Iraqi Association, 241 King Street London W6 9LP • Telephone: 020 8741 5491 • Fax: 020 8748 9010, Charity Registration No. 1101109 email: info@iraqiassociation.org

Issue No. 99 English Supplement

Al-MuntadaEnglish Supplement

of the Iraqi Association

www.iraqiassociation.org

IRAQIASSOCIATION

PALINGSWICK HOUSE241 KING STREETHAMMERSMITHLONDON W6 9LPTEL: 020 8741 5491FAX: 020 8748 9010

E-mail: info@iraqiassociation.org

November 2009

Most Vulnerable Singled Out Over the years, we have

met here refugees, and thosewho fled home-country per-secution, to preserve theirlives and the lives of theirchildren. They are peoplewho have survived the mostappalling experiences, fleeingfrom war, terror, torture andsectarian murder. Some ofour clients have been forcedto watch their relatives beingmurdered and their homesdestroyed. They come to usseeking safety, they are pen-niless and desperate, andthese are the people who aresingled out by the HomeOffice for cuts in their bene-fits. Today in Britain, thou-sands of these vulnerablepeople face a life of sever andextreme hardship.

Nowadays, economicrecession is also increasingxenophobia and false head-lines - it is true though that

the issue of asylum seekers issurrounded by strong feel-ings, political controversyand emotive arguments.However, it is also importantto distinguish between therefugees and economicmigrants. Migrants choose tomove in order to improvetheir lives. Refugees areforced to move if they are tosave their lives or preservetheir freedom. The debateconcerning asylum and immi-gration in the UK has longbeen warped by a litany ofhalf-truths and false impres-sions. Perhaps the most per-nicious misconception is thatBritain is a magnet for for-eign free-riders, welfare-cheats and scroungers. Onaverage, however, a singleasylum seeker is expected tolive on little more than £40 aweek; barely enough forbasic amenities.

As we lurch further into therecession, it is no secret that apublic spending cut is on theway, and one target for cutshas already been identifiedasylum-seekers’ benefits. TheHome Office proposes toreduce the weekly subsis-tence payments to those wait-ing for a verdict on theirapplication from £42 to £35.Targeting those who soughtsafety here might be political-ly convenient, but it is notmorally right. The subsis-tence payments they receiveare already meagre; around30 per cent lower than job-seekers’ allowance. Cuttingthem will push asylum-seek-ers further into severe pover-ty. The cuts will heap suffer-ing on people who havealready suffered enough, asthe system prevents themfrom working while theirclaims are being processed.

The propose cuts discrimi-nates against people who arealready among the poorestand most vulnerable in thiscountry.

At Iraqi Association, wesee people with professionalskills of qualified doctors,teachers, artists and engi-neers. The vast majority ofour clients are eager to workand play a useful role in oursociety, but the system wouldnot allow them to earn theirlivings. Since 2002, the gov-ernment has refused permis-sion for almost everyoneclaiming sanctuary here, towork. The cost is met by tax-payers, a policy which pre-vents people from contribut-ing to our economy. In a timeof economic crisis, we musttake care and not to leavesome of the world’s most vul-nerable people in an evenmore terrible situation.

In October, a flight carrying 40refused Iraqi asylum seekers hasbeen forced to return to Britain. TheUK Border Agency spent £250,000chartering a plane to fly around 40Iraqis and more than 80 securityescorts. But officials in Baghdadrefused asylum seekers to enter thecountry because of the legality oftheir paperwork. Only 10 of theIraqis were allowed in, the rest werereturned to Britain and being held atdetention centre at Gatwick.

Amnesty International warned thatthe deportations to central or south-ern Iraq risked the lives of the failedIraqi asylum-seekers. But the HomeOffice said that the UK governmentwas working with the Iraqi authori-ties to secure entrance for all the menand was committed to finding anoth-er flight to return the detainees toIraq as soon as possible. The HomeOffice had taken advice from the

Immigration and Asylum Tribunal,which had said that returns to anypart of Iraq were lawful and wouldnot place detainees in danger fromviolence. However, the UK ForeignOffice website advises against alltravel to Baghdad and the surround-ing areas. Its guidance states:

“The situation remains highly dan-gerous with a continuing high threatof terrorism throughout the country.This includes violence and kidnap-ping.”

We deplore arranging secretflights, and inhumane methods of theHome Office to send these peopleback to dangerous areas. It would bean ideal and cheap way to determinewhether the target areas is safe, justsend a senior member of the UK Bor-der Agency to spend a week on afully paid private vacation in the des-tination areas of the Iraqi asylumseekers.

