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Iraqis in U.S. applaud refugee plans, U.S. to grant asylum to
up to 7,000 Iraqis |
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Iraqis in U.S. applaud refugee plans, U.S.
to grant asylum to up to 7,000 Iraqis
15.2.2007
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February 15, 2007
NASHVILLE, Tennessee. - Iraqis living in the
United States celebrated the announcement Wednesday
that 7,000 war refugees will be allowed to settle in
the U.S., but some complained the decision would not
help millions of other families who have fled their
homes.
In several cities with Iraqi communities, officials
promised to welcome the newcomers.
"Those who come here are running away from
explosions and terror, and they just want a peaceful
place to raise their children," said Ali Mahmoud,
60, the retired chairman of a defunct service group
called Iraqi House in Nashville, which is home to
8,000 Kurds, the nation's largest such community.
"There are a lot of miserable Iraqi people who want
out of Iraq," said Ruad Ridha, 70, an Iraqi refugee
who arrived in the U.S. in 1999 and lives in
suburban Chicago. "This is a very good decision, a
very kind decision and a humanitarian decision."
Wednesday's announcement marked a major policy shift
for the U.S., which has allowed only 600 Iraq
refugees into the country since the war began.
But resettlement workers and Muslim groups said even
the expanded number was a token gesture, especially
since the United Nations estimates 3.8 million
people have fled Iraq since 2003, most to other
Middle Eastern countries.
"How will they choose the few lucky ones?" asked
Samina F. Sundas, executive director of American
Muslim Voice in the San Francisco Bay area.
The decision to admit 7,000 Iraqis "is much better
than a few hundred, but ... it's a small number
compared to what everyone knows is the situation,"
said Salem Poles of the Arab American and Chaldean
Council in Detroit, a city that has one of the
nation's largest concentrations of people with roots
in the Middle East, including an Iraqi community.
Kansas state Rep. Lee Tafanelli, a colonel in the
National Guard who spent a year in Iraq commanding
an engineering battalion, said the U.S. is obligated
to help refugees. He said the nation should expect
more of them if American troops withdraw.
The United States bears much of the responsibility
for the refugee crisis, said Tafanelli, a
Republican. No matter how many Iraqis the U.S.
admits, "it will never be perceived in the world
community as being enough."
Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland of Ohio said he was
not inclined to accommodate the refugees because
doing so would help bail out President Bush.
"I am sympathetic to the plight of the innocent
Iraqi people who have fled that country," he said.
"However, I would not want to ask Ohioans to accept
a greater burden than they already have borne for
the Bush administration's failed policies."
Mahmood Suleiman, a retired Iraqi immigrant living
in Menlo Park, Calif., recently visited 20 relatives
who fled to Jordan to escape the war.
"I worry so much about them," he said. "I can only
hope they'll be among those allowed to come here to
build up a future."
AP
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