Prague, March 20 (CTK) – The fourth group of Christian refugees from Iraq arrived in the Czech Republic in the afternoon, Martin Frydl, from the Generace 21 endowment fund organising the project, told CTK on Sunday.
The plane with 21 refugees aboard landed at the Vaclav Havel Airport Prague before 14:30. Originally, 23 people were to fly to Prague, but two of them, a widower and his daughter, decided to stay in Iraq at the very last moment, Frydl said.
Last year, the Czech government met the Generation 21’s proposal to accept 37 Christian Iraqi families, a total of 153 people. Several groups of them have already arrived this year, the first one in January.
Now the number of Iraqi Christian refugees has amounted to 89.
This group includes nine children, six women and six men, Frydl said.
“The group is quite varied. It includes university graduates, such as two men graduating from a civil engineering faculty, a physician and a woman graduating from a technical school,” Frydl told CTK.
The newcomers will be divided after the arrival. Six people will leave for Smilovice near Trinec, north Moravia, where the previous group of 14 Iraqi refugees was accommodated. Another 15 people will find a temporary home in a hotel in Prague-Branik neighbourhood.
Like the preceding groups’ members, the new arrivals will undergo courses acquainting them with Czech culture, society and language.
After about two months, they will move to standard flats. Then they are to be granted Czech asylum and they should start seeking jobs, with the assistance of Generation 21.
Before being sent to the Czech Republic, the refugees chosen by Generation 21 underwent security checks by Czech intelligence services, had interviews with Czech state bodies and were examined by doctors.
Most of the people have the international refugee status.
Apart from Prague and Smilovice, they have been accommodated in Brno and in Okrouhlik near Jihlava, south Moravia.
Generace 21 is organising and funding the project with a 15-million-crown budget with the aid of its partners and supporters.
