Somali born Sir Mo Farah slams Trump immigration order

Somali born British double Olympics and world distance champion, Sir Mo Farah has hit out at the controversial immigration order declared by US President, Donald Trump that have caused chaos and consternation worldwide.

UK citizen Farah who is based in Oregon says Trump’s executive order banning entry to the US from seven majority-Muslim countries including his country of birth Somalia was ‘ignorant and prejudicial’.

“On 1st January this year, Her Majesty The Queen made me a Knight of the Realm. On 27th January, President Donald Trump seems to have made me an alien.

“I am a British citizen who has lived in America for the past six years – working hard, contributing to society, paying my taxes and bringing up our four children in the place they now call home. Now, me and many others like me are being told that we may not be welcome.

“It’s deeply troubling that I will have to tell my children that Daddy might not be able to come home – to explain why the President has introduced a policy that comes from a place of ignorance and prejudice,” Farah wrote on his Facebook page.

The London 2012 and Rio 2016 men 5000m and 10000m winner was scheduled to travel back to the UK after a training stint in Ethiopia and is not due to return to the US in the next few weeks.

“I was welcomed into Britain from Somalia at eight years old and given the chance to succeed and realise my dreams. I have been proud to represent my country, win medals for the British people and receive the greatest honour of a knighthood.

“My story is an example of what can happen when you follow polices of compassion and understanding, not hate and isolation,” the Moscow 2013 and Beijing 2015 double world distance champion added.

Speaking to Citizen Digital, Jo Livingston from Pace Management that represents him wrote they were monitoring the situation keenly with Farah’s family based in Oregon where he trains with his coach, Alberto Salazar.

The ruling was made after the American Civil Liberties Union brought a challenge on behalf of two Iraqis detained at John F Kennedy airport in New York on Friday night, hours after Trump issued his executive order at the White House, banning entry to people from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia.

It prompted protests at airports across the US, and condemnation from around the world.

Trump’s order, titled “Protection Of The Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into The United States,” makes good on his longtime campaign promise to tighten borders and halt certain refugees from entering the United States.

As well as the ban on travel from seven named countries for 90 days, it also caps the total number of refugees admitted into the United States during the 2017 fiscal year at 50,000, down more than half from the current level of 110,000. It halts all refugees from Syria indefinitely.

“I am establishing new vetting measures to keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the United States of America,” Trump said during the signing at the Pentagon. “We don’t want them here,” CNN reported.