Canada to extend asylum to 1,200 by end of year
Nearly 400 Yazidi refugees, other victims of Islamist terror accepted in past four months
OTTAWA — About 1,200 people considered to be among the most vulnerable refugees in the world are to be housed in Canada by the end of this year, the federal government announced Tuesday — a move praised by Conservative MP Michelle Rempel as a message to the world that the persecuted Yazidi population needs to be a greater priority for safe-haven countries.
Nearly 400 Yazidi refugees and other survivors of Islamist extremists have already been accepted over the Past four months, Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said in announcing the initiative, which is expected to cost $28 million.
But unlike the thousands of refugees fleeing violence in Syria who were greeted by flashing cameras and intense public exposure, the Yazidis have been entering the country with no fanfare. That won’t change, say government officials who are protecting the identity of the asylum-seekers because of their vulnerability.
“Some of these women haven’t even told their own families about what they experienced” at the hands of their persecutors, associate deputy immigration minister Dawn Edlund told a news conference alongside Hussen.
Others are worried that, should their identities be revealed, the family members and friends they’ve left behind will face retribution, she said.
Rempel, who commended the government for taking in the Yazidis after her own previous Conservative government failed to act, said she has been shocked by the stories she has heard and amazed by the resilience of the survivors of rape, torture and other unspeakable atrocities.
In addition to 1,200 government-assisted refugees, the government says it also intends to facilitate private sponsorships of Yazidi refugees.
The announcement came four months after the House of Commons unanimously supported a Conservative motion that called on the government to provide asylum to an unspecified number of Yazidi women and girls.
The motion recognized that the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, also called Daesh, is committing genocide against the Yazidi people and holding many of the religious group’s women and girls as sex slaves.