magnumpi

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/amp.cnn....tes/index.html

From a safe country to another safe country? Huh, and Canada lets this happen !!

RCMP intercepted almost 7,000 asylum seekers in the last six weeks in Quebec. 3,000 of those were in July, RCMP says, and almost 4,000 in just the first half of August.

Canadian police wait patiently on the other side. They warn anyone who approaches that what they're about to do is illegal, that they'll be arrested.

But that's the first step. Once arrested, the thousands of asylum seekers who have made this journey across to Quebec in the past few weeks, can apply for asylum in Canada. He hopes that would mean a chance at uniting with his family that remains in Haiti after 17 years apart. Then, he hopes, his family could apply to for asylum to become Canadian residents too.

dbd33

America isn't a safe country for Haitians. They're not refugees but people given temporary accommodation due to disaster and their temporary status is expiring.

magnumpi

Not all are that is just an example:

https://www.google.ca/amp/www.cbc.ca/amp/1.4257696

It appears that Canada is bound by the Safe Third Country Agreement, which mandates that refugees must claim asylum in the first safe country on which they land. Asylum seekers who first landed in the U.S. must be sent back there if they attempt to enter Canada through an official point of entry — except these asylum-seekers are crossing into Canada illegally, meaning the Safe Third Country Agreement does not apply.

Oakvillian

You are presumably aware of why there's a flood of Haitians crossing the border into Quebec?

It's almost entirely because refugees from the 2010 earthquake, whose homes and communities were largely destroyed, had "enjoyed" TPS (temporarily protected status) in the USA until now. In May of this year, on instruction from the current Federal administration, that protected status was renewed only for a further 6 months and the advice was given to Haitians that they should prepare to leave the country voluntarily or expect to be deported.

What would you do in those circumstances? There's already a significant Haitian expat community in Montreal and across Quebec. There's not a significant language barrier. There's no realistic prospect of returning to Haiti, where the infrastructure has not adequately recovered from the earthquake in 2010 and Hurricane Matthew last year. If Trump is throwing them out of the US, where else are they supposed to go?

magnumpi

What a mess !

Trump really is an ass regarding the Haitian situation

BristolUK

I noticed you'd been a little quiet on the Trump front of late.

magnumpi

Ha ha I was just sitting back and watching the US implode

Former Lancastrian

Well here is conundrum that Canada is facing. The Haitians that arrived in the USA were not fleeing fear of persecution, reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion. Many have been in the USA for several years under the TPS which they knew was temporary and would have to eventually to return to Haiti.

Now the TPS is under threat to be lifted by Mr Trump which also applies to thousands of other South/Central American citizens guess what Canada is now the potential destination for these people who are fearing that they will be sent back to these countries.

Can the Haitians make a claim for protection in Canada? Yes they can.
Will they be accepted as refugees/protected person within Canada? To be determined by a member of the Refugee Protection Division.
Can they appeal a negative decision? Yes they can.
Can they be removed back to Haiti? Yes they can.

The big question is how many will be found to be in need of protection as at the current moment the acceptance rate of claimants from Haiti is around 50%.

Unfortunately the state of a country is in after a national disaster are not grounds to make a claim for protection.

So if found not to be a refugee then what does Canada do with them? Keep them or return them to Haiti?

plasticcanuck

The last four words of your statement are redundant.

magnumpi

So what would happen if a temp worker in Canada, believing their visa may be refused, or someone on a 6 month stay decides to go to the USA, but rather than cross at the border, where a normal immigrant would cross, goes across the opposite direction to the Haitians ?

Would the US take them in and make a camp, give them food and $$ and say welcome to America ?

not2old

Meanwhile (in the news) the Haitian born-Canadian MP from Quebec, Emmanuel Dubourg travels to Miami to explain the situation. Duh!

http://nationalpost.com/news/politic...asylum-seekers

dbd33

It doesn't matter. If Donnie sticks his head in the gas oven, are you going to stick your head in the gas oven? What Trump's America does is no guide to what anyone else should do.

That said, if the competent authority finds someone not to be a refugee and the appeal fails, Canada has to send that person back to whichever country they came from. If people don't go back at the end of a temporary protection arrangement, it'll be politically very hard to ever have another similar program for another disaster.

magnumpi

That can take years n years with many appeals, meanwhile !

If these people came across at a border they would be sent straight back to the US, why don't Canada just do the same wherever people cross, legally or illegally

Yorkiechef

Because when playing monopoly, you go around the board clockwise, they are the rules.

Shard

Any estimates of how many temporary status Haitians there are in the US? Maybe Canada/Quebec could absorb them.