Soldier becomes U.S. citizen posthumously

NEW YORK, Sept. 17 (UPI) -- U.S. Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y. arranged a posthumous naturalization ceremony in New York Monday for a U.S. Army corporal killed in Iraq.

Juan Alcantara, 22, a native of the Dominican Republic, was on a three-month extension of his tour of duty when he and three other U.S. soldiers died Aug. 6 in an explosion in Baqubah, The New York Daily News reported.

Rangel arranged to present Alcantara's citizenship certificate to his family at a ceremony at New York's City College.

"How are you going to become a citizen after you're dead?" Sayonara Lopez, 22, Alcantara's fiancee and the mother of his infant daughter, asked the Daily News.

Alcantara arrived in the United States with his family in 1990 and joined the Army to pay for college.

His mother, Maria, said her 22-year-old son would be alive today if his tour in Iraq had ended as originally scheduled in June. Instead, it was extended for three months as part of the U.S. surge strategy.