ROTTERDAM – Disrupting their dream summer vacation in the US, two Dutch Muslim students were deported to London by the American authorities at JFK Airport in New York on July 11.
“Because we are Muslim,” that was the reason according to Othmane Charib and Ismail Aghzanay who made a video about their incident, NL Times reported on Tuesday.
“We were treated like criminals. We had to sit back to back with each other and weren’t allowed to make eye contact,” the Rotterdam natives said.
“They took our pictures and fingerprints. Our tickets were torn to pieces. Dogs are treated better.”
After being questioned in London, both students’ visas were approved and then they were allowed to get onto a flight to the US.
“They wanted to know which mosque we go to, whether we have extreme thoughts. They did a whole background check. They could see for themselves that we’ve never been in contact with the police and that we try to motivate young people. Still they finally said: ‘this doesn’t feel good’. It took more than 10 hours, while we were freezing from the cold. We participate to the maximum in society and then we are treated like this? It’s scandalous!” Charib and Aghzanay informed.
The costs they incurred for flight tickets and hotels were not reimbursed. And in an uncommon reply from the airline on the incident “The airline said they could do nothing for us.
“We only take you from A to B,” the two students said.
The new American president Donald Trump implemented an entry ban a week and a half ago. The ban covers the residents of six Muslim countries, Iran, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, Libya and Somalia.
And in another unfamiliar response from the Dutch state were both students are citizens, a
Unexpectedly, the spokesperson of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that the ministry is aware of what happened.
“In principle the authorities of a country, in this case the USA, decide who may enter and who may not. The Netherlands has little influence on it,” the spokesperson told AD newspaper.
“The Ministry still wants to help the two students and will try to find out why they were denied entry,” he said.