Sri Lankans who arrived illegally in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have arrived in Los Angeles!
This is a similar pattern to the “Malta Doctrine”*** the Bush Administration created some years ago. Illegal aliens arrive in some country seeking asylum and we go in and scoop them up to add to our “refugee” population. Readers, international law says that “asylum seekers” must ask for asylum in the first safe country in which they arrive—that country is not meant to be a transit stop on the way to America.
The UAE’s migrant population is NOT our problem! The fact that many ARAB countries do not take refugees is not our problem!
Gang of Eight bill will codify what the State Department is already doing!
Before I get to the news, let me say here that one of many problems, and a very significant one, in the Gang of Eight’s “comprehensive” immigration reform (S.744) is this line (I highlighted it on Wednesday):
a. Section 3403 – expands the President’s authority to designate “specifically defined groups of aliens” for resettlement based on either humanitarian reasons or because it “is otherwise in the national interest.”
The first part of that change means that whole groups of people could be deemed refugees just because they belong to a certain class (presently they must prove they personally are persecuted), and it is going to surely open the flood gates even wider. Asylum seekers only need to say: I’m Iraqi, I’m Somali, I’m gay, therefore I am persecuted.
But, it’s the second part that I’m focusing on here this morning, and it is troubling because we are already doing it! Illegally! We have been using the refugee program to ‘help out’ other countries for some other purpose. Can you say Uzbek airlift? (where we airlifted political dissidents/so-called refugees who had been troubling the President of Uzbekistan to the US at the time Bush wanted access to Afghanistan through Uzbekistan).
S.744 would codify what the State Department has already been doing on the sly. What the hell is “in the national interest?”
Are we trying to curry favor with the government of the UAE by taking their illegal alien Sri Lankans off their hands? Is it in our “national interest” to do so? Hmmmm?
From The National (more people in need of welfare on their way to LA!) Hat tip to Joanne:
DUBAI // Eleven Sri Lankan refugees have arrived in Los Angeles to begin their new lives after receiving care in the UAE for six months.
[….]
“We can now lead a life without fear and don’t have to live as refugees any more,” said Sivabalan Niranjani, 35, of the harrowing journey that ended when she landed in Dubai. She arrived in the US with her husband and two children yesterday.
Mrs Niranjani was seven months pregnant when she and 44 others set sail from India by boat last October to seek asylum in Australia.
Five days later their boat broke down and they had to be rescued by the Singaporean ship Pinnacle Bliss, which was en route to Jebel Ali.
[….]
When the group arrived in Dubai on October 23, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) notified the UAE of their presence.
Although the Emirates is not a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention and not legally obliged to allow refugees to stay, they were allowed to disembark and the UN agency was granted access to determine the legitimacy of their claims for asylum.
While waiting for asylum, Mrs Niranjani gave birth to a girl in December at Dubai’s Latifa Hospital.
[….]
Babar Baloch, a spokesman for UNHCR, said the refugees’ departure was arranged by the International Organisation for Migration.
“Authorities in the US will handle refugees that have been accepted for resettlement,” Mr Baloch said.
Of the 46 who arrived in Dubai, including Mrs Naranjani’s baby, seven were sent back by the UN as they were deemed not to be in need of international protection. [Some were not legitimate refugees!—ed]
Eight were sent to Sweden and one went to the US earlier. After another 11 left for the US yesterday, 19 are left in the UAE to continue their wait.
Asylum shopping:
Kulasegaram Geetharthanan, a lawyer with Jein Solicitors in the UK, has submitted asylum applications to several consulates in Dubai on their behalf – including Sweden, Switzerland, Canada, Germany, Austria, Ireland and the UK.
I guess he can take Switzerland off his list! But, we hear Ireland is very welcoming! BTW, Tamils are mostly Hindu, with about 5% Muslim population, however, the Tamil Tigers are infamous for having invented the suicide belt.
For more on Sri Lankan “refugees,” just type ‘Sri Lankan’ into our search function and see the problems both Australia and Canada are having with them arriving in boats.
*** I call it the Malta Doctrine because back in 2007 or 2008, Bush’s Ambassador to Malta set a precedent by turning “asylum seekers” (really economic migrants arriving on Malta’s coast illegally from North Africa) into refugees to be resettled in the US. Type ‘Malta’ into our search function and you will see in dozens of posts how this really illegal process has evolved turning Malta into a magnet for even more illegal migration. That is why it is so important for the refugee industry advocates to get that line into the new Gang of Eight bill—the President can deem someone or some group as being in the “national interest” to bring to America.