“Hardship is not over, even after becoming a citizen”

It took Amer so long to meet his wife and reunite with her in Europe, because of his former legal status as a stateless Syrian Kurd, which caused him many troubles and made him face many difficulties in following-up his refugee papers, unlike other refugees with Syrian nationality.

Amer Jameel Hamma, born in Ad Darbasiyah town in 1985. He is classified as a stateless, specifically from the ajanib^[1] class, which made him suffer real hardships, as he recounted to STJ through an interview conducted in March 2018:

"It all started when the special census was conducted, and my father was classified as ajnabi, while my uncles became Syrian citizens. The difficulties the ajanib used to face are known to everyone, especially those connected to education. I couldn’t get a scholarship to Tunisia or Egypt as my friends with citizenship, although we had the same grades. So I submitted my papers to the university in Deir ez-Zur Governorate, where I faced countless troubles. They asked me to present an Individual Civil Registration extract, which was almost impossible to get. I went to Deir ez-Zur three times to follow up the university papers. However, after graduation all my friends were employed at governmental institution except me."

Following the issuance of Decree No. 49, Amer finally managed to obtain the Syrian nationality, but fled the conflict, and decided to immigrate to Germany:

"When I arrived to Germany, I faced some difficulties in following-up my papers as a refugee, especially since I was one of ajanib al-Hasakah, prior to obtaining Syrian nationality. They asked us, all refugees from al-Hasakah, Deir ez-Zur, Idlib, and Raqqa, to request papers from the Personal Status Department in Damascus specifically, and this has greatly impeded and delayed the reunion with my fiancée, who later became my wife, since I did not have a registry in the official records there from before 2011. Actually, it took us so long to reunite in Germany.”