‘We Have Done it Before and We Can do it Again’: Organizers Who Helped Resettle Syrian Refugees Launch New Campaign Amid Afghan Crisis

This excerpt from the Toronto Star describes how Lifeline Afghanistan, of which Senator Omidvar is a co-founder, will help resettle Afghan refugees in Canada.

Shortly after the news came of Kabul’s fall to the Taliban, Wendy Cukier started getting email from former sponsors of Syrian refugees looking to her to do something about the humanitarian crisis coming out of Afghanistan.

The Ryerson University professor quickly convened the same advocates, colleagues and friends she worked closely with six years ago in the campaign to sponsor, welcome and resettle Syrian refugees as permanent residents in Canada.

In response to the escalating crisis in Afghanistan, they would like to replicate their previous success that saw Canadians from coast to coast raising money, rolling up their sleeves and helping tens of thousands of Syrian newcomers settle in their communities.

“Obviously, the attention was being focused on the evacuation from Afghanistan, but a lot of ordinary citizens didn’t really know what to do or where to go. So they reached out to to me because I had led the effort in 2015,” said Cukier, a co-founder of Lifeline Afghanistan launched Tuesday in response to the unfolding Afghan crisis.

“I’m just lucky I have a really incredible network of people that I was able to mobilize very quickly. We all understand how important it is to engage the people in Toronto and across the country in this effort.”

Cukier, director of Ryerson’s Diversity Institute, quickly enlisted 50 civic leaders, including human rights activist and journalist Sally Armstrong, Sen. Ratna Omidvar and Afghan-Canadian lawyer Hila Taraky, as well as community organizations to get them on board.

Click here to read the full article in the Toronto Star