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On the Hill: The OSCE and the Iraqi refugee crisis
April 10, 2008
By Beth Hearn
The flow of Iraqi refugees is the largest displacement of people in the region since 1948, said Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.), Chairman of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (U.S. Helsinki Commission), at a hearing on Capitol Hill on April 10. Ambassador James Foley, Senior Coordinator for Iraqi refugees at the U.S. State Department, cited statistics from the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) estimating that 4.5 million Iraqis are currently displaced: 2.5 million internally and 2 million in Iraq’s neighboring countries. He said that Syria has accepted 1.2 to 1.4 million; Jordan, 450,000-500,000; Lebanon, 50,000; Egypt, 20,000-40,000; Turkey, 5,000-10,000; Iran, more than 57,000; and the Gulf States more than 200,000.
This massive influx of people is putting pressure on the resources of the host countries, said Michael Gabaudan, Washington Director of UNHCR, particularly as many have high populations of refugees from other conflicts. Lebanon, for example, has a population of just over 4 million and hosts 250,000 Palestinians in addition to the Iraqi refugees.
The legal systems of countries in the region do not provide for legal refugee status, meaning that Iraqis often do not have entitlements such as the right to work, said Gabaudan. Iraqi refugees throughout the region face severe difficulties: many are at risk of refused admission, deportation, poverty and exploitation. They “live on the fringe of society,” he said.
The refugees are also highly traumatized. Of those interviewed by UNHCR, said Gabaudan, 77 percent have endured air bombardments and shelling or rocket attacks, 80 percent witnessed a shooting, 68 percent had been interrogated or harassed by militias or other groups with threats to life, 22 percent were beaten by militias or other groups, 23 percent had had family members kidnapped, 72 percent witnessed car bombings and 75 percent knew someone close to them who had been killed or murdered. Sixteen percent had been tortured.
Many, therefore, suffer from post-traumatic stress. Noel Saleh, a member of the Board of Directors at the Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services (ACESS), said that those arriving in the U.S. need help to deal with the traumatic events they have experienced, as well as with the challenges of meeting their most basic needs. They face poverty, difficulties navigating the complex immigration system, and discrimination.
To respond to the refugee crisis, the U.S. is increasing humanitarian assistance and aims to accept 12,000 Iraqi refugees during the 2008 fiscal year, said Lori Scialabba, Senior Advisor to the Secretary of Homeland Security for Iraq Refugees. She described the process of admittance to the U.S. at length, expressing the government’s desire to accept refugees while still being “vigilant of our mission to preserve national security.” There are multiple organizations, multiple steps and multiple variables that affect the speed of the process, she said, but added that the U.S. is doing everything it can in the way of acceleration.
Increases in funding, and the aim of admitting more Iraqi refugees to the U.S., are undoubtedly steps in the right directions, yet they are small steps, said Hastings. He pointed out that the U.S. admitted only 4,933 Iraqi refugees between April 2003 and March 31 of this year, while Sweden, a country of 9 million people, accepted 34,000 Iraqi refugees over the same period. “The increase in humanitarian assistance,” he said, “is a paltry sum compared to the $338 million our government spends each day on combat operations in Iraq.”
Anders Lago, Mayor of Sodertalje, a small town in Sweden that has accepted five percent of all the Iraqi refugees in Europe, emphasized the importance of accepting refugees and providing the opportunity to start new lives. “I am not a president; I am not an ambassador; but I know that we must create a new future for the children fleeing from war,” he said. “And I know there is no time to lose.” |
