fingerprinted in Greece, many asylum seekers lose hope of being able to seek asylum in their preferred destinations in Sweden, the UK, Germany, and other countries. The EU has frustrated the preferred destinations of asylum seekers through a regulation known as Dublin II, which since February 2003 (and building on the framework of the earlier Dublin Convention, which has been in force since 1997) establishes that the Member State responsible for examining asylum claims will generally be the one in which an asylum seeker first sets foot.13 Although both Greece and the Iraqi asylum seekers appear to agree on their preference that Iraqis not stay in Greece but rather seek asylum in countries to the west and north, in fact, Iraqi asylum seekers find themselves stuck in Greece—they can’t move onward because of Dublin II, they can’t move back home because of a fear of war and persecution, but they are almost never granted asylum in Greece. In 2007, the approval rate for asylum seekers was 0.04 percent in first-instance interviews.14 13 Council Regulation (EC) No. 343/2003 of February 18, 2003, establishing the criteria and mechanisms for determining the Member State responsible for examining an asylum application lodged in one of the Member States by a third-country national. 14 NOAS, Norwegian Helsinki Committee, and Greek Helsinki Monitor, “Statistical Information on Asylum in Greece (19972007),” in A Gamble with the Right to Asylum in Europe: Greek Asylum Policy and the Dublin II Regulation, April 2008, p. 81. 21 Human Rights Watch November 2008