Crocker Blasts Refugee Process

[cal04]

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/20...

[LeighAnn]

1. I was afraid you meant Chris Crocker nt

[enigmatic]

2. I was going to say that!

[jus_the_facts]

3. ME TOO!

[arcos]

4. LOL!!!!

Me too... I guess YouTube's "stars" have a bigger influence than we thought.

[tekisui]

5. If we speed it up, will we be bringing rushing in some of "them" to

fight us over here?

[FormerRepub]

6. Ryan Crocker's concerns

I agree that we need to be careful about whom we allow into our country. However, Crocker is known as one of the best negotiators of his generation and this situation is apparently weakening his negotiating position in some way. Our president created this increasingly dire humanitarian situation in the region. It's the Bush Administration's responsibility to do everything possible to ease the suffering of refugees, especially those who can be easily documented as collaborators and friends of our servicemen. I would think there are all sorts of statuses that could be given these people that would at least keep them out of harm's way until a more permanent dispensation of their individual situations could be decided. One thing is for sure.....the Republican Party can no longer claim the moral high ground after GWB.

[gratuitous]

7. Silly Mr. Crocker

We just make refugees; we don't take refugees. But now that he's covered his ass with this ineffectual memo, he can continue to oversee the American plundering of Iraq, and the continuing abuse of its people.