Nearly 300 Afghan refugees from Albania will arrive in St. Louis in a few months

The International Institute of St. Louis is preparing to resettle about 300 Afghan refugees who will arrive from Albania over the next few months.

For more than a year, the Afghan families have been waiting in Albania, a small country on the Balkan Peninsula, for the U.S. State Department to process their Special Immigrant Visas or refugee resettlement papers, said Arrey Obenson, president of the International Institute.

The families fled Afghanistan in 2021 after Taliban fighters seized control of the country.

The institute has helped resettle about 700 Afghans since last year. In the past few months, six Afghans arrived in St. Louis from Albania.

The institute had difficulty finding enough housing for Afghan refugees who came in last year, because federal officials did not give resettlement agencies enough time to prepare, Obenson said.

“When you have 150 people arriving in one week, there's just not enough housing capacity. There's just not enough planning,” he said. “Now we have the benefit of time and with the benefit of time, we are more prepared.” Read more.