Category: Other refugees

Good summary of the Bhutanese situation

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

We have written about the Bhutanese refugees on many many occasions and this article has nothing new.  However, I am posting it because it is a good summary of what the situation is at a time when some of you have Bhutanese refugees coming into your communities.    Also, some of our newest readers may be unfamiliar with the fact that the US will be bringing 60,000 refugees from camps in Nepal over the next few years.

According to the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Nepal, seven western governments — the United States, the Netherlands, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Norway and Denmark — have offered to resettle nearly 90 thousand refugees.

The United States said it was ready to pick up 60,000 initially, followed by as many as wishing, in the next five years.

That last sentence is a little confusing because our Presidential determination for FY 2008 has set the ceiling for the total number of refugees from around the world at 80,000.  It is extremely unlikely that 60,000 would come from one country alone.

Please read the article because you should know that some Bhutanese do not want to be sent to another country and it has caused conflicts in the camps and splits in families as well.

Weighing the merits: gorillas vs. refugees. What happens when two leftwing causes conflict?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Today I came across an article about threats to UN designated World Heritage Areas.   By the way, World Heritage area designation is a way for the United Nations to begin to have a say about land use in sovereign nations.    You should know we have some in the US too.  Maybe you live in one and don’t even know it.  But, that is another story.

The article that caught my interest said that a gorilla preserve,Virunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo, is threatened by refugees. 

Virunga National Park has been on the list of World Heritage sites in danger since 1994. It faces threats from refugees, who set up home in the park, armed militia, and continued poaching and deforestation, particularly for fuel and illegal charcoal production.

In 2007, 11 gorillas were slaughtered in Virunga, out of the 750 that remain in the wild. A joint monitoring mission by IUCN and UNESCO was organized.

I don’t know if it will work, but frankly I was surprised to find a sensible (although short term) solution.  The World Wildife Fund with Bruce Babbitt as chairman of the board ( Do you remember him?) is helping to create tree plantations and purchase wood for the refugees so that they will not have to enter the park.   You can read about it here.

Here in the US, the subject of immigrants and the environment has caused a rift in major environmental groups with some members complaining that large numbers of immigrants will put a strain on our natural resources.  (Yes, they will.)  Fearful of veering from their leftwing roots (and annoying their leftist sugar daddies), most major environmental groups will not touch the immigration issue at all even in light of the obvious destruction of natural areas traversed by the illegals flowing in from Mexico.

International Organization for Migration office bombed in Nepal

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update, later in the day:  The IOM and two UN agencies including the High Commisioner for Refugees today said they would suspend all aid to refugees if intimidation continues.  I’m wondering if harming all innocent refugees makes any sense.

Why would anyone want to bomb the IOM office— because as we scatter the Bhutanese to the four winds there are elements within the refugee camps that don’t want this to happen.   If we scoop up a promised 60,000 Bhutanese who are of Nepali origin (but Nepal doesn’t want them), the chances of their returning to Bhutan as a political force are diminished.

Kathmandu – At least two crude bombs exploded in the office compounds of the International Organization of Migration (IOM) in eastern Nepal, causing panic but no injuries, media reports said Tuesday. The bombs were hurled at the IOM office compound in the town of Damak, about 450 kilometres east of the Nepalese capital Kathmandu, on Monday evening, the Kathmandu Post newspaper reported.

The IOM is involved in third-country resettlement of Bhutanese refugees, which has been vehemently opposed by several political groups representing refugees.

The blast caused no human casualties, but highlighted growing security concerns for refugees favouring third-country resettlement.

Although no group has yet claimed responsibility for the blasts, Nepalese police said they suspected the involvement of underground groups operating inside the refugee camps, the newspaper said.

The underground groups, which include the militant Bhutan Communist Party – Marxist Leninist Maoist, had previously demanded a halt to the resettlement programme terming it “human trafficking.”

The group has also been accused of intimidating refugees against applying for resettlement.

Read the rest of the article here.

Don’t get me wrong, I sure don’t condone what these Marxist groups are doing (if they are the perpetrators), but they make one point that is close to the truth.  They say the refugees will just do menial labor for cheap wages in the US, but note they are using the more provacative term— “human trafficking.”  

For more information, use our search function for Bhutanese refugees, we have written extensively on this resettlement.

Campaign underway to bring North Korean refugees to the US

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

So far we have only brought a few North Korean refugees here, but the push is on.   I don’t have anything definitive, but it’s just like the Rohingya situation, one starts to hear the faint drumbeats that the US MUST save another beleaguered group. 

This is from something called MyDD (direct democracy) which I confess is a political blog I had never heard of:

This is a terrible situation [Editor: aren’t they all?]. Surely, the United States has it in our hearts to provide some kind of help to North Koreans living as refugees in China.

North Korea pays China a bounty of around $300 for each North Korean caught and returned to North Korea. Returned escapees will typically be prosecuted, then imprisoned, or, if it is their third attempt, summarily executed, for the crime of betraying the fatherland by leaving.

Surely the US could match that $300 [Editor: can you see it now, a bidding war with North Korea to benefit the Chinese] and provide a new start for North Korean refugees somewhere in the US, where they would be happy to get a new start. Many have led terrible lives and they are also discriminated against in South Korea.

And then this:

They need a safe place they can go and live in peace.

Why the heck should the South Koreans discriminate against their cultural kin.  South Korea is a peaceful prosperous country and if they are a friend of ours, we should tell them to take in their own people! 

Besides, a reader tells me (but I haven’t researched it yet) that there is a shortage of marriageable men for South Korean women and that they are importing Thais for husbands (oh brother!).

Not much news coming out of South Africa

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

You would hardly know that South Africa’s grand experiment in multiculturalism, the “rainbow nation” myth, exploded a month or so ago.   It’s hard to find news to update our readers on the violence that erupted throughout the country—violence against refugees and asylees who local South African blacks claim are taking their jobs and bringing crime with them—that killed scores and caused the creation of makeshift refugee camps.

Here is a small portion of an ‘opinion’ piece from a universtiy professor discussing a report released for World Refugee Day last week.

First, the recent violence is but an extreme sign of how non-nationals are treated as ‘outsiders’ by various elements of South African society, from members of the public, to civil servants, service providers, and government leaders. This report outlines many of the ways non-nationals — refugees, asylum seekers, and other immigrants — are excluded from the services, welfare, and dignity they are guaranteed by South African law and Constitutional commitments.

Second, while South Africa must improve its policing practices and promote tolerance, it must also revisit and fundamentally revise the way it manages migration from the region and further afield. Let us be clear, halting migration is neither possible nor a solution. Are we prepared to follow the United State and Europe in their fruitless, deadly, and hypocritical efforts to halt immigration?

South Africa already deports close to 300 000 people a year. How much further are we willing to go? How can we speak in one breath of promoting tolerance and barricading our borders? Doing so only confirms many South African’s deep suspicion that migrants truly are a mortal threat to South African society. Yes, stop corrupt officials and criminals, but let us not further demonise and criminalise our neighbours.

The gratuitous attack on the United States was laughable especially the hypocrisy charge I’ve highlighted because we aren’t running around calling ourselves the “rainbow nation” and according to all the figures I could find we deport 200,000 illegal immigrants a year.    That figure puts tiny South Africa about 100,000 deportations ahead of us!

Oh, and as for the “deadly” part, professor,  I don’t recall any riots in the US where immigrants were targeted by mobs of citizens and beaten or set on fire.  Last I saw the South African asylee and refugee death toll was around 60.