Crocker Blasts Refugee Process [View All]

Source: Washington Post

Iraqis Could Wait 2 Years for Entry, Ambassador Says

The U.S. ambassador to Iraq warned that it may take the U.S. government as long as two years to process and admit nearly 10,000 Iraqi refugees referred by the United Nations for resettlement to the United States, because of bureaucratic bottlenecks.

In a bluntly worded State Department cable titled "Iraqi Refugee Processing: Can We Speed It Up?" Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker noted that the Department of Homeland Security had only a handful of officers in Jordan to vet the refugees.

Bush administration officials in Washington immediately disputed several of Crocker's claims.

Still, the "sensitive" but unclassified memo, sent Sept. 7, laid out a wrenching, ground-level view of the U.S. government's halting response to Iraq's refugee crisis. Human rights groups and independent analysts say thousands of desperate Iraqis who have worked alongside Americans now find themselves the targets of insurgents and sectarian militias, prompting many of them to seek residency in the United States or Europe.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/16/AR2007091601698.html?hpid=topnews