Two Iraqi women whose family were killed by American troops were invited to the U.S. by two organizations to speak at peace events. The State Department, however, denied their visas because--get this--they don't have any family in Iraq and so might not want to return:
Two Iraqi women whose husbands and children were killed by US troops during the Iraq war have been refused entry into the United States for a speaking tour. The women were invited to the US for peace events surrounding international women's by the human rights group Global Exchange and the women's peace group CODEPINK.
In a piece of painful irony, the reason given for the rejection was that the women don't have enough family in Iraq to prove that they'll return to the country. "It's appalling that the US military killed these women's families and then the US government rejects their visas on the grounds that they have no family to return to in Iraq. These women have no desire to stay in the United States. We had a very hard time convincing them to come, but we told them how important it would be for their stories to be heard by Americans," said Medea Benjamin, a co-founder of both the groups that had invited the women to the US.
The women whose visa applications were rejected are Anwar Kadhim Jawad and Vivian Salim Mati. They had to make a dangerous journey to Amman, Jordan just to apply for the visas and were told on February 4th that they'd been rejected. On February 14th, CODEPINK was informed by the US State Department that the women "failed to overcome the presumption of intending to emigrate."
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