Terror threat slows flow of Iraqi refugees here

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has dramatically slowed the resettlement of Iraqi refugees— including former U. S. military translators and embassy workers — in the midst of growing concerns about al- Qaeda’s potential ties with some asylum seekers, a senior administration official says.

Two Iraqi refugees who resettled in the United States in 2009 were arrested in May in Bowling Green, Ky., and are accused of plotting to send weapons and cash to al- Qaeda in Iraq. The administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, says intelligence indicates the threat is much broader than the two refugees.

Authorities learned of the Kentucky plot through intelligence gleaned in late 2010, the official said. “That threat stream led us to re- examine our vetting process for this population and really all of the refugee population,” the official said.

FBI Director Robert Mueller noted last year, before the Kentucky arrests, that a potential threat rested with “individuals who may have been resettled here in the United States that have had some association with al- Qaeda in Iraq.”

After more than 36,000 Iraqi refugees were resettled in the USA between October 2008 and September 2010, only 9,400 refugees were resettled in the following year. In the last three months of 2011, only 826 Iraqi refugees have been resettled in the United States, according to the State Department.

The fingerprints of one of the Kentucky suspects, Waadramadan Alwan, was found on a component of a roadside bomb before he arrived in the USA. The fingerprints were not in any databases that visa applicants were automatically checked against. Alwan pleaded guilty in federal court in December to conspiring to attack U. S. soldiers in Iraq, conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction and attempting to provide material support to terrorists.

Neither man had worked for U. S. organizations in Iraq. Both received refugee status for humanitarian reasons.

In September, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano told a Senate panel that security checks were expanded and that more than 57,000 already admitted into the U. S. have been revetted. But even before the Kentucky arrests, security checks were expanded and have led to a slowdown in processing applications.

The U. S. government implemented additional security procedures in February 2011, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Checks are run twice, once before a refugee is interviewed by the Department of Homeland Security and a second time shortly before departure. The details of what the enhanced security checks entail are not shared publicly, but refugee information is likely being checked against security, forensic and intelligence databases that were not among those covered by the other security checks, according to the UNHCR.