Month: June 2008

Mess in Malta continues

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Here is a fairly lengthy discussion of the increasing illegal immigration to Mediterranean islands Malta and Cyprus.   We’ve written on previous occasions how those entering Europe illegally seek asylum and end up as refugees to the US.   Today I attended a meeting in Annapolis on immigration and a topic of discussion was that all immigration (legal and illegal) must be reformed in the US.  

As I have also said previously, critics of illegal immigration in the past have been careful to separate criticism of illegal from legal, that distinction is fading fast.

When the US takes illegal aliens from Malta, as we did recently, and transforms them into ‘legal’ refugees we encourage more “boat people” to try to reach island nations like Malta, and the State Department further blurs the line between legal and illegal.

In Malta, between 2001 and 2002 the figure of asylum seekers shot up from some 50 to nearly 2,000, and continued at a steady pace averaging some 1,500 every year since then, with a total of some 9,000 “boat people” alone so far until 2008. Most of these arrived illegally and undocumented from Libya, although very few of them were actually Libyans. For the most part, they came from sub-Saharan Africa, transiting through Libya, where several would have lived and worked sometimes for years before taking the boat to Europe.

See my earlier posts on Malta here.

Troubles pile up for the “rainbow nation”

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I would like to say more about this story but am running out of time tonight, so I’m just going to post it.  The story is from the Associated Press and is just more in the sad saga of a nation sinking under the weight of uncontrolled immigration.  South Africa, the country that was dubbed the “rainbow nation” for its welcoming stance on immigrants (come one and all they said) has seen 60 people killed in “xenophobic” riots in the last few weeks alone. 

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — City authorities vowed Tuesday to challenge a court order to move some 3,500 immigrants living in a camp near a popular tourist destination after they were forced from their homes in a wave of xenophobic violence.

The sprawling camp on a wind-swept beach near the Cape of Good Hope has come to symbolize South Africa’s dilemma about what to do with the tens of thousands displaced by the attacks that erupted a month ago.

Cape Town’s High Court ruled late Monday that the city must open community centers to house the displaced.

But authorities said moving the immigrants would risk exacerbating tensions with native South Africans, many of whom accuse the foreigners of “stealing” scarce jobs and services. The xenophobic attacks left at least 60 people dead.

“We want to reduce tensions, not increase them,” said Robert Macdonald, spokesman for Cape Town.

Civil rights groups have charged that the “safe sites,” such as the camp at a former picnic area at Soetwater, are like internment camps.

“The conditions there are so bad,” said Patrick Chauke, the powerful head of a parliamentary Home Affairs committee. “The tents have been blown by the wind. There are women and children who are dumped there.”

The camp includes nearly 2,000 Somali refugees. They say they are too afraid to return to the communities that chased them out and looted their stores, can’t return to Somalia, and want the U.N. refugee agency to move them to another country such as Australia or the United States.

U.N. representatives over the weekend said they couldn’t be relocated, prompting the Somalis to threaten charity volunteers, trash food and begin a hunger strike. They also threatened to jump into the rough, icy waters and claimed that several had already committed suicide by drowning.

Iraqi professionals find jobs in America scarce

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

A blogger at something called “Principle Pictures” gives a first hand account of a group of Iraqi professionals arriving in the US and finding their former professions in Iraq mean very little here. 

On Saturday afternoon forty-eight Iraqi refugees who have resettled in the U.S. arrived at Reagan International Airport. The men wore pressed suits and ties and the women had freshly polished fingernails and high heels. They were clearly dressed to impress. In their luggage they carried a most prized possession – resumes detailing their work with American companies, the American military and the American government in Iraq. While they are a unique refugee group — all are college-educated professionals — they face the most common refugee problem: continuing their careers in America

I confess I don’t understand why the outfit that brought them, Upwardly Global, brings immigrants to America with the expectation that they will walk into good jobs.  It seems cruel.  We have seen one story after another from around the country where educated refugees are cleaning motels or cutting meat. 

We even had one sad sounding Iraqi college professor whose husband was a doctor write to our blog literally begging us to tell her what sort of jobs they might have in America.    How do you tell older people, formerly successful people, that they will likely have no satisfying work. 

Iraqis learned the hard truths about hunting for a job here: human resources managers spend an average of 20 seconds on every resume, personal stories (even the heart-wrenching ones they all have to tell) have no place in a job interview, the economy is terrible, resumes should be limited to a page or two (most of theirs are 3, 4 and 5 pages), and, most difficult for them to hear, don’t expect their employers in Iraq to hire them in America. 

