Category: Canada

Catholic leaders trying to get refugees out of Libya and to Canada

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

This is a lengthy report from a Catholic publication about the condition of the refugee population in Tripoli.  Some refugees were already approved to be resettled in Canada before what Catholic leaders say was a rash decision by the US and allies to begin bombing Ghadafi.   Here is one interesting bit in this article that caught my eye.   Just like Human Rights First, here, the Canadian Council for Refugees wants an expedited process to get African refugees to Canada.

From The Tidings:

The Canadian Council for Refugees asked the Canadian government to work with other governments and international organizations to promote the evacuation and protection of all affected refugees. In addition, the council urged the government to include refugees with a pending application to Canada in the measures to evacuate Canadian citizens and to fast-track refugee and immigration applications to Canada from refugees affected by the Libyan crisis.

As I read the lengthy report, I was fearful I would read that we had to get American troops on the ground to escort the refugees to the border.  Thankfully I saw no mention of any such proposal. 

David Frum gets it mostly right

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

In his National Post opinion piece Frum* paints a dismal picture of what I think everyone can see—the newest refugee “crisis” coming out of the North African/Middle East turmoil.   What I was looking for, however, is any understanding that there are one-worlders (within the immigration industry) who see this crisis and chaos as a good time to advance their borderless world concept and will be using the “refugee crisis” to further destabilize European nations and as an excuse to BRING MORE REFUGEES TO THE UNITED STATES and to Frum’s home country of Canada. Islamists as well will see this as an opportunity to increase Muslim numbers in Western countries.

This is not going to be Europe’s burden (cross to bear!) alone!

Here is Frum at the National Post:

The turmoil in Arab North Africa is not only a political crisis: It could soon trigger a global migration crisis.

Already, 5,000 Tunisians have attempted to migrate to Italy since the collapse of the Ben Ali regime. The would-be migrants are being held on the Italian island of Lampedusa, while the Italian government decides what to do.

Italy’s foreign minister, Franco Frattini, has publicly worried that 300,000 Libyans might try to flee to Italy after a collapse of the Gaddafi regime. It is less than 200 miles by sea from the Libyan capital of Tripoli to Lampedusa.

Spain legalized 750,000 illegal immigrants in 2007. Unsurprisingly, that generous amnesty only summoned more illegal immigration.

The Arab and African populations are booming and there are literally millions of young men with nothing to do. (Cheerful read for a Saturday morning, isn’t it.)  But, I repeat, it will not be Europe’s problem alone.  Keep a watchful eye for the drumbeat to begin—waaahhhh! We need to bring the refugees to North America!  To Australia!   We have been hearing this cry for decades every time there is upheaval in the world.  I guarantee you it is already being discussed in the UN and in the US State Department!

The Arab world -especially the North African Arab world -is in turmoil because of the economic and political failure of Arab -and especially North African -governments.

Increasingly, the people of these societies look to migration as their solution.

Yet their solution is Europe’s problem. Voluntarily and involuntarily, Europe is now receiving 1.7 million immigrants a year -more than the United States. Europe’s immigrants come overwhelmingly from the Middle East and North Africa, and they are overwhelmingly Muslim in religion.

[…..]

These migrants do not usually arrive with the skills necessary to succeed in an advanced economy. They pool at the bottom of the labour force and often turn to crime or political extremism.

Unfortunately both for the immigrants and for the native-born, Europe’s generous welfare states offer the lowskilled an attractive alternative to work.

[…..]

Middle Eastern and North African populations are surging: Egypt is up from 20 million in 1950 to 80 million today. Two-thirds of all Arabs are under age 25. Some 80 million net new jobs are required over the next 15 years just to keep pace with the population explosion.

Read it all.  And, get ready!

*Learn more about David Frum here at wikipedia.  He has a distinguished career, however, note that most recently he helped organize that ridiculous “No Labels” political group that fizzled the day it was announced.

New York Times reports sob story on Virginia’s “anti-immigrant mood”

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

There is just one problem with this SOB STORY—the guy had no right to be in the US in the first place!

In typical fashion for the Leftwing media (see CBS rape story too), the New York Times left out a key fact in its bash Virginia story.  This is how the reporter sets up the reader (get out your box of tissues):

FALLS CHURCH, Va. — When Mohamed Mejri, a Tunisian immigrant with a limousine business here, first learned that the State Department of Motor Vehicles had refused to issue him a new driver’s license, he thought it was a mistake. After all, he had been a licensed driver in Virginia for years.

But last fall, the department stopped accepting his federally issued work permit, a document that was his main proof that he was in the country legally, because he does not have a green card.

Now, five months later, his business is collapsing, and bill collectors are calling.  [Are you crying yet?]

Remember the story where the drunk illegal alien killed a nun in Virginia (I posted it here), well, Virginia changed its policy (good for them) to make it harder for those in deportation proceedings to use a work permit as proof of address to get a drivers license.

