5. COMING TO AMERICA: DASHED HOPES AND UNCERTAIN FUTURES

According to the U.S. Committee for Refugees (2002) there were approximately 15 million refugees in the world in 2001, of which over three million were African. Refugees are persons who flee to a different country to escape persecution based on personal or group characteristics such as race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, social group, political opinion, or armed conflict, and lack of a durable solution (U.S. Committee for Refugees, 2001). For example, in Burundi, a small African country of about 6 million people, the civil war between the Tutsi and the Hutu has forced over half a million refugees to seek shelter in other African countries, Europe, and the United States (UNHCR, 2000).