Why Canada rejected Syrians
Documents reveal reasons for denying refugee claimants
TORONTO — One had been a senior government official complicit in human rights abuses. Three had been involved in “subversion by force.” Another was considered a danger to the security of Canada.
Government documents obtained by the National Post reveal why Canada rejected dozens of Syrians as refugees, and provide a “high-level overview” of the backgrounds of those who were selected.
The Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada documents, released under the Access to Information Act, summarize the results of interviews of Syrian refugees conducted by visa officers in Beirut.
The refusal rate for Syrian refugees was four per cent according to the documents, which, though released only recently, date to the early stages of the Syrian refugee program, when the Liberal government was trying to fulfill a campaign promise to resettle 25,000 by the end of 2015.
During the first month the Liberals were in office, Canadian visa officers refused Syrian refugee claimants 35 times for everything from failing to answer questions truthfully to uncertainty about their identities.
Between 2014 and Nov. 17, 2015 83 applicants were refused — five of those for security reasons. (Because some may have been rejected for more than one reason, it is unclear exactly how many Syrians were turned away in total.)
According to the documents, the Syrians accepted as refugees came from five areas: Aleppo, Hassakeh, Damascus, Homs and the Dara’a and Sweida region along the Jordanian border in the south.
Those from Aleppo were “virtually all” Armenian families with one or two children. Most were “self-employed businessmen and tradesmen (welders, mechanic, jewelers) with moderate to high levels of wealth,” it said.
They tended to be from neighbourhoods close to Aleppo’s old city, near the frontline between government and opposition forces. Most had fled Syria in 2012, although some had stayed until as late as 2014 because they didn’t have the money or needed to care for elderly family members.
“Those who stayed longer tended to float between neighbourhoods staying with different family members. They moved as the fighting moved and intensified in different parts of the city,” a report on the interviews said.
They cited their reasons for leaving Syria as the complete lack of security. “There was no water or power, and regular shelling of neighbourhoods. There were a few accounts of client, client family members, or neighbours having been kidnapped and ransomed.”
In Beirut, most found work in their trades while others were employed part-time at places such as restaurants. Those lacking money or jobs “tended to migrate back and forth between Lebanon and Syria,” the report said.
“There were even at least a couple of women who returned to give birth. People would return to sell their business or other assets such as car in order to continue supporting their family. One client’s account of his return to Aleppo was upon hearing from the neighbours that members of the National Defence Force (aka Shabiha) had taken up residence in his home.”
The smaller number of refugees from Hassakeh, in Syria’s northeast corner near the Iraqi border, were also small business owners or tradespersons — a mini-mart owner and a dishwasher repairperson, for example.
“Stories of kidnapping and intimidation were more frequent with this group of clientele,” the screening officers wrote in their report. “The oft repeated narrative with this group was that they were forced to take flight very suddenly, in the middle of the night or early morning upon discovering that the Daesh (ISIL) was marching on their town or village.”
The Damascus refugees were a mix of Christians and Muslims who had fled more recently and were more likely to have government jobs and a post-secondary education. “Neighbourhoods were swept by security forces, sometimes neighbourhoods were cordoned off for prolonged periods and heavy shelling was described, including barrel bombs.”
The majority from Homs were Sunni Muslims, who were relatively uneducated and had families of six or more children. “There were numerous accounts of entire villages being targeted by the Shabiha,” the report said. “There were mass arrests in which all male adult(s) in a village were taken away at the same time. All homes would be looted and sometimes burned down.”
The Canadian screeners saw few refugees from the south, probably because most fleeing that area would cross into nearby Jordan instead of Lebanon. One Druze family from Sweida had fled because of “multiple armed groups in the area,” including ISIL. “Sweida has remained largely intact due to the fact that it has become a major smuggling hub that all groups, including regime forces, are profiting from considerably.”
ERBIL, Iraq — A baby’s cry pierces the din as dozens of people wait to see a doctor or nurse at what’s surely one of the busiest health clinics in the Middle East: inside a sprawling refugee camp that’s home to 18,000 displaced men, women and children.
The clinic’s future is as unclear as that of its clientele.
The facility is just one of several projects Canada is supporting in Iraq as part of its efforts to help those affected by the war against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant — help those on the front lines say is desperately needed.
“It’s very important for the people here that they have this clinic and they can get services here,” Azad Murad, a nurse with the International Organization for Migration (IOM), said through a translator. “And it’s really good that the Canadian government helps the clinic, because it is a great help for the people here.”
But as welcome as Canada’s support is, the UN and other aid agencies say more is needed from the international community — now and going forward.
“One of the things we are nervous about inside the humanitarian community is once (ISIL) is gone in the next couple of months, the world is going to turn its back,” said Lisa Grande, the UN’s humanitarian chief in Iraq.
“They’re going to look at Syria and Yemen and other places that have a crisis. But we know the humanitarian crisis in Iraq is not going to be over when the fighting is.”
The Liberal government pledged last year to provide $840 million over three years in humanitarian aid to Iraq, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon as part of its revamped mission against ISIL.
On Monday, International Development Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau revealed the latest details, announcing that $52 million would be directed to different NGOs working with refugees in Iraq.
The funds will be directed to three key areas: health care, clean water and sanitation, and providing psychological help and counselling for those affected by conflict, especially women and children.
Another $187.5 million will go toward similar projects in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon.
Speaking from Erbil after touring the nearby Ashti refugee camp, Bibeau said she saw and heard firsthand how Iraqis are struggling with the traumas associated with war.
That’s why Canada has put a special emphasis on psychological support, she said.
“They’ve been through horrible things, and they were telling me how this support from our humanitarian partners is important for them,” Bibeau said.
“And not only talking about the food, but the needs they have in terms of psychosocial support.”
Women and girls have been a particular focus for Canadian assistance; one such initiative, visited recently by The Canadian Press, is a women’s centre in the Khanke refugee camp near the city of Dohuk.
Established by the UN Population Fund in October 2014, the centre features a women’s-only health clinic, including reproductive education, recreational activities such as knitting, and job training.
“Before coming I was not comfortable, I was crying,” Baran Shmo Yosf, who fled with her family when ISIL attacked their town more than two years ago, said through a translator. “Now I can keep going on.”