housing and jobs. Many of those who fled are wealthy enough to afford rents in Iraqi Kurdistan; others have moved in with relatives; the worst off have ended up at the monastery here and another nearby, St Matthew's, one of the oldest Christian monasteries in the world.
By one estimate, only 5,000 of the 100,000 Christians who once lived in Mosul remain. The displacement of Christians has continued despite the legal protections that Iraq's constitution offers religious and ethnic minorities, though Islam is the official state religion and no law can be passed contradicting its basic tenets.
Christians have a quota of five seats in the new 325-member parliament, though little political influence. Christmas was declared a national holiday in 2008, though celebrations are muted, and in Kirkuk, a tensely disputed city north of Baghdad, Christmas Mass was cancelled last year.
The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, appointed by President Barack Obama and Congress, said that the nominal protections for religious minorities in Iraq - including Christians, Yazidis and Sabean Mandeans, followers
ADVERTISEMENTof St John the Baptist - did little to stop violence or official discrimination in employment, housing and other matters. It noted that few of the attacks against minority groups were ever properly investigated or prosecuted, "creating a climate of impunity".
"The violence, forced displacement, discrimination, marginalisation and neglect suffered by members of these groups threaten these ancient communities' very existence in Iraq," the commission said in its latest annual report in May. Last week, security officials announced the arrest of insurgents they claimed had planned the attack on Our Lady of Salvation; those who actually carried it out died when Iraqi forces stormed the church. They offered few details, and a spokesman for the American military, which regularly joins Iraqi forces during such arrests, said he had no information on those arrested.
Archdeacon Emanuel said the government needed to do more to preserve a community that has been under siege in Iraq for decades - from the first massacre of Christians in Sumail in 1933 after the creation of the modern Iraqi nation to the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein to today's nihilistic extremism that, in his words, has taken Islam hostage. Invitations by European countries for Christians to emigrate following the attack, he said, would only hasten the departure of more, which "is not a solution".
Instead, the latest violence should give impetus to the creation of an autonomous Christian enclave in the part of Nineveh province that is now under the control of the Kurdish region. That idea, though, has little political support in Iraq in Baghdad or Iraqi Kurdistan. "What happened has been done repeatedly and systematically," he said. "We have seen it in Mosul, in Baghdad. The message is very clear: to pluck Iraqi Christians from the roots and force them out of the country."
By Steven Lee Myers, the New Scotsman
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Iraqi Christians flee Baghdad
Thousands of Christians have been forced to flee in seeking refuge from militant attacks after the siege at a Catholic cathedral in October, the United Nations said today. .
The UN High Commission For Refugees said at least 1,000 families had fled Baghdad and Mosul since 1 September for the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq. A further 133 families had registered with the organisation in Syria, as had 109 individuals in Jordan.
Father Hanna, the leading Assyrian Catholic priest in Beirut said that 450 recently arrived families had contacted with his office and plan to ask the UN for help.
The mass movement of Iraq's Christians, the remnants of which make up one of the most ancient communities in the Middle East, was sparked by the brutal siege in a Baghdad Assyrian Catholic cathedral on October 31, which left at least 58 people dead and around 100 injured.
Since then, Christian families have been increasingly targeted in their homes, among them survivors of the church massacre. The violence is being driven by al-Qaida and its affiliates and is being seen as an attempt to ignite sectarian chaos after repeated attempts to lure Iraq's Shias back into battle had failed.
"We have heard many accounts of people fleeing their homes after receiving direct threats. Some were able to take only a few belongings with them," the UN report said.
There are thought to be around 500,000 Christians remaining in Iraq, down from 1 million when Saddam Hussein was ousted. They enjoyed protection under Saddam and have not been persecuted by the various Shia-led regimes that have ruled Iraq since. However, many Christian leaders fear that Iraq's leaders can no longer safeguard them from attacks. Many suggest that the last six weeks mark the beginning of the end of an era in Iraq that dates back almost 2,000 years.
The UN described the movement as a slow but steady exodus, but Christian leaders disputed this. "I can tell you that the numbers the UN are citing are too low," said Abdullah al-Naftali, head of Iraq's Christian Endowment Group."We have recorded a 213% increase in normal departures since the church massacre. It is not a slow, or steady exodus - it is a rapid one."
The large numbers of families looking for refuge in Iraq's Kurdish north have been drawn there by the region's president, Massoud Barazani, who last month pledged to protect and shelter them.Iraq's central government has also increased security around churches and Christian enclaves.
"The Iraqi government has reiterated its commitment to increase the protection of places of worship," the UN said. "While overall civilian casualties are lower this year than last, it appears that minority groups are increasingly susceptible to threats and attacks."
The exodus has sparked widespread concern among Christian communities elsewhere in the Middle East, such as Lebanon and Egypt, where they enjoy freedom, but are apprehensive about declining demographic balance.
"The Christians in general in the broader Middle East are not really secured and feel a kind of uncertainty all over the Islamic world," said Amin Gemayel, a former president of Lebanon and patriarch of the country's largest Christian bloc.
