Improving Security Prompts UN to Revise Guidelines for GAY Iraqi Asylum Claims

May 8, 2009 in Asylum, Gay, Gay Life, Gay Rights, GLBT, Homosexuality, Iraq, Iraqi, Iraqi LGBT, LGBT, UN

Improving security prompts UN to revise guidelines for Iraqi asylum claims
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=30702&Cr=iraq&Cr1=

A view of UNHCR tents being used by displaced people in north-east Iraq

5 May 2009 – A drop off in levels of violence in some parts of Iraq has allowed the United Nations refugee agency to revise its guidelines on eligibility for those seeking asylum.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) previously advised that all Iraqis from the central and southern governorates be considered refugees.

In its latest recommendations, the agency believes that the international protection needs for those originating from Al-Anbar, encompassing much of the country’s western territory, and the south should be assessed on individual merit.

However, UNHCR advises favourable consideration for people belonging to specific groups from these areas which have been identified as at risk, including members of religious and ethnic minorities; Iraqis perceived as opposing armed groups or political factions; Iraqis affiliated with the multinational forces or foreign companies; media workers; UN and non-governmental organization (NGO) workers; human rights activists; and homosexuals.

The agency also stressed that ongoing violence, conflict and human rights violations in most of the central governorates of Baghdad, Diyala, Kirkuk, Ninewa and Salah Al-Din places asylum-seekers from these areas in continued need for international protection.

UNHCR estimates that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have sought refuge in neighbouring countries, mainly in Syria and Jordan but also in Lebanon, Egypt and others, with over 40,000 asylum applications made in industrialized countries last year alone.

The agency stressed that improvement in the situation in Iraq is not yet sufficient enough to promote or encourage massive returns and it recommended that refugees already benefiting from international protection should retain their status.

In a related development, an Iraqi ministry has pledged $30 million for projects aimed at improving the lives of children in rural marshland areas.

With a 34 per cent illiteracy rate among women living in marshlands, compared to 24 per cent nationally, and school enrolment at least 30 per cent lower than in urban areas, and around 80 per cent of households not connected to the general water network, the marshlands has some of the worst development indicators in Iraq.

See Also Tetu Article :
http://www.tetu.com/actualites/international/lonu-reclame-lasile-pour-les-gays-dirak-14596

https://gayswithoutborders.wordpress.com/2009/05/08/improving-security-prompts-un-to-revise-guidelines-for-gay-iraqi-asylum-claims/

See also, by Michael Petrelis, on the same subject:

• UN: ‘Favourable Consideration’ Needed For Gay Iraqi Asylum Claims

See also:

• Chicago: Protest Focuses on Obama’s Failure to Denounce Rampant Anti-Gay Violence in Iraq
• Improving Security Prompts UN to Revise Guidelines for GAY Iraqi Asylum Claims
• They Kill People Like Us Says Gay Iraqi
• Iraqi Gays Face Gruesome Torture/Murder Technique by Doug Ireland
• Iraq: Torture, Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment of LGBT People – Iraqi Militia Have Deployed a Painful Form of Torture Against Homosexuals by Closing Their Anuses With Glue
• Iraq: IGLHRC Asks the Iraqi Government to Protect LGBT People
• NYC: Brendan Fay – Protest At Iraq Mission Over Murders Of Gay Men In Iraq
• San Francisco Gays Protest 6 Gay Iraqi Murders – April 6, 5 PM, Harvey Milk Plaza
• Iraq: Six Gay Men Murdered in Iraqi Slum
• URGENT: Stop Executions of Gay Iraqis – Members of Iraqi LGBT Group on Death Row – Action Needed to Halt Judicial Executions
• Iraq’s Queer Underground Railroad: A Secret Network of Safe Houses and Escape Routes Is Saving Gay Iraqis From Execution by Islamist Death Squads
• Iraq’s Underground Queer Railroad – Safe Houses and Escape Routes Save LGBT Lives by Peter Tatchell
• UK: Queer Fear 2 – The Sexual Cleansing of Iraq – Film Screening November 3rd 2008
• Sexual Cleansing in Iraq: Bashar, Coordinator of Iraqi LGBT in Baghdad Assassinated – Islamist Death Squads Are Hunting Down Gay Iraqis and Summarily Executing Them
• Iraq: Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Do Kill – Newsweek’s Inquiry About Gays Persecuted
• Iraq: Out of the Gathering Darkness – Two Iraqi Lesbians, Amal and Zahra, Shot Dead and Decapitated
• U.S. Invasion Has Made Life Worse for Iraqi LGBT Community
• New York: Benefit Party for Iraqi LGBT at the North Star Fund
• Iraqi LGBT Have Recently Obtained New Video Evidence
• New Disappearances of Gay People in Iraq
• Treatment of LGBT People In Iraq by Police
• From Iran to New Iraq, Ayatollahs Are Murderers of Homosexuals: Massive Crimes Against Humanity Are Committed by the Pro-Iranian Iraqi Government Installed by the Amerikan Occupation and Its Sectarian Militias
• Three Iraq Safe Houses Forced to Close
• IRAQI LGBT: SAFE HOUSE CAMPAIGN