The Assyrian Democratic Organization
SAN DIEGO – AINA — Several hundred Iraqi Chaldean immigrants and their families converged on the federal building in downtown San Diego yesterday to demand that the United States provide greater protection and more refugee visas for persecuted Iraqi Christians.
While all Iraqis have been affected by sectarian violence after the U.S.-led invasion four years ago, Chaldean Christians and other religious minorities have felt particularly vulnerable.
Many demonstrators said they have relatives in Iraq who live in fear of being killed or kidnapped. Riyadh Makani, 45, of El Cajon said his father’s store in Baghdad, which he’d run for 35 years, was bombed last year “just because he was a Christian.”
At least 2 million Iraqis have fled to neighboring countries. Many hope to join relatives the United States, but as of Sept. 30, only 645 Iraqi refugees had been admitted since the start of the war.
In February, the State Department announced that an additional 7,000 Iraqi refugees would be accepted this fiscal year. But background checks take so long that very few have been admitted so far, said Steven Garmo, an Iraqi-American immigration attorney. –L.B.