“Iraqis are having a hard time coming to terms with the reality that while their education and skills were valued in Baghdad, Fallujah, and Basra, they are not valued here,” says Jane Leu, Upwardly Global’s founder and president. “These people were leaders in Iraq, and they will be leaders here if given the chance. The idea that all immigrants have to pull themselves up by their boot straps is outdated.”

I wrote about Upwardly Global kicking off a lobbying campaign in April to bring more Iraqis to the US here.  They are a non-profit group,  but apparently act as a head hunters for American companies.   Sounds like they fell down on the job with this group.

Read Judy’s earlier post here about how Iraqi officials do not want to lose Iraq’s professionals—they need them to rebuild Iraq. 

No lawsuit by Ahmadiyya Muslims against the town of Walkersville, MD

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Today the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community (AMC) announced it will not pursue a lawsuit against Walkersville for its denial of their special exception request to build a Muslim convention facility adjacent to this rural town.  

We followed this case at RRW because it happened not far from where we live and it brought the publics’ attention to an issue that will be only increasing in coming years—the friction between immigrants’ religious requirements and a community that wishes to maintain its rural character.   This last is my take on the issue, the Citizens for Walkersville and other residents focused on how a facility of this size would impact the quality of their environment.   Traffic, emergency services, and water supply are examples of the issues that the Board of Zoning Appeals considered in its decision.

Here are some excerpts from the Frederick News Posts article today. 

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community will not appeal a decision that has prevented them from building a worship center in Walkersville.

The decision made in February by the Walkersville Board of Zoning Appeals was to deny AMC’s special exception application.

The group, based out of Silver Spring, wanted to buy 224 acres of agriculturally zoned land on Woodsboro Pike to build recreational and worship facilities.

Most of the year, the center would have served about 20 local families. During one summer weekend, it would have been used for AMC’s annual Jalsa Salana festival which could have drawn about 10,000 to the center.

“It is our determination that at this time we have to leave the matter in the hands of God, whom we serve,” said Syed Ahmad, AMC spokesman in a statement. “Participation in a lawsuit would be tantamount to a trespass on His hallowed ground.”

Citizens for Walkersville spokesperson had this to say:

The decision by AMC not to pursue a lawsuit is an honorable decision, said Steve Berryman, spokesman for the Citizens for Walkersville, a group opposed to AMC’s request.

When the group announced its intentions, members said they would not pursue the purchase if it was clear the town did not want the mosque, Berryman said. With this decision, they are sticking to their original, honorable declaration.

“It was the best outcome for all concerned,” he said.

I guess the owner of the property has left the door open a crack with this following bit.   I had no idea there was a federal law to protect religious freedom in land use.  Wow, I wonder what that means?  Suppose a religion had some practices that were detrimental to the land.  Does religious freedom trump environmental protection?

Roman Storzer, who represents the land owner David Moxley, has hinted at the possibility that he may take the case to federal court.

His options include civil rights action regarding enforcement of the religious freedom protections in the federal and Maryland constitutions and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act. The act is a federal statute, passed by Congress in 2000, to provide stronger protection for religious freedom in land use.

See all of our coverage of Walkersville, MD and the Amadiyya here.

 

Refugees replace illegal aliens at meatpacking plants

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update September 3, 2009:   Here is the missing link to the Wall Street Journal article sent to me by a reader when I wrote this post yesterday.

 

Yesterday a reader sent me a story written by Miriam Jordan at the Wall Street Journal, but you would know it, the Wall Street Journal wants a subscription before you can read the whole thing.    I wasn’t looking forward to copying large sections of it from a pdf file, so this morning I was happy to see that American Renaissance has done that work for me here.    They didn’t take all the sections I thought interesting but they  do have enough of the story for you to get the gist of it as well as some comments worth reading.

Our volag worker, Mike, told us this week that Refugee resettlement should be about economics—-bringing healthy workers into the US—the Wall Street Journal pretty much confirms with this story that it is.    I think it’s time for refugee advocates to drop the pretense and stop beating the citizenry over the head with the humanitarian angle and admit much of this program is driven by big business—like Swifts or Tysons Food— and their big business head hunters in the State Department and some of the volags.

I wrote about the refugee situation in the Texas panhandle back in early May here and here.

Note:  The health department for Cactus, TX needs to check with the health department in Ft. Wayne (Allen County), IN where they do have huge expenses related to the health of the Burmese refugees, esp. involving TB.