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Sweden tightens rules on Iraqi asylum
seekers
6.7.2007
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July
6, 2007
STOCKHOLM, Sweden, July 6, -- Sweden, which
hosts more Iraqi refugees than any other country in
Europe, has ruled that Iraqis seeking asylum must
show they would be personally at risk in their
homeland to avoid being sent back.
The ruling came after Sweden's migration board
issued a statement on Friday, giving its decision on
three separate cases.
In the first case, a Christian man from Baghdad was
granted asylum on the basis that he could show he
was at personal risk while in his home city, the
statement said.
"The second man from Baghdad could not point to any
individual circumstances that would increase the
risk that he is a victim of the violence in Baghdad
to a greater extent than others living there," the
statement said. "He therefore does not fulfil the
criteria."
A third asylum-seeker from southern Iraq was also
denied asylum on the same basis.
The ruling clarifies the criteria for asylum-seekers
in Sweden. Previously, the migration board
considered applications on a case-by-case basis, a
migration board official said.
A Swedish court also ruled earlier this year that
the country does not consider Iraq to be an armed
conflict, a status which can influence whether
refugees are granted asylum.
Nearly half of all Iraqis that fled to Europe last
year came to Sweden, a country known for its
generous welfare benefits and more relaxed rules on
asylum.
A Swedish migration board official said official
figures showed 8,951 Iraqis came to Sweden last
year, or 45 percent of the total in Europe.
Christian Iraqis, fearing persecution in their
homeland, make up a large part of that total.
Iraqis also constitute the biggest group of
asylum-seekers in Sweden, dwarfing the second
largest group from Serbia and Montenegro, which
numbered 1,760 last year.
But Sweden has grown increasingly worried about the
strain that the flood of asylum-seekers is taking on
its welfare system.
The migration official said each asylum-seeker was
entitled to up to three hearings to determine his or
her status.
In February the Migration Court of Appeal ruled that
asylum seekers could be sent back to the three
Kurd-controlled provinces in Kurdistan autonomous
region (Iraq) and the Kurdish areas around them.
Baghdad and the southern parts of the country were
at the time considered to be too dangerous.
The Kurdistan regional authority has refused to take
back citizens who have been sent home from other
countries, citing a lack of resources.
Reuters | thelocal se
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