"Unfortunately there is a kind of unconsciousness among the Muslim leaders," he said in an interview with the Guardian. "Even among the moderates we don't feel an effective reaction or see initiatives to stop this kind of behaviour," he added, referring to attacks by extremists.
"This is very negative for the Muslim world. The Christians bring a lot to the region. They are eastern people with eastern feelings and eastern values."
Martin Chulov, The Guardian
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Iraqi Refugees In Limbo
This holiday season, thousands of Iraqi refugees are living in limbo in the Middle East.
Iraqi Christians and other religious and sexual minorities, as well as U.S.- affiliated Iraqis are struggling to survive outside Iraq with limited ability to exercise their basic rights, obtain formal employment or access services such as education and heath care, according to a new report from Human Rights First, a research and advocacy organization.
The report charges that “serious reforms are needed in the U.S. resettlement program to remove unnecessarily processing delays which now leave many Iraqis refugees and U.S.-affiliated Iraqis vulnerable and stranded in difficult and sometimes dangerous situations.”The report is entitled, “Living in Limbo: Iraqi Refugees and U.S. Resettlement.” Its lead author is Jesse Bernstein.
As violence and instability persist in Iraq, resettlement to other countries – including the United States – remains the only effective path for many of these refugees. These include “those who have faced persecution in Iraq because of their work with the United States, to find safety, dignity and a new home for their families,” the report says.
It adds that, while the United States has stepped up its response to Iraqi displacement over the last few years, “Lengthy delays in U.S. processing leave Iraqis slated for U.S. resettlement languishing for months – even years – in countries where they have limited opportunities to support their families and some – particularly those within Iraq – face life-threatening circumstances,” said HRF’s Bernstein.
“These persisting processing delays, including delays in processing background clearances, continue to undermine the effectiveness of the programs created by Congress – in bi-partisan legislation – to ensure that U.S.-affiliated Iraqis are brought to safety in a timely manner,” he said.
Despite the ongoing U.S. troop drawdown and its shift to a civilian-led operation in Iraq, Iraqis continue to face persecution and violence, circumstances that cause them to flee to different regions of Iraq or to seek refuge in countries such as Syria, Jordan, and Turkey, the report says.
“This serious situation requires continued high level engagement from the United States and international community. In 2010 alone, the U.N. refugee agency (UNHCR) registered just over 31,000 Iraqi refugees. In October of this year, there were 3,000 new registrations alone in Syria and Jordan. Over 195,000 Iraqi refugees are registered with UNHCR in the region, although additional refugees are not registered,” HRF reports.
The report documents that in its interviews with Iraqis in the region, including religious minorities such as Iraqi Christians and U.S.-affiliated Iraqis, “not one had hopes of returning to Iraq, and some experienced direct violence while waiting to be resettled to the United States.”
In one case, the report recounts, the son of an Iraqi translator who worked for the United States military waited 21 months in Baghdad for his resettlement approval. During his wait, he was shot due to his father’s U.S. affiliation and he received additional threats while waiting for his U.S. security check process to be completed. He finally arrived in the United States in November 2010. In another example, a child fell ill and died while awaiting security processing and his young siblings and mother were jailed by Turkish authorities because they had overstayed their visas.
The report explains that, “in recent years, the United States has played a leadership role in providing humanitarian assistance to Iraqi refugees and displaced persons. It has also contributed significantly to UNHCR’s Iraqi protection operations.”
But at the same time, the Departments of State and Homeland Security continue to struggle to overcome persistent problems that undermine the timeliness of U.S. resettlement efforts, including delays in the processing of inter-agency security clearances.
It notes that former US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker complained about the “bottlenecks” in security clearance processing over three years ago.HRF’s report, based on independent research and interviews with Iraqi refugees as well as government officials and UN staff, recommends a series of reforms to address the concerns raised in the report.
The US, it says, should ensure timely and effective processing of resettlement and visa applications for Iraqi refugees, U.S.-affiliated Iraqis and other refugees – specifically:
■Reduce unnecessary delays in the security clearance process. The National Security Council should, together with the Departments of State, Justice, Homeland Security and intelligence agencies, improve the inter-agency security clearance procedure to enable security checks for refugees and U.S.-affiliated Iraqis to be completed accurately and without unnecessary delays within a set time period;
■Develop and implement an emergency resettlement procedure for refugees facing imminent danger. The Department of State should continue to work with other relevant federal agencies to develop and implement a formal and transparent resettlement procedure for refugees who face emergency or urgent circumstances;
■Remove other impediments that continue to delay the applications of U.S.-affiliated Iraqis. The Department of State, working with other agencies, should – in addition to addressing delays in security processing – continue to take other steps to eliminate case backlogs and address inefficiencies in the current SIV visa processing procedures;
■Provide information necessary for refugees to submit meaningful Requests for Reconsideration. The Department of Homeland Security’s U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services should implement reforms to improve the fairness and effectiveness of the resettlement process, including by revising the current Notice of Ineligibility for Resettlement to provide case-specific factual and legal reasons for denial.
