Wholesale movement of Bhutanese refugees to US to end (so they say!)

11/19/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

But, the UN still has 8,500 more to go to completely clean out their camps in Nepal.

The other day I mentioned that the US under Obama committed to helping the UN clean out some of its African camps of the people from the DR Congo and I predicted the resettlement would go way beyond the 50,000 (over 5 years).

After all, the US State Department has a track record….

Sauerbrey with UN ceil — Bush Asst. Sec. of State for PRM, stunned the UN in the fall of 2006 with news that the US would lead in cleaning out the camps.

New readers may not know that in 2006, the Bush Administration said, oh sure, we will take 60,000 over 5 years of the displaced ‘Bhutanese’ (really people of Nepali origin) living in UN camps in Nepal.

Never mind that we had no strategic interest and no responsibility for the Bhutan/Nepal quarrel.

The mostly Hindu ‘Bhutanese’ ended up in camps in Nepal when the country of Bhutan said they wanted only their people in their country (formerly known as Shangri-La). Nepal refused to take in its people flooding out of Bhutan causing the UN to build camps.

So, I presume looking for more docile third world workers, George W. Bush said sure!

We were only supposed to take 60,000 over five years. But guess what?

We are now up to 94,473 (2,000 more are being processed) in nearly ten years!

I’m telling you, once the spigot opens, closing it becomes almost impossible! Just look at the Somalis who we have been admitting for 30 years!

From Kathmandu Post:

Nov 19, 2017-As the decade-long third country resettlement programme of the Bhutanese refugees living in eastern Nepal draws to a close, the fate of the those still in the camps hangs in the balance.

The Ministry of Home Affairs (MoHA) and the UN refugee agency in Kathmandu confirmed that the third country resettlement scheme is closing down after the last batch of refugees leaves by the end of December.

Currently there are around 8,500 refugees in the camps in Jhapa district but both sides—Nepal government and the UNHCR—have yet to find alternatives for them.

There was pressure on Nepal government to locally assimilate the refugees in Nepal, but Kathmandu has been constantly saying that these refugees should be repatriated to Bhutan.

[….]

Screenshot (1103)_LI — LOL! So much for sharing in the responsibility with 7 other countries! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhutanese_refugees

Nearly nine out of 10 Bhutanese refugees (90 percent) have been resettled since the launch of the third country resettlement programme in 2007, with nearly 111,000 refugees resettled in eight different countries. “Globally, far less than 1 percent of refugees are resettled. Thus, the resettlement programme for Bhutanese refugees in Nepal is truly exceptional,” the office said. The UNHCR, together with the international community, is working closely with the government of Nepal to find solutions for the remaining refugees, the UNHCR added. According to the UN office, with nearly 111,000 refugees resettled in third countries and only 8,500 of them remaining in Nepal, the opportunities to achieve durable solutions at this juncture are great.

[In 2006 we were told there were 100,000 that needed to be spread around the world, but see now they are up to nearly 120,000. Where did the extra 20,000 come from? Wandering in from the neighborhood?—ed]

[….]

Quick facts

Approximately 120,000 Bhutanese fled from their country and arrived in Nepal to become refugees from Bhutan in the early 1990s

They were lodged in several camps in Jhapa in eastern Nepal

The third country resettlement programme was launched in 2007

In the last one decade, nearly 111,000 refugees from Bhutan have been settled in various western countries, with the US alone receiving more than 90,000 of them

Nearly 2,000 refugees are currently undergoing screening process under the third country resettlement programme

The UN refugee agency says it is set to close down the third-country resettlement programme by early next

The last batch is likely to leave in December after which an estimated 8,500 Bhutanese refugees will remain in Nepal

More here.

For my extensive file on the Bhutanese resettlement to America, click here. You will see in early posts how hard the people fought to NOT be distributed around the world.

And, if you want to know how many your state ‘welcomed’ here is a map today at Wrapsnet.

Screenshot (1100)

Screenshot (1101)_LI — Top ‘welcoming’ states are Pennsylvania, Ohio and Texas (making sure those states turn reliably blue, so dark blue you can’t read the numbers on the map!)

Add one more to the list of countries whose nationals can stay in the US forever—Nepal

07/03/2015 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

The Temporary Protected Status (TPS) category, a legal immigration program, is anything but temporary. The Obama Administration has just added Nepal to its list of countries whose citizens can stay as temporary refugees, work (and probably vote!) here forever because the temporary designation is simply extended every time it expires.

I say this repeatedly, but when your friends (or your Member of Congress) says legal immigration is good, remember TPS and know that they don’t know what they are talking about.