Iraq Refuses £250,000 Asylum

Charter Flight

Sadly MissedAnthonyLillis, ourwell-lovedcouncillormourned.Lillis wasthe cabinetmember forcommunityand chil-dren’s services at the LondonBorough of Hammersmith andFulham, and was the vice chair-man of the London Councils’grants committee, which distrib-utes £28m to groups working inthe capital. Anthony Lillis wasborn and brought up in Fulhamand lived all his life in the bor-ough. Much of his life was dedi-cated to public service and inparticular the children and elder-ly residents of the borough.Anthony Lillis, passed away on29 July after a battle with can-cer, he was 42. He will be sorelymissed by our community.

Iraqi Association issued a Press Release on26.10.2009 in the wake of the latest nihilistcrime in Baghdad. The Press Release extractsays that, the return of murderous nihilism toBaghdad must be condemned by all. Yester-day’s terror shows that extremists’ indiscrimi-nate killing is a grim reminder that terrorists

will try to undermine the planned election inJanuary. More than 150 killed ad over 500injured in Baghdad on Sunday. “This was thedeadliest terror since 2007. The first bombstruck the Justice Ministry building in themorning. It blew out the building’s large win-dows that overlook Haifa Street, sending fly-ing glass and shrapnel into passers-by. Thesecond attack hit the main Baghdad city coun-cil building killing many worker and visitors.”Said Jabbar Hasan of Iraqi Association inHammersmith West London. “This horrificevil act is committed by abundance of sub-human killers, and terror feeds their hate andsadism. How can anyone claim to carry outthese abominations in the name of opposi-tion? How can any community or regime tol-erate and protect these murderers in theirmidst? ” Said Jabbar Hasan. This carnageleads to more widows and orphaned children,and are a cause of poverty and unemploymentand of wider economic dislocation. We urgeIraqi leaders to set aside political and reli-gious differences to work together to protectcivilians and assist victims of the frequent eviland savage attacks. You can send CondolenceMessages to info@iraqoassocition.org

Carnage in Baghdadmust be condemned by all

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Al-Muntada - Issue No. 99 November 2009

Arrest of Iraqi asylumseekers during raid

Amnesty International is gravelyconcerned about the recent raid onthe Brorson’s Church in Copen-hagen, Denmark, and the subse-quent arrest of 17 Iraqi asylum-seekers, who for three months hadsought refuge in the church, fearingbeing returned to Iraq. “AmnestyInternational calls on the Danishgovernment to immediately releasethe 17 detainees and grant all 282Iraqis leave to remain pending areview of their cases,” said IreneKhan, Secretary General.

The UNHCR has clearly andunambiguously outlined the risksfor forcibly returned Iraqis in a let-ter to the Danish government, stat-ing that no Iraqis from the five cen-tral regions should be forciblyreturned, until substantial improve-ments have been made in the stateof the security as well as the humanrights situation of the country.

Amnesty International is alsodeeply disturbed that the policeraid on the church in the middle ofthe night, by officers reportedly in

full riot dress, may have causedfurther stress and suffering for Iraqifamilies with children, who mayvery well be already traumatised asa result of torture and war, and by astay of up to 10 years in Danishrefugee centres.

“The Danish government shouldat a minimum allow the Iraqis toremain in the country on humani-tarian grounds” said Irene Khan,Secretary General.

“However, given concerns aboutthe unduly restrictive interpretationof the 1951 Refugee Convention bythe Danish government and therefusal to acknowledge the assess-ment of UNHCR regarding Iraq,we also call for cases of the Iraqisto be reviewed.”

During the night betweenWednesday and Thursday, Danishpolice raided the Brorson´s churchin Copenhagen, in order to detainand deport the rejected Iraqi asy-lum seekers. When attempting totransport 17 Iraqi-asylum seekersfrom the church in a police bus,police apparently used excessiveviolence, captured on film, toremove demonstrators. The 17 Iraqiasylum-seekers were eventuallytransported to a prison-like facilityin the Sandholm detention centreand have reportedly now begun ahunger strike.

Issue No. 99 November 2009

DemonstrationAgainst ClearingBrorsons Church

At least 20,000 took to the streetsin Copenhagen in protest againstthe clearing Brorsons Church inAugust. Danish police forced theirway into a church early Thursdayand detained 17 Iraqi nationals whohad sought refuge there after theirasylum applications had beenturned down. Some 50 police offi-cers took part in the overnight raidon the Brorson church in theCopenhagen district Norrebro.Scores of protesters gathered out-side the church and some clashedwith police during attempts to stopa bus transporting the young Iraqimen. Five protesters were brieflyarrested. About 60 Iraqis have

sought refuge in the church sinceMay when Denmark and Iraqsigned an agreement over the repa-triation of some 240 Iraqis. At thetime of the overnight raid, some 30Iraqis were reported to be in theBrorson church. Police did notdetain women, children or elderlywho have left the church and soughthelp from friends.

