By NNN-Bernama
Melbourne : A former Canberra-based Iraqi diplomat has been allowed to return to Australia to be reunited with his family after five years of agonising wait for approval.
Nattiq Ali Radhi, 68, the Iraqi charge d’affairs in Canberra for four years until being recalled to Baghdad in 2002, fled to Yemen and then to Jordan awaiting a reunion with his wife, daughter and two sons, The Australian newspaper reported.
Radhi’s wife, Haifa’a Nour al-Din, had repeatedly urged Australian authorities to allow his re-entry. His family believe he was deemed guilty by association because of his role as a relatively junior public servant, reporting to Saddam Hussein’s regime.
Haifa’a said the former Iraqi foreign affairs administration ordered him back to Iraq in May 2002 as he was not co-operating. “They wanted reports about the Iraqis who lived here in Australia and when he refused to send any, they asked him to come back to Iraq,’’ she told the newspaper.
“He feared that the Government would punish him for it. My kids were still at university studying, so he decided that it was better for us to stay here in Australia and he could return back to Iraq,” she said.
When her husband arrived in Iraq he was interrogated and investigated “and they wanted to know why he left his family back in Australia”.
“He fled Iraq before the war started in 2003 to Yemen and he lived there for two years, and through all this time he has been in contact with the Australian embassy after applying to join us here, but he couldn’t get an answer except ‘your claim is in the process’.”
Daughter Morouge Ali, an Australian citizen, told The Australian she had almost given up because she was “sick of writing, sick of waiting, sick of people with no heart”.
“He was only a very simple diplomat who served his time here in Australia and, knowing the regime at that time in Iraq, he went back to Iraq because he felt he had to. He sacrificed his safety and his being just to give us a better future. Of course he was questioned as to why he left us behind, and he was ready to go to jail,” Morouge said.
“We are very happy and relieved now, but we are sorry for all those still waiting and suffering. We have been trying so hard for him. My father never held a gun in his life – he’s a simple man, just a diplomat. Being an Iraqi has not been easy – there is a big cloud over you and it is there all of your life. Our country went through those wars and when it came time to help the people, nobody could help,” she said.