(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
In March last year, they would send out Iraqi Kurds in 2019, which the UDI did not claim to have asylum or residency on a humanitarian basis.
But because it was impossible to send the Kurds to northern Iraq, everyone received a one-year temporary residence permit pending a final solution to the "problem".
Over a year later, the UDI still has not made a final decision on the matter.
- But within a week or two a decision will be made, says information adviser Are Sauren in the UDI.
Bomber the Kurds
- This is starting to be a gross negligence on the part of the UDI. On March 2, we had a meeting where they also said that the decision would be made next week. One and a half months later, they say the same thing. Meanwhile, the Kurds are day in and day out in the uncertain. This is about to become one of the ugliest things we have experienced in asylum cases, says an upset adviser Rune Berglund Steen in the Norwegian Organization for Asylum Seekers.
The stone is not just upset because the UDI lets the Kurds live in uncertainty. He is also very critical that the UDI considers Northern Iraq a safe area.
Lately, British and American pilots have come forward, testifying that they have repeatedly been called home during a raid to enforce the no-fly zone over Northern Iraq, which is alleged to protect the Kurds from Saddam's regime. On the way out, however, they have met Turkish planes on their way in to bomb Kurdish villages and camps.
The Turks have also regularly entered northern Iraq and carried out military operations on the ground. Late last fall, one of the military offensive ended up killing 60 Kurds.
Knows about the bombing
- The security situation in the Saddam-controlled areas is not good, everyone agrees. But in northern Iraq, a general need for protection does not exist. We share this assessment with most countries in Western Europe and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, says information adviser Are Sauren at the UDI.
- We know that some of the asylum seekers have mentioned the Turkish bombing in the applications, and know that it has happened. But this has happened so little that we do not see it as a danger to people, he adds.
Saurén also confirms that the land-based Turkish military actions have not weighed heavily enough in the UDI's assessment of the Kurds' protection needs.
- In March last year, the Ministry of Justice made a change in policy towards the Kurds from Iraq. We felt that they no longer had a general need for protection. But because it was impossible to send them back to northern Iraq – unless they themselves voluntarily entered the area – we gave just over 2000 of them a one-year temporary residence permit, explains Sauren, who states that most of them came to Norway in 1999.
- Relative concept
- Security is obviously a very relative concept. In northern Iraq, social conditions are miserable and the security situation is very unstable, says Beate Slydal, a recently appointed political adviser to Amnesty International in Norway.
In her previous job as an adviser in the Norwegian forum for freedom of expression and through countless journeys, she has a good knowledge of the conditions in Kurdistan.
- Not least, ordinary Kurds are squeezed between the two major rival parties in northern Iraq, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP). Whether you are for or against us, is the parties' view of the matter, Slydal explains.
Despite both internal and external enemies, she believes that the Kurds have had to look far for international support.
- Even the UN did not even react to the Turkish massacre of 60 Kurds last autumn, she states.
Common European problem
So the UDI will now make a decision in the near future about what will happen to the Iraqi Kurds. The one-year temporary residence permit has already expired for many of them.
- We have sent out a circular to the police where we have explained that the Kurds can stay in Norway until the decision is made, says the information adviser at the UDI.
Sauren says that the Iraqi Kurds are a "common European problem" for the Schengen countries.
- There are tens of thousands of Kurds within Schengen who are in the same situation as those in Norway. We follow what practice they have elsewhere in Europe, but of course make an independent decision in the UDI, says Sauren, who adds that they are waiting for feedback from the Ministry of Local Government.
- But it is the UDI that makes the final decision, and it comes in a week or two, he points out.
- Amazing
After the tightening of asylum policy towards Kurds from northern Iraq, Sauren said the influx to Norway has stopped sharply. In the first quarter of this year, only about 30 Kurds have arrived. These too have been granted a one-year temporary residence permit.
The authorities' reluctance towards the Iraqi Kurds is strongly reflected in the UDI's statistics. The figures for Iraq, which do not distinguish between Kurds, Shia Muslims in southern Iraq or Iraqis from the central parts of the country controlled by Saddam Hussein, show a sharp decline in recent years.
While 33 Iraqis were granted asylum in 1998, and 12 were granted asylum in 1999, only one single Iraqi was weighed and found asylum-heavy enough last year. Whether or not he was an Iraqi Kurdish, the UDI's Sauren cannot disclose.
- It is unbelievable that only one Iraqi was granted asylum last year. This is not for believers and does not reflect the situation in Iraq at all, says a head-shaking Berglund Steen in NOAS.
Want to squeeze them out?
The information adviser at the UDI can not say anything about which direction the decision on the Kurds will go. In Germany, the authorities have made a decision on "duldung" (tolerated stay) in relation to the Kurds from northern Iraq.
This means that they are denied a work permit, an opportunity to study, family reunification and financial contributions from the state, which in practice means that they must leave the country.
- It is a similar decision we fear that the Norwegian authorities may make. By taking away their work permits and sending them back to the asylum reception centers, they make the stay for the Kurds so untenable that they have no choice but to leave Norway, says Rune Berglund Steen in NOAS.
The alternative of sending the Kurds by plane over northern Iraq and releasing them into a parachute has not been considered, according to Ny Tid.
