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Associated Press

US immigration authorities are barring entry to a 21-year-old Syrian cinematographer who worked on a harrowing film about his nation’s civil war, The White Helmets, that has been nominated for an Academy Award.
According to internal Trump administration correspondence, the Department of Homeland Security has decided at the last minute to block Khaled Khateeb from travelling to Los Angeles for the Oscars.
Khateeb was scheduled to arrive on Saturday in Los Angeles on a Turkish Airlines flight departing from Istanbul. But his plans have been upended after US officials reported finding “derogatory information” regarding Khateeb.
Watch: the official trailer for The White Helmets


Derogatory information is a broad category that can include anything from terror connections to passport irregularities. Asked for comment, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, Gillian Christensen, said: “A valid travel document is required for travel to the United States.”
The White Helmets, a 40-minute Netflix documentary, has been nominated for Best Documentary Short. If the film wins the Oscar, the award would go to director Orlando von Einsiedel and producer Joanna Natasegara. Khateeb is one of three people credited for cinematography; Franklin Dow is the film’s director of photography.
The film focuses on the rescue workers who risk their lives to save Syrians affected by civil war. Many of the group’s members have been killed by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s air forces. The group also was nominated for last year’s Nobel Peace Prize.
The White Helmets includes emblematic scenes of the deadly six-year-old conflict: people digging through destroyed homes looking for survivors, at constant risk of “double tap” attacks that target first responders after they’ve arrived at the scene of a strike.
Khateeb had been issued a visa to attend the ceremony with Hollywood’s biggest stars. But Turkish authorities detained him this week, according to the internal US government correspondence, and he suddenly needed a passport waiver from the US to enter the country.
The correspondence indicated he would not receive such a waiver. There was no explanation in the correspondence for why Turkey detained Khateeb.


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Syrian conflict

Barred from US: Syrian who worked on nominated film ‘The White Helmets’ can't attend Oscars

Syrian civil defence volunteers, known as the White Helmets, search for survivors following reported government air strike on the rebel-held neighbourhood of Tishrin, on the northeastern outskirts of the capital Damascus. Photo: AFP

white helmets

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