- Title: SWEDEN: Small Swedish town of Sodertalje struggles with influx of Iraqi refugees
- Date: 19th February 2008
- Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) FADI SAWA, STUDENT, SAYING: "We first came to Sodertalje because there are many Iraqis here. We thought we might encounter problems if we went anywhere else, although we could if we wanted to. In Sodertalje there are many Iraqis, we are amongst relatives and our loved ones, so we can feel as if we are in our country that we are exiled from. So in this
- Embargoed: 5th March 2008 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Sweden
- Country: Sweden
- Topics: International Relations,Population
- Reuters ID: LVA7SBW3QX6IP532KRSDK2VB1ZGE
- Story Text: Sweden takes more refugees from Iraq than any other country outside the Middle East and a large majority chooses to settle in Sodertalje, a town of 83,000 inhabitants, just 30 kilometres south of the capital Stockholm, best-known for housing the headquarters of Scania and being the birthplace of tennis ace Bjorn Borg.
An average thirty new Iraqis arrive in Sodertalje every week, joining an already swelling population of 5000 in the small Swedish town of 60,000 residents.
Most new arrivals seem relatively happy with their new lives, able to tap into vast social and family networks from back home. In the evenings men gather in one of the many social clubs in Ronna, an area where many Iraqis live.
Sarmed Eila, from Mosul, arrived in Sweden five years ago. At first he lived near Gothenburg but he moved to Sodertalje a few years ago to be closer to his friends.
"It is a nice and pretty area. There are many Arabs living here and I have many friends and family here. So I came," he says.
Sarmed works as a baker but says it was difficult to find a job as so many refugees are looking for work. But despite that, he and his family have no plans to relocate.
Most of the town's refugee population are Iraqi Christians, many of whom already had relatives who had immigrated there in the 1960's. But the recent influx is straining the local infrastructure, and officials are worried that Sodertalje is reaching breaking point.
In 2007, Sweden's "Little Baghdad" accepted twice as many refugees as the entire United States. Housing, schooling and health services are struggling to cope, and last December Migration Minister Tobias Billström suggested compelling asylum seekers "to only settle in areas where there was housing, work or education possibilities."
Marita Larnestad from the local council says a town of Sodertalje's size should be able to cope with around 150 refugees each year; last year 1,266 applicants were granted asylum. If the trend continues, they expect the number to increase to 2,000 in 2008.
"The problem is that we have so many people coming to Sodertalje and we haven't got anywhere for them to live. We have no free flats and not so many places where you can go to school, you have to wait to go to school to learn Swedish, to get work. It is not so easy," says Larnestad.
When the refugees are granted asylum, they enter a period of "Introduction", during which they receive practical knowledge, language tuition and information about Sweden. They also sit for "competence assessments" to enable them to look for work that matches their skills.
The Head of the Sodertalje Council Refugee Introduction Unit, Pia Sjostrand, says the council is increasingly recruiting more staff to cope with the large amount of people arriving.
"From a refugee's point of view it is obvious that you choose a place where you know people, family or friends. They come from an unsafe place and choose a safe place. From an integration perspective, it is more doubtful because so many of those who come to little Sodertalje are mostly Arabic speakers. If you go to Swedish classes in Sodertalje, 90 to 95 are Arabic speakers. It won't be Swedish that they'll talk during the breaks and then they go home to their housing area where 80 per cent speak Arabic, so they don't speak Swedish there either. So from that perspective it is not that good," Sjostrand said.
The Sodertalje council has started a campaign to inform refugees about other parts of Sweden and have been urging the government to take active steps to encourage people to move to places where labour is needed and where the housing situation isn't so over-stretched. They say they cannot force people to move, but hope to give them enough incentives to do so. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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