The action comes within the sameday when the Iraqi government hascast doubt on the Danish agreementon the repatriation of rejected asy-lum seekers. Demonstrators went onThursday evening in the street fromthe church on Nørrebro and movedto Christiansborg.

UK Border Agencypowers ‘too much’ say JCWI

The Joint Council for the Wel-fare of Immigrants (JCWI) hascondemned UK Border Agencypowers following the reported raidon the home of a Tongan ex-employee of the Attorney General.The JCWI said the officials had“some police powers” that were“too much”. The Mail on Sundayreported a raid on the Londonhome of Loloahi Tapui, investigat-ed over a report she had workedillegally for Baroness Scotland, theU.K Attorney-General .

The Home Office said extend-ing border officers’ powers hadbeen “necessary”, but the council’schief executive Habib Rahmansaid immigration officials could“misuse” their authority. He alsosaid he was not supportive of thesetype of raids being carried out byUK Border Agency officials. “Wehave been complaining about raidsfor a long time,” he said. “Thegovernment has given some policepowers to border officials, andthey have too much power now.“Border officials also have thepower of customs officers as well,and if you give them all this dra-conian authority they may misuseit. “We have seen cases where theborder agency is dealing withcases that they’re not trained for,like the police are. “We think therewill be training issues, and that thelaw will not be implemented like itshould be.” Mr Rahman added thatthe JCWI was against raids onhomes where immigration was an

issue. “Innocent people can getcaught up in the activity, and itspreads fear in the community. Thepeople they are looking for canjust run away. “There should bemore intelligent ways of dealingwith immigration issues or irregu-larities.” Mr Rahman said the situ-ation surrounding Baroness Scot-land’s former cleaner, a Tonganwoman, was a “godsend for ourargument”. He added: “Employersand work agencies have been com-plaining to us about the fact thatthey are expected to act like immi-gration officers themselves.

“This case shows how difficult itis to implement the nuances ofimmigration law, if a problem canoccur with a government minister.It’s not easy.” A spokeswoman forthe Home Office said the Immigra-tion and Asylum Act 1999 provid-ed extended powers to immigra-tion officers “allowing them, incertain circumstances, to searchpersons and premises, to enterpremises for the purposes ofsearching and for arresting personsand to seize and retain relevantmaterial”. “The provision of thesepowers to immigration officers isnecessary to allow the immigrationservice to make use of existingpowers of arrest and to operate, inappropriate circumstances, withoutaccompanying police when con-ducting operational visits.” Thespokeswoman also said that a war-rant must only be served by apolice officer or designated arresttrained officer of immigration offi-cer rank or above. The UK BorderAgency yesterday slapped a £5000fine on the Attorney General, whosaid she had been punished for a“technical error” in not photocopy-ing her former employee’s docu-ments.

Baroness Scotland

Those Who Seek Safetyat Our Shores Face DNA Tests

Asylum seekers are to be subjected to DNA tests inan attempt to confirm their true nationalities. Mouthswabs will also be used to test whether childrenbrought in by an asylum claimant are the asylumseeker’s children or unrelated. The UK BordersAgency says that this will help limit bogus asylumclaims made by people arriving in the UK and pre-tending to have fled war zones so they cannot bedeported. But this controversial programme, which isbeing launched without any consultations, has beenfiercely criticised by scientists and researchers in thisfield.

The Home Office spokeswoman said ancestralDNA testing would not be used alone but would becombined with language analysis, investigative inter-viewing techniques and other recognised forensicdisciplines. However, Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys ofthe University of Leicester, who invented the forensicDNA fingerprinting techniques, is said that usinggenetic data to determine nationality in this manner isdeeply flawed and that was wildly premature, evenignoring the moral and ethical aspects. Professor Jef-

freys said that even withsufficient research evidenceon the ability of DNA test-ing to identify ethnic originfrom that region available,genetic indications of eth-nicity would still not estab-lish nationality.

The use of science toenforce legal distinctionsbetween people has a badhistory. Apart from theinevitable echoes of eugen-ics, Nazis and apartheid, in

Britain, the imposition of virginity testing on wivesfrom the Indian subcontinent in the late 1970s led topicketing of Heathrow airport, and the use of X-raysto determine children’s ages was discredited as dan-gerous as well as unreliable.

Chris Brodie, a PhD Researcher of Isotope Geo-sciences and Palaeoclimate, Durham University saysthat There is no clear evidence that isotopes fromsample materials such as nails, hair, tissues will pro-vide accurate and precise “location markers” forwhere humans were born and grew up on a consistentand robust basis.

