16 September 2008

Media Release:

Forcible Deportation of Iraqi asylum seekers ended in violence

IFIR has been informed by Kurdish asylum seekers yesterday that at 7am, Monday 15 September Home Office commandoes went to the following four detention centres Tinsley House, Dover House, Oakington and Colnbrook  removed and handcuffed 60 Iraqi asylum seekers and placed them in five coaches. Their mobile phones were confiscated before they could call solicitors or friends. 

 The asylum seekers were then transported to Stansted airport, where a German aircraft waited to return them to Erbil in Northern Iraq.  However, when one of the asylum seekers punched and smashed a window of the plane, the Commandoes boarded the plane to try to unsuccessfully pin the Iraqi asylum seekers down.  Many of the asylum seekers were badly beaten including Fazzel the leader of the Campsfield hunger strikers whose face is badly bruised.. The flight was cancelled and the wounded Iraqi asylum seekers have been taken back to Colnbrook and put in single cells.

 IFIR and the Coalition to stop Deportations to Iraq demand an immediate release of all Iraqi asylum seekers, an immediate stop to the policy of forcible deportation, a boycott of Royal Jordanian Airline and all other companies complicit in forcible removals.  The government must end this barbarous policy once and for all. The Home Office is willing to play politics with these Iraqi lives, proving only to itself that Iraq is safe by sending people back to a situation everyone else can see to be volatile

 The operation this morning has entirely bypassed any usual procedure and represents a new level of contempt for Iraqi asylum seekers we ask all human right and  refugee right organisations,  MP’s and Trade unions to support our campaign to stop this policy of forcible deportation.

 For more information please contact: Karen Johnson 078 0489 1082 , Dashty Jamal 078 5603 2991, Samera Ahmad 078 2842 4164 email: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

 International Federation of Iraqi Refugees-IFIR

CSDIRAQ