“Temporary” refugees from Nepal will send US dollars back to rebuild the country after the April earthquake. Photo: http://time.com/3928685/nepal-earthquake-recovery-donors-food-rice/

The gist of it is that we would be considered bad people if we sent nationals back to their home country in the middle of a crisis, but the problem is that ten years or more after the crisis is long over, we simply extend their stay as they wait for the Obama/Republican amnesty. The temporary designation is a sham!
From NBC News:

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has granted Nepal Temporary Protected Status (TPS) under the Immigration and Nationality Act following the devastation of the massive 7.8-magnitude earthquake of April 25 and subsequent earthquakes and aftershocks which are estimated to have killed over 5,200 people, injured more than 12,500 people, and displaced approximately 2.8 million people.

This designation will allow approximately 10,000 to 25,000 Nepali nationals currently in the United States to stay and to work until December 2016, even if their visas expire, without threat of being detained or deported.

They will be permitted to send money out of the country (called remittances) which is a drain on OUR economy! In 2012, $123,273,000,000 left the US via remittances to the third world. The next time you see one of those studies being promoted by the likes of ‘Welcoming America’ about how immigrants boost the local economy, ask if they included remittances leaving America in their study!

In addition to safety concerns, being authorized to work in the United States will allow Nepali nationals to work and send money back to Nepal to help the country rebuild.

Other countries which have been granted TPS in the past due to ongoing armed conflict, environmental disasters, and other extraordinary conditions include Haiti, Honduras, El Salvador, and Syria.

More at NBC here.
By the way, I heard recently that there are up to 25,000 Syrians in the US eligible to stay under TPS.

For a laugh, check this out: Hondurans were given TPS in 1999! Salvadorans in 2001 and Haitians in 2011. So much for TEMPORARY!

There is an application in for Yemen too!

Writer: Bhutanese ‘third country resettlement’ sets a bad precedent

01/08/2013 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Joseph Mathew (or is it Mathew Joseph?) writing at the International Business Times has penned an interesting article giving us the background on why the people of Nepali origin were expelled from Bhutan which led to the US (under the Bush Administration and continuing into today) taking tens of thousands of those expelled people to America over the last five years. Here is just one recent post about Bhutanese/Nepali people coming here en masse.

Below are my excerpts from the article by Mr. Mathew:

The long pending issue of the repatriation of Bhutanese refugees of Nepali origin, who were housed in the UNHCR-sponsored refugee camps in the eastern Nepal districts of Morang and Jhapa since early 1990s, was “resolved” to many by the Third Country Resettlement proposal put forth and being carried out by countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark and the Netherlands. As of now, a sizable section of the refugees have been resettled in these countries, with a majority of them now living in the United States.

These Bhutanese refugees of Nepali origin were expelled from Bhutan in the early 1990s as a result of the state sponsored Bhutanization drive epitomized in the promulgation of “Driglam Nam Za” (code of social etiquette) in 1989, which stipulated strict controls over the people of Nepali origin who inhabited the southern districts of Bhutan.

The author explains that the ruling class in Bhutan feared the growth of the population of people of Nepali origin.

A growth in the number of the people of Nepali origin and their cultural distinctiveness from the ruling elite became a cause of worry for them. The heightened political consciousness among the people of Nepali origin compounded the fears of the Ngalong ruling elite.

Several times Mr. Mathew implies that the ruling class fears of being eventually taken over demographically by the Nepali people and losing control of their government was an irrational fear. I do remember when I first wrote about the Bhutanese years ago that there was mention of the Maoists agitating within this expelled population. I don’t know if that is so, but that might have been behind some of the intransigence of Bhutan’s government. Yes, I found it! here is the news story that reported Maoists in the camps.

Mathew continues:

In the last 20 years, Bhutan has undergone many changes including transforming herself from an absolute monarchy to a constitutional monarchy and became a “democracy” from above. However, while undergoing these changes Bhutan has not changed a bit her policy towards the repatriation of the refugee population located in the UNHCR camps in eastern Nepal. On the contrary, it has created many hurdles in the process of resolving the refugee problem amicably despite the efforts of Nepal.

Frankly folks, I have never understood why Nepal didn’t want its own ethnic people back!

So why did the US get into this squabble?

I have no answer to that. Discerning readers at this point are likely asking—why is it the business of the US to resolve a dispute involving Bhutan and Nepal and to a lesser degree India? Why is this in our national interest?

The only answer I have is this—that open-borders agitators wanted more immigrants, more Democrat voters, more people in need of Social Services, more cheap (captive because they can’t go home!) laborers in meatpacking plants and other low-wage industries.

And, then writer Mathew brings up the downside of this wholesale dispersal of a population to the four winds. He notes that with this UN push to resolve the issue, we helped let Bhutan, Nepal and India get off the hook. Consequently they didn’t have to come up with a solution that might have led to repatriation (or their resettlement in their original home country of Nepal!).

