U.S. Abandons Iraqi Translators to Their Fates While Diminutive Denmark Rescues Its Own

By Maura Stephens, AlterNet. Posted July 27, 2007.

I recently wrote about the dire situation of "Andy," an Iraqi interpreter who has worked for the U.S. military for nearly four years, and his young wife and their two babies. As a result of his work with the U.S. Army, their home was bombed, Andy's father and brother were murdered and their own lives were threatened. Since last April they have been caught in a seemingly endless tangle of U.S. State Department red tape.

When the story was published on July 10, they had been approved for a visa to the United States and were waiting to fly the following Saturday from Basra, Iraq, to Amman, Jordan, where they would be processed at the U.S. Embassy before going on to start a new life in the United States. After a heartbreaking farewell to their families, the couple and their 2-year-old son and 1-year-old daughter boarded the plane in Basra along with about 60 other Iraqis -- men, women and children. Andy's mother was especially shattered to say good-bye; after losing her husband and Andy's brother, she now fears she will never again see Andy and Alysse and her grandchildren.

The flight from Basra to Amman is pretty short, as the two cities are only about 700 miles and one time zone apart. When the plane arrived in Amman, the passengers were detained at the airport by Jordanian authorities. They were kept for hours without food or bedding or supplies. Finally, they were given devastating news: Jordanian authorities told them they would be deported back to Iraq as soon as a plane arrived, either later that night or early the next day -- an almost certain death sentence for Andy and his family as well as for others in the group. Everyone's passport was stamped "Never to Enter Jordan Again." They were given no reason for this treatment except: "You are Iraqi."

After a few hours Andy was able to borrow a mobile phone with international minutes. He called me, desperate. I asked him if I could speak with a Jordanian official. The Jordanians refused to talk to me. I called and emailed every person I could think of in Amman, including U.S. Ambassador to Jordan David Hale, and in Washington, D.C., but of course it was Saturday and nobody was reachable. Next I called the kindly proprietor of the Toledo Hotel in Amman, at which I'd made a reservation for Andy and his family. I'd already been calling Mr. Barakat for hours, wondering if the driver he'd sent to pick them up at the airport might somehow have missed them. Mr. Barakat in turn spoke to the Iraqi Airways personnel who had flown the plane from Basra, regular guests at the Toledo. The pilots told him this was par for the course nowadays; they would fly in a planeload of Iraqi refugees, and the Jordanians would just ship them all back to Iraq. Iraqi Airways apparently has no qualms about accepting the high airfare from people it knows won't ever reach their intended destination.

The Jordanians then told the Iraqi passengers that they had one other choice than to return to Iraq: They could take a plane to Syria, where they would be "guaranteed" admittance. It was not clear how the Jordanians could speak for Syrian authorities, but Andy decided to take it rather than return to Iraq. I did not hear from him again for 30 hours. When I did, we had a garbled 60-second conversation in which I heard " ... in Syria ... all our luggage gone ... we are OK." The next day we had a decent connection, and Andy told me they'd been admitted to Syria on a 30-day tourist visa that could be extended by 90 days. I passed along the instructions I'd gotten from the U.S. Embassy in Damascus: "Go to the Embassy at precisely 1 p.m. on Tuesday or Wednesday. Otherwise, you'll have to wait until next Sunday."

Andy went for his initial interview on Tuesday and was told it would now take six to eight weeks for his paperwork to arrive from the U.S. Embassy in Amman. When I was working with embassies 20 years ago, we could get a diplomatic pouch from Quito to Manila in less than 48 hours. I guess technological advances have changed things. What worries me now is that Andy will wait weeks, and then we could be told that the papers have mysteriously disappeared and we have to file them all again. It wouldn't be the first time.

Meanwhile, Andy and Alysse and the children are living in a hotel, for which they are paying a princely sum by Iraqi standards. They lost all their luggage -- their entire worldly possessions -- in the Jordan to Amman rerouting fiasco; it was probably stolen in Basra or Amman. Luckily, they had their papers with them. And some things they could buy new: clothing, baby items, toiletries. But they lost many irreplaceable personal possessions: family photos, letters, mementos of his slain father and brother and other loved ones they may never see again. Alysse and baby Fatima are both unwell (they have been since Fatima's birth by Caesarean, without anesthesia or antibiotics, last June) and need medical care. Andy is trying to procure it for them while they otherwise languish in Syria. It is dreadful enough that they have lost their home, their homeland, their society, their loved ones. Now, despite Andy's four years of service to the U.S. government, the family exists at the whim of a callous bureaucracy. Sadly, so are thousands of others.

See more stories tagged with: iraq, translators, denmark

Journalist and activist Maura Stephens first visited Iraq in January and February 2003 and with her husband, George Sapio, published a book, Collateral Damage, about the Iraqi people. Since then Stephens has returned to the country twice and has given scores of presentations about the humanitarian situation as a member of the Iraq Speakers Bureau.

Liked this story? Get top stories in your inbox each week from AlterNet! Sign up now »