BAGHDAD — Iraqi Ivan Sahda Moshi has been hiding at a friend’s house in Gothenburg, Sweden, since Dec. 1, 2017, as a decree has been issued by Sweden to forcibly return him to Iraq. “I hope that my case is looked over again this year,” Moshi told Al-Monitor. Moshi, who fled Iraq in 2007 seeking asylum in Sweden, belongs to a Christian family, all of whom have fled Iraq to different countries. He fears going back, as militias threatened to kill him due to his work with US forces, not to mention that Christians are a threatened minority in Iraq.
On Jan. 10, Abdul Bari Zebari, the head of parliament’s Foreign Relations Committee, indicated that the European Union is intending to forcibly return Iraqi immigrants whose asylum requests have been rejected back to Iraq. He called upon the Iraqi government to not accept any negotiations with the European Union concerning forcibly returning Iraqi immigrants, as he suggests that returning them should be voluntary, not compulsory.