The diplomatic deadlock between Nepal and Bhutan and India’s non-involvement in resolving the problem created the opportunity for the international community to step in. The context of the proposal of the Third Country Resettlement is that. The proposal for Third Country Resettlement came as a blessing in disguise for Bhutan, Nepal and India as it will definitely ‘resolve’ the refugee problem without affecting their interests and concerns. For many refugees, mainly young people, it offered new opportunity in rebuilding their lives, though the older lot among them was not in agreement with this thinking. The socio-psychological impact of the Third Country Resettlement on the Bhutanese refugees is something to be visible in the course of time.

We have already seen some of the psychological impact with the high suicide rate of Bhutanese here in the US.

The decision to move this entire “refugee” population and not resolve it between the countries involved will have “serious implications” for the future resolution of similar problems around the world:

The proposal for Third Country Resettlement in effect, in this particular case, turned out to be a rejection of the right of repatriation of the refugees. This is going to have serious implications for the resolution of various refugee issues pertaining to different regions of the world. International community, instead of making arrangements for Third Country Resettlement, must put pressure on the concerned parties to facilitate the process of repatriation for the resolution of refugee problems. As far as refugee problems are concerned, repatriation not Third Country Resettlement is the only meaningful solution. [Agreed!—ed]

US exceeds original goal—admits over 60,000 “Bhutanese refugees” since 2007

12/14/2012 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Nevermind that the “refugees” are not Bhutanese, but in fact are Nepalis. They are originally from Nepal, had settled in Bhutan (probably illegally) and then Bhutan gave them the boot (wanting to keep Bhutan for true Bhutanese). Nepal, not an evil terrorist country, didn’t want their kinsmen back, so they lived in camps and the UN and the US State Department under George Bush said, what the heck we’ll take 60,000.

Remember Bush is an Open Borders guy and I suspect, although soft-hearted on immigrants generally, was largely driven by financial backers looking for cheap labor. Think about it, with captive LEGAL refugee laborers, big businesses keep wages low and their employees are additionally supported through taxpayer-funded “social services” to bring their living standards up (since their wages won’t do it alone). What a racket! (But, I’m digressing).

We have followed this story from its earliest days when the “refugees” proclaimed that they didn’t want to be resettled and dispersed around the world (Let us live together here with our brothers and sisters), but wanted to work things out with Bhutan and Nepal. Why we ever got into this squabble between neighbors is beyond me, but it was Bush’s then Asst. Secretary of State for Population, Refugees and Migration who ultimately gave the green light, here. And, just as I said in my previous post about TPS, these really are economic migrants, they aren’t people being persecuted in their home country.

Now, the UN (which loves moving people around the world) is celebrating that they have dispersed 75,000 economic migrants to mostly the US. The story I’m posting below is confusing but it appears that we have now resettled 63,400. As recently as September the number was 60,000, here. I’ll bet you a buck this isn’t the final number!

December 13 2012, Kathmandu Nepal: Claiming to have resettled around 75,000 Bhutanese refugees from Nepal, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) confirmed the number in a joint statement. Under one of the largest and successful resettlement programs, more than 63,400 refugees were resettled in United States, 3,837 in Australia, 5,296 in Canada, 724 in Denmark, 710 in New Zealand, 326 in Netherlands, 546 Norway, and 257 in United Kingdom where Yagandra Kami a six year old boy became the 75,000 refugee to be part of major resettlement program. The Program was launched in November 2007.

Stephane Jaquemet, UNHCR Representative in Nepal said, ““This is a tremendous achievement, where we have successfully placed 75,000th Bhutanese refugee from Nepal to the United States [75,000th to US?—-ed] on Wednesday for the third country settlement. It has only been possible due to the incredible generosity of the resettlement countries, the resilience of the refugees, the great support of the Government of Nepal, and the exemplary partnership with IOM.”

[…..]

The Bhutanese ethnic cleansing took place in early 1990s, where hundreds of thousand Nepali origin Bhutanese were forced for exile. [It would be like us sending Mexicans back to Mexico, and Mexico rejecting them—ed] They were forced to be limited in overcrowded refugee camps in eastern Nepal with no progress toward a resolution of their plight. Many rounds of bilateral talks between the governments of Nepal and Bhutan could not resolve the issue. [Why didn’t we just tell Nepal to repatriate its own people!–ed]

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well as binding international treaties signed by Bhutan, ensures the right of the refugees to return to their country. During this long period of exile, however, Bhutan has not allowed a single refugee back. In midst of that the US and other supporting agencies started the resettlement program which has led in ensuring at least a quality of life for the refugee.

Quality of life? Just now I was looking back at reports of all the problems the mostly Buddhist Bhutanese have experienced in America. Yes, my critics will tell me many others are doing just fine. One post is about a Baltimore murder of a Bhutanese refugee, here. And in that post I said this:

I just typed ‘Bhutanese murdered’ into the search function here at RRW and up came this archive of all the problems the Bhutanese are experiencing—others murdered, one killed by an abortion doctor, inner city beatings, suicides, and the list goes on.