At Iraqi Association, we deplore this unethical andunworkable programme, it’s not only expensive torun, but also will determine the fate of individuals onfalse and flawed information. This poses a questionas why the Home Office would not use experts tointerview those who seek safety at our shores. Itwould be more cost effective and would work betterif the people whose cases were under review wereinterviewed, even casually or covertly by peoplefrom, or whose families came from the area in ques-tion.

It seems that this is an expensive way

for our bureaucrats to justify their existence.

Furthermore, genetic filtering has the whiff of Nazism.

Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys

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Al-Muntada - Issue No. 99 November 2009

Issue No. 99 November 2009

Al-Muntada - Issue No. 99 November 2009

17Issue No. 99 November 2009

Our Charity’sRecent Activities1. Organised an evening in

July in Hammersmith to hostthe famous Iraq stars, actressNahida Ramah and actorSami Kaftan to coincide withshowing their play in Lon-don.

2. Organised an outing for theelderly club users to visitBrighton in June attended by45 people.

3. Organised a communityfamily outing in August tovisit East Bourne attended by80 families with their chil-dren and friends.

4. Held an evening in Ham-mersmith, west London, withZIPANG on Iraqi culture andpoetry including Babylonianand Sumerian, it was held inJuly and attended by 45 peo-ple.

5. Organised a book launch forIraqi Author Salwa Jarah tosign her new book in Ham-mersmith, it was attended by50 people.

6. Organised an evening inSeptember for families andchildren in Hammersmith tocelebrate ‘Ed’ Al Ramazan.The evenining event attendedby 100 people.

7. Organised a book launch inOctober for Iraqi artists andauthor Faisal Laibi Sahi.Sahi is a renowned Iraqiintellectual and painter.

8. Participated in a meeting ofin June Aswat Al-Iraq – theIraqi news agency

mentored by Thomson ReutersFoundation during its start-up period in Iraq. Aswat ALIraq is funded by UNDP.

A phone call from the Consulate … Following our previous articlewhich described the pain of Iraqibureaucracy, the Iraqi EmbassyConsulate kindly contacted us toexpress his unhappiness aboutthe contents of the article. The fact is that our message wasto highlight the needs of ourcommunity and deplore the exist-ing bureaucratic procedures,some of those crawl procedureswere created by the past regime’sculture of suppression and pun-ishment. Saddam knew thatbureaucracy is the art of makingthe possible impossible. We arefully aware that the maze ofbureaucracy is led by the Iraqicomplex law and procedures, andnot the Consulate section. How-ever, locally the system can bemodernise to ease the pain andsuffering when it comes to therights of Iraqi citizens to obtainpersonal documentations. Documents such as:

1. Certificate of Power of

Attorney2. Certifying/endorsing British

Marriage Certificate3. Certifying/endorsing British

Birth Certificate4. Renew/Issue of Iraqi Pass-

port5. Certifying UK Full Driving

LicenceThe pressing issue is that manyBritish- Iraqi have lived heresince 1970s as exiles and settled.A large majority of them marriedwith children born and educatedhere, some of them highly quali-fied and employed in manyBritish institutions. They couldbe encouraged to serve theirnative parents’ country. These people do not have copiesof original Iraqi birth certificatesnor do they have Iraqi personalidentity documents. But they dohave British legal documentationto confirm their Iraqi origin. Aclassic case is that, in Iraqincluding the Kurdish area, the

previous regimes law, in relationto personal documentation isactive and applied. This year, oneof our community membersreturned to Iraq, and he wantedto certify his British marriagecertificate, he was interrogatedand spent hours in a local policestation then he was released onbail and told that overseas mar-riages are illegitimate. The samedegrading process exists whenBritish-Iraqi exiles wishes toobtain the Iraqi personal identity,whether in Baghdad or the Kur-dish controlled area. Anotherclassic case is the tragedy of FailiKurds, they are not entitled toobtain Iraqi personal documents,unless to produce a range of orig-inal Iraqi documents, which theydon’t have, and it is a catch 22situation. The deportation of theFaili Kurds from central andsouthern Iraq was part of the pol-icy of ethnic cleansing practicedby Saddam’s regime. They were

stripped of Iraqi citizenships andtheir belongings and propertieswere confiscated by Saddam’sapparatus. In an ideal world it is not naïve toput a rigorous system, which sus-picions becomes a popular cul-ture, but surely common sense

must prevail to ease the nastypassage to obtain the essentialdocuments, which without it,Iraqi exiles are unable to pursuethe return process and rebuildtheir settlement in Iraq, cruel lawheap suffering on people whohave already suffered enough.

An evening with Nahida Ramah and Sami Kaftan Our elderly users, attending our regular day centres….

A play by actor Sami Kaftan and and acress Nahida Ramah in Hammersmith, organised by Iraqi Asso-ciation and attended by 200 people...