Hong Kong fugitives are refugees? Washington, you’ve got to be kidding


America’s ‘war on terror’ has displaced between 37 million and 59 million people around the world, according to a new study but the US State Department wants to accept Hong Kong people fleeing the law as part of its propaganda war against China

SCMP Columnist
My Take by Alex Lo
Published: 2 Oct, 2020

Washington is good at telling sick jokes. The latest? In its annual proposal on refugee admissions, the US State Department has proposed including Hong Kong people for the first time, in response to the new Chinese national security law.

It will prioritise “people who have suffered or fear persecution on the basis of religion; for Iraqis whose assistance to the United States has put them in danger; for refugees from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras; and for refugees from Hong Kong, Cuba, and Venezuela”.

The US plan, though, will cap the total number of refugees accepted at 15,000, down from 18,000 this year. How many real desperate refugees are there in the world? And how many of them have been created by America’s wars, both overt and covert?

Here are some disturbing numbers compiled in a new study from the Costs of War Project at Brown University.

Canada has resettled more than 10 times as many refugees per Canadian citizen than the US

“US post-9/11 wars have forcibly displaced at least 37 million people in and from Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, the Philippines, Libya, and Syria,” wrote lead author and anthropologist David Vine.

“This exceeds those displaced by every war since 1900, except World War II. The 37 million is a very conservative estimate. The total displaced by the US post-9/11 wars could be closer to 48–59 million.”

Breaking down the numbers, they are: 5.3 million Afghans; 9.2 million Iraqis; 3.7 million Pakistanis; 1.7 million Filipinos; 4.2 million Somalis; 4.4 million Yemenis; 1.2 million Libyans; 7.1 million Syrians.

Syria? Didn’t the US work tirelessly to end the horrible civil war there? Actually, it was one of the major parties that helped prolong the Syrians’ agony. Washington has provided funding, training, and logistical support to numerous rebel groups. US forces started fighting in the country in 2014 against the Islamic State.

“As a result, we focused our calculations on people displaced from five Syrian provinces where US forces have fought and operated since 2014,” Vine wrote.

Turkey has hosted 3.9 million refugees. One in seven people in Lebanon and one in 15 in Jordan are refugees.

Canada has resettled more than 10 times as many refugees per Canadian citizen than the US.

The US? In recent years, refugee admissions have practically fallen to zero from Muslim-majority countries.

Meanwhile, Hong Kong people will get priority admissions because of some propaganda campaign of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Some people do turn your stomach.