Opinion
Camp or no-camp, Syrian refugees are legitimate refugees
By Rouba Al-Fattal Apr. 11, 2016
Just because Syrian refugees don’t live in refugee camps and end up renting pseudo-apartments, it doesn’t mean they don’t need our help. Those living outside of camps are in dire need, often in worse situations than those in camps. As well, by the end of 2013, the UN stopped accepting refugees in camps because they were full. Then in 2014 they even stopped registering refugees altogether.
National Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan, left, Immigration Minister John McCallum, and Health Minister Jane Philpott, are pictured Nov. 19, at a Syrian refugee camp in Jordan with a UNHCR staffer. Photograph courtesy of Immigration Canada
OTTAWA—The story published on the front page of last week's issue of The Hill Times titled, “Very, very few Syrian refugees came to Canada from refugee camps,” investigated the percentage of Syrian refugees who came to Canada from refugee camps compared to those who came here from outside the camps. It was not the article that struck me as much as the comments from readers on it that demonstrated so much prejudice and ignorance within our societies concerning the situation of
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