Farouq Ali

"I have won a new life."
Farouq Ali is the father of four and a refugee from Iraq. He had completed two university degrees and was working as a manager for a local firm in Baghdad, Iraq, when he began receiving death threats from local militants. One day he received this text on his mobile phone: "We will put an end to your life tomorrow." The same day, six people were murdered as part of sectarian violence in his neighborhood. Farouq fled with his second family (he left two sons from a first marriage behind) to neighboring Syria, where, with the help of UNHCR, the family was selected for resettlement to Liechtenstein. When that application stalled, he chose to be resettled in the U.S. . Farouq now lives in the Massachusetts town of Lowell, where he works with other resettled refugees. "The last country I was thinking of was the USA, actually," he said of his adopted home. "But Europe closed all its doors before Iraqis... I don't know why." Leaving Iraq, he said, was a huge blow, but he does not consider himself "a big loser": "On the contrary I have won a new life." For more information about refugees, visit www.unhcr.org

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