'Does daddy have to go to war?': Iranian Americans fear for family left behind by travel ban

Tensions between the two countries have created uncertainty and worries of being permanently separated from loved ones

Sorena Amirkhani has spent half his life struggling to understand why his father must live in a country on the other side of the world. This week, the 11 year-old’s questions about his dad took on new urgency: he wanted to know if he would lose him in a third world war.

Amirkhani lives in Lexington, Kentucky, with his mother and sister, while his father lives in Tehran, Iran’s capital, and has been barred from the United States for years under Donald Trump’s travel ban. While the renewed conflict between Iran and the US this week has spread anxiety among Iranian Americans across the United States, the international crisis has created particular uncertainty for families torn apart by Trump’s immigration policies, with rising fears about a potential war permanently separating loved ones.

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from World news | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2tM85Ru