These people need our help

I am old enough to remember when the UK used to pride itself as being a safe haven for political refugees, many of whom enriched British society, but those days seem long gone. In the excellent article by your reporter Sundari Cleal, we learned of the ill-treatment, deprivation and squalor undergone by Souren, an artist and political refugee from Iran.

She arrived in this country after years of persecution by the religious establishment in Iran, culminating in a sentence of three years imprisonment and 84 lashes for her depiction of women. Arriving in England with broken ribs and in poor health, she was refused medical treatment and questioned for hours before being sent to a hostel of extreme squalor with nothing but the clothes she was wearing and no money to buy the most basic toiletries. This was the beginning of six years of callous treatment and no rights before she was finally accepted as a refugee and another six years as ‘a stateless person’, before achieving citizenship.

We appear to be so afraid of economic migrants that the ill-treatment of genuine refugees is glossed over. This is collective shame on our society and I would congratulate Amnesty International for highlighting Souren’s experience and urge support for the Refugees’ Council, the charity set up to assist desperate refugees with no-one else to turn to

Brian Nicol (Dr), John O’Gaunt Road, Kenilworth