“By addressing the persistent delays in processing, the Obama administration will strengthen the effectiveness of the U.S. resettlement program and recommit itself to the protection of refugees,” Bernstein concluded.
US efforts to relocate Iraqi refugees have had a checkered history.
Since 2003, more than 35,000 Iraqi refugees have resettled in the U.S. The U.S. was slow to admit the refugees until Sen. Kennedy initiated legislation to facilitate the process. The Refugee Crisis in Iraq Act, which passed in 2008, directs the Secretary of State to establish processing facilities in Iraq and countries in the region for eligible Iraqis to apply and interview for U.S. admission as refugees or as special immigrants.
In 2009, after years of delay and bureaucratic red tape, refugees from the Iraq War were finally allowed into the United States. But there is ample evidence that America opened its gates to refugees and then simply forgot about them after they arrived.
In the process, the United States was in danger of failing to meet its legal obligations to extend protection to the most vulnerable refugees, promote their long-term self-sufficiency, and support their integration.
These are among the key findings of a study carried out by a team of students at the Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, D.C. The students, members of Georgetown Human Rights Action, conducted the study in partnership with the Law Center’s Human Rights Institute. They interviewed Iraqi refugees in Jordan and in two cities in the U.S., Washington, D.C. and Detroit.
Their report says, “Across the United States, many resettled Iraqi refugees are wondering how, after fleeing persecution at home to seek refuge in (Jordan) a country that barely tolerated them, they have found themselves in ‘the land of opportunity’ with little hope of achieving a secure and decent life.”
It charges that recently resettled Iraqi refugees “face odds so heavily stacked against them that most end up jobless, some even homeless” and cites the experience of one Iraqi widow who lives with her three young children in a shelter.“I left Iraq to find security,” the refugee says. “But what kind of security is it to live in a homeless shelter?”
The report applauds the advocates who “worked tirelessly to encourage the U.S. government to accept Iraqis who were forced to flee a war initiated by the United States,” but notes that “few have studied what happens to those refugees after they arrive here.”Acknowledging that resettlement is one of three “durable solutions” for refugees, the report says there has been “scarce focus on just how durable the U.S. resettlement system actually is.”
It says that the United States Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) “is unique in giving new life and opportunity to millions of refugees, accepting many times more than the rest of the world combined.” But it cautions that as these new refugees from Iraq arrive in increasing numbers, and “as the U.S. economy continues to offer little prospect for those seeking work, there is an urgent need to diagnose the ills of refugee resettlement before they become incurable.”
The project sought to determine the extent to which Iraqi refugees have been afforded protection and a durable solution through the USRAP. Throughout their report, “long-term self-sufficiency” and “long-term integration” are the terms used to describe both the goal of the USRAP and the standard against which it is measured.
The report says, “If the United States is to meet its own aims and serve as a guarantor of security for those it welcomes to its shores, it is imperative that U.S. policies be based on respect for these legal norms.”
The report recommends that refugee resettlement should be decoupled from U.S. anti-poverty programs and tailored to the unique needs and experiences of refugees.It suggests that refugee assistance be increased from eight to eighteen months, and programs designed to promote the long-term self-sufficiency and integration of refugees should be better funded.
Stronger emphasis should be placed on the core barriers to self-sufficiency and integration, including lack of English language skills, lack of transportation, and lack of opportunities for education and recertification.
It also recommends that funding for employment and social services should be tailored to estimates of incoming refugee arrivals and secondary migration, as well as the unique needs of these particular groups. Funding should not be based on the number of past refugee arrivals.
Finally, the report says, “All actors within the USRAP must improve planning and information sharing capabilities. Planning should anticipate and prepare for the unique needs of each refugee group prior to arrival. In order to tailor services for refugees, actors must take into account important information on refugees collected in the resettlement process, such as health status and professional background.”
The United Nations estimates that there are currently 4.7 million Iraqi external and internal refugees. Until 2007, the numbers admitted to the U.S. were in the low hundreds. Then, under pressure from advocacy groups and increased reporting on the plight of Iraqi refugees, the U.S. began resettling more Iraqis. In the fall of 2007, Congress passed the Refugee Crisis in Iraq Act, providing admission for Iraqis that worked for the U.S. or its contractors in Iraq, and allowing in-country processing for at-risk Iraqis.
In 2008, the United States appointed two Senior Coordinators for Iraqi Refugees, one at the Department of State (DOS) and one at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), to strengthen the American humanitarian commitment to refugees with a particular emphasis on resettlement. In FY 2008, the U.S. resettled 13,822 Iraqi refugees. As of August 31, 2009, the U.S. had resettled 16,965, totaling approximately 33,000 since the start of the 2003 war.
William Fisher, a regular contributor to The Public Record, has managed economic development programs for the U.S. State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development in the Middle East, Latin America and elsewhere for the past 25 years and served in the administration of President John F. Kennedy. He reports on a wide-range of issues for numerous domestic and international newspapers and online journals. He blogs at The World According to Bill Fisher | |
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