Back to the NYT:

Virginia changed its policy in September after an illegal immigrant from Bolivia was charged with hitting and killing a nun while driving drunk in Prince William County.

Her death hardened what was already a strong anti-immigrant mood in the state. Virginia’s governor, Bob McDonnell, announced that work permits would no longer be accepted as proof of legal residence because they could be held by people who, like the Bolivian immigrant, are in deportation proceedings. The governor said other documents would still be accepted.

The permit, called the employment authorization document, allows foreign nationals to work in the United States. Asylum seekers, refugees and students are among those who have one.

Here is Mr. Mejri’s story as reported by the New York Times (emphasis mine).  Hey, NYT, is this the best story you could find?

For Mr. Mejri, who is 54, the permit is all he has. He fled Tunisia in 1992, and after living in Canada, where he had been granted political asylum, he came to the United States in 2000. American immigration authorities rejected his application for asylum, over an unpaid fine in Canada. By the time it was paid and processed, several years had passed, [sounds fishy to me–ed] and he received notice that it was too late to reapply. He then received an administrative order to leave the country, but a federal judge ruled in his favor that he not be deported [so why wasn’t his deportation order rescinded?–ed]. Now he is in limbo, in the country legally but without any path to citizenship.

You should be wailing for Mohamed by now!

But, here is the kicker!

You can’t be granted asylum in Canada and then just hop on over to the US and stay!   Heck, a Canadian citizen can’t just decide he wants to leave Canada and be an American citizen!  Asylum law requires that you ask (and hopefully receive) asylum in the first country in which you land.  Having been granted asylum in Canada doesn’t grant you the right to then go shopping for a better country!

Get ready Marylanders!  What has Mohamed done?  He set up a temporary residence in Maryland!

A month ago, Mr. Mejri rented a room in Rockville, Md., and got a driver’s license in that state. But his monthly insurance payments have tripled, and for now, he has put his business aside.

The way I see it, the worst thing that will happen to Mr. Mejri is he will be sent back to that horrible (LOL!) country Canada.  (I bet there is more to the story about the “fine” in Canada, he was probably going to be deported from Canada.)  But, most likely none of that will happen now that the New York Times has christened him a poster boy for Virginia’s “anti-immigrant mood.”

One last thing.  We don’t deport anyone to a country that has an unstable government and the recent revolution (oops democracy movement) in Tunisia will likely be his American lawyer’s ace in a hole.

Vancouver: Confirmation that Tamil Tigers were on the MV Sun Sea

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

This is an update of the story I first reported here last August.

Seems that investigators in Canada have identified at least 32 Tamil Tigers among the “asylum seekers” who arrived in Canadian waters claiming to be refugees last summer.

From the National Post:

A fog bank cloaked the MV Sun Sea when it entered Canadian waters off Vancouver Island last August carrying 492 Sri Lankan asylum seekers.

Six month later, things are more clear.

Federal investigators have been interviewing those on board and chasing leads in Southeast Asia. The passengers have been telling their stories at refugee hearings and in court.

The evidence is shedding new light on the bold migrant smuggling operation that has cost taxpayers $25-million and led the government to draft a new anti-human smuggling law.

“At this time, the majority have declared that they wish only to live peacefully in Canada with the hope of eventually sponsoring other family members,” reads a Canada Border Services Agency analysis of interviews with the Sun Sea migrants.

But the investigation has also identified 32 so far with suspected ties to the Tamil Tigers rebels, organized crime and war crimes. Also on the ship were “prominent figures” who played “primary roles in the smuggling venture,” the CBSA report says.

Read on, its a very interesting report.

Think this doesn’t effect you in the US, think again, we have actually resettled Tamil “bachelors” to Oakland, CA who managed to get to Australia and we (helpfully) took them off the Aussie’s hands!

Edmonton: Clan and drug violence responsible for so many Somali “kids” in body bags

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Just the other day we reported that clan disputes were creeping into American cities where Somalis have congregated in large numbers.  In one of Canada’s most concentrated Somali communities, murders of young Somalis are worrying Somalis and the police:

From the Toronto Sun:

EDMONTON — When 23-year-old Mohammed Jama was shot to death in front of horrified onlookers at a restaurant on New Year’s Eve, he became the 11th young man from Edmonton’s Somali community to die in a hail of gunfire in less than 30 months.

Cops say that most of the victims had some kind of tie to the drug trade. Many moved to Edmonton from Toronto within the last few years.

The body count has horrified the city and sent ripples of fear, dread and anger through the city’s rapidly-growing Somali community.

Its 14,000 members make up the largest Somali-Canadian community outside of southern Ontario and the largest African community in Edmonton.

[….]

…. it’s even more complex for struggling new Somali families, Abdullahi says, because too often the parents bring their homeland’s clan rivalries with them.

“People from one group have nothing to do with another,” he says. Abdullahi says there are at least five different Somali cultural associations in the city and they’re all rivals.