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There are as many as two million refugees caused by the conflict in Iraq. So far 466 Iraqis have been permitted to find refuge in the United States. The announcement that the quota has been raised to 7,000 inspired both ABC and CBS to focus on a single category of would-be emigrant: interpreters for the US military who have been sentenced to death for collaboration with occupation forces. Inside Iraq, noted CBS' Lara Logan, "interpreters have to keep their faces hidden to survive working so closely with US troops." There are 10,000 such translators in Iraq, vulnerable to being "hunted down and murdered." Yet at present the US offers just 50 immigration visas each year. "I have to hide like a rat," one woman told Logan, who concluded that "their only hope lies outside the country they never wanted to leave."
From Amman in Jordan ABC's Dan Harris took A Closer Look at one crippled former interpreter, his leg amputated after a roadside bomb explosion. The 22-year-old is nicknamed Opie for his fondness for TV's Oprah talkshow. If Opie goes home "he could get killed…He says he has sacrificed to help America and now America should help him."
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