Troops from the 25th Infantry Divsion leave
Hickam Air Force Base yesterday.
Photo by George F. Lee, Star-Bulletin

The first of the two flights, carrying 469 passengers, landed today. Two additional flights were due to leave Turkey today.

Over the next few days through Friday night, about six more flights are to bring a total of 2,500 Kurds - ranging from 4 months to 70 years old - to the American island territory in the western Pacific.

"We hope to have them all here by the end of (the) week," said U.S. Navy Cmdr. Glen King via telephone from Guam. "We want them to feel welcome, and we're doing everything we can to take care of their needs."

The refugees will spend the next 30 to 90 days in vacant military housing at Anderson Air Force Base while U.S. State Department and Immigration and Naturalization officials process them into the country, an official said.

The State Department says the vast majority will resettle in the United States, but those found to have criminal records will be excluded.

About 200 soldiers from the 25th Infantry Division left Hawaii for Guam yesterday to help provide humanitarian relief for the evacuees. The Schofield Barracks soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 27th Infantry Regiment, and the 58th Military Police Company are expected to be there for three months.

It was not immediately clear what further role Hawaii would play in the assimilation of the evacuees being airlifted from Turkey in this U.S. Pacific Command joint task force operation dubbed "Pacific Haven."

The current exodus of Iraqis seems small compared with 1991 when nearly 2 million fled to Saudi Arabia and Iran during and after the gulf war. Most eventually returned to Iraq, accepting an amnesty decreed by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, but 32,000 stayed in camps in Saudi Arabia. Of these, most were defectors from Iraq's army or were taken prisoner by the U.S.-led coalition forces and refused to return to Iraq after the war.

About 10,000 of these Iraqis have been resettled in the United States. More than 10,000 others have been accepted in other countries, including Iran, Sweden, Australia, the Netherlands, Norway, Finland and Canada. About 3,000 opted to go back to Iraq.

Those entering the United States receive assistance from U.S. voluntary agencies, which arrange for food, a place to live and help in finding jobs. The refugees generally are sent to locations where they have job prospects.

The military has contracted with airlines such as Tower for the evacuation, King said.

"The evacuees are going to be certified to see if they fit the criteria for political asylum," he said.

Guam has large, secure, remote U.S. military complexes where Kurds who had opposed Saddam while working for U.S. agencies in northern Iraq can be safely debriefed.

"They were offering humanitarian assistance to (another segment of) Kurds," said King.

The evacuees are employees or relatives of the U.S. Agency for International Development's Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance and the Department of Defense's Operation Provide Comfort, officials said.

Those arriving include at least one doctor and many English speakers, King said.

The evacuation came as a result of the turmoil in northern Iraq, where a Kurdish group made an alliance with Saddam and took control of the area after routing a rival group. The United States staged missile strikes this month to retaliate against Saddam's incursion.

The refugees are being bused from the border area to Diyarbakir in Turkey, a staging area for their flight to Guam.