Jan Bittner, senior foreign policy advisor to conservative CDU/CSU Bundestag Leader Volker Kauder, has written a compelling post at the Atlantic Community blog on the plight of the more than 2.2 million Iraqi Refugees who have fled to neighboring countries to escape sectarian violence and ethic strife at home. Based on first-hand accounts gained during a fact-finding trip to Amman, Damascus, and Istanbul in October, Bittner draws particular attention to the terrible sufferings of Iraqi Christians, who are arguably Iraq’s most vulnerable religious minority:
The U.S. Government has already started to address the refugee problem. By the end of 2007, it will have provided almost $1 billion in humanitarian assistance since 2003 for Iraqis in Iraq and in neighboring countries. At the end of October, President Bush requested $160 million to provide basic health services and education for Iraqi refugees in Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon; and $80 million to provide emergency relief supplies, health care, and water and sanitation infrastructure to people displaced in Iraq. At the same time, though, the Bush administration has come under tremendous pressure from Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill to allow many more Iraqis asylum in the United States. So far, however, logistical and bureaucratic hurdles at the State Department as well as terrorism and security concerns raised by DHS have caused regrettable delays in the relevant U.S. resettlement initiatives. Europe, too, should do much more to help alleviate the suffering of Iraq’s refugees. For those countries that have decided to stay out of Iraq militarily, a sharp increase in humanitarian aid for Iraqi refugees would be an excellent opportunity to care for those people most in need and to help contain a humanitarian crisis that, even as violence declines, could have dangerous spill-over effects in a very volatile region of the world. European public opinion is generally critical of sending soldiers abroad on tough missions to hunt down terrorists in far-distant countries. In contrast, the same polls consistently indicate broad-based popular support for soft, “feel good” foreign policies that focus on humanitarian aid, peacekeeping, and economic reconstruction. According to the German Marshall Fund’s Transatlantic Trends 2007 survey, among those Europeans backing a stronger EU role in international affairs, 84 percent were in favor of spending more money on development aid; 74 percent preferred using trade incentives to influence other countries; 68 percent wanted to commit more troops for peacekeeping missions; yet only 20 percent supported deploying troops for combat operations in general. With the notable exception of Sweden, the plight of Iraq’s refugees has so far failed to galvanize Europe to action. Unfortunately, large parts of European public opinion still view the Iraq war as a lost-cause–a quagmire caused by an unwarranted unilateral U.S. military invasion–that is essentially Bush’s problem to solve. EU leaders should seize the opportunity to tell their publics why helping Iraq’s refugees through expanded aid and targeted resettlement programs is not only a moral imperative but also smart, principled foreign policy.
