US Visas and Iraqi Refugees: Is it Enough?

In an IHT.com article published recently, the issue of visas being given to Iraqis by the US was discussed. US visas were finally being given by the US for Iraqis who worked with the US since 2003 in administering development after the beginning of the war. The argument by the writer was that due to all the assistance many of these individuals have given to the United States, it is finally justifiably reciprocated through the issuing of US visas for these US allies. While this is true, a large part of the story which is continually avoided was regarding the other two million Iraqis, many of Iraq's best and brightest taking refuge in Syria and Jordan, overwhelming societies in both nations without any movement by the US or Europeans to taken in many of these Iraqi refugees.

In past posting in the FPA Migration Blog, Rich Basas and Cathryn Cluver have made several postings on the issues regarding Iraqi refugees and the response by the international community. While meeting in international bodies have done much to address the existence of the issue, the result was to place further onus on countries like Syria and Jordan, who have gone beyond their humanistic responsibility in trying to accommodate and adapt many Iraqi refugees into their societies. This failure of the international community comes with actions taken in Iraq since 2003, lacking in any response or much media coverage on the displaced 2 million. Only when Iraqi government initiatives have sought to create some sort of incentive for its citizens to return has media responded to the issue, still lacking in urgency through much of the narrative however.

It is not the first time media and the international community has failed displaced people in the region. Many reports on the Israeli response to Darfuri refugees had criticized Israel, like Jordan and Syria with Iraq's refugees, for not allowing more African migrants to settle in Israel. While the Israeli government did settle many people and continued to take in Sudanese refugees and place them under protection, many of Sudan's neighbors have killed Darfuri refugees with no response towards the shooting of dozens of Darfuri refugees at the Egyptian-Israel border by Egyptian border security by media or the EU and US. Placing the onus of large international refugee problems on smaller nations, while taking no effective response themselves lead many to believe that the international community will allow another Rwanda with little effective response. While this point of view is the source of much debate, the effect of not responding to Darfur, or having the US in Iraq is that many Western powers may not legally allow an Iraqi to claim refugee status as the US already is present in that nation, which is considered as protecting Iraqi people inside Iraq itself. Iraq cannot prosper and Darfur will become a symbol of poor international leadership unless effective policies are created in the region. While the ICC and Den Haag can ask for extraditions of Karazdic and Sudan's leaders, law without enforcement becomes another failure in global justice.