Canada rejected humanitarian bids to stay in the country at a much higher level during the pandemic. Critics want to know why

2021/07/17 Leave a comment

Would be interesting to know the reasons for the increased rejections and how IRCC was able to process more bids when every other program declined:

Despite the processing of immigration applications being scaled back during the pandemic, Canada dramatically increased the number of bids it rejected from those seeking to stay in this country on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

Unlike other immigration programs, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada actually finalized more applications under the so-called H&C category in the last year than in 2019.

In 2020, officials processed 8,735 H&C applications, 900 more than the year before COVID-19 was declared a global health crisis, prompting border closures and travel restrictions, and stalling immigration operations.

However, last year’s refusal rate reached a five-year high of 57 per cent, up from 35 per cent in 2019. In the first quarter of 2021, 70 per cent of the H&C applications were refused.

In general, prospective migrants must apply for permanent residence from outside Canada but those already inside the country and out of status as overstayed visitors and workers or failed refugees can ask for special permission to acquire permanent status if they can provide proof of establishment in Canada or undue hardship upon removal from the country.

“With these historic rejection rates, the federal government is condemning those migrants already here, and working in the most precarious situations to further insecurity and deportation,” Syed Hussan of the Migrant Rights Network told a news conference Tuesday.

“By doubling rejections, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is doubling the potential for exploitation.”

With the myriad programs to bring in temporary residents such as international students and migrant workers, Hussan said migrants can easily fall through the cracks and become undocumented and the H&C is the only way for them to access permanent status in Canada.

During the pandemic, the immigration department has focused on transitioning temporary residents in Canada into permanent residents. In May, it opened new immigration pathways to 90,000 international graduates and essential workers, but undocumented migrants were ineligible.

“We need comprehensive not piecemeal change, that is to ensure full and permanent immigration status for all migrants, including undocumented people in the country,” said Hussan, who estimated there are half a million of non-status migrants in Canada.

“To avoid facing the same crisis in the future, ensure that all residents that arrive in the future do so with permanent resident status.”

Hussan said it’s not known what has led to the skyrocketing refusals against H&C applicants because there have been no policy changes as to how these applications are processed.

“The Liberal government must provide answers to why there is such a significant jump in H&C refusals and take immediate action to rectify this,” said NDP immigration critic Jenny Kwan, who obtained the data.

Applicants from the Philippines and India were the most overrepresented groups under the humanitarian program, with refusal rates hovering at 72 per cent and 75 per cent respectively.

“It’s long past time that Canada returns to an immigration system that honours the contributions of all workers with a full range of diverse skills and occupations with landed status on arrival,” Kwan said. “A regularized immigration stream for migrant workers is the only way to ensure workers’ rights are respected.”

Queen Gabriel was among those whose humanitarian application was refused last year. The 39-year-old Trinidadian woman arrived in Canada on a visitor visa in 2013 and has worked as a personal support worker even though she is without status in Canada.

She said precarious immigration status puts migrants like her at risk to exploitation at work places. She said she was made to work 400 hours a month for more than two years and the employer refused to pay overtime and vacation. She couldn’t even travel for her father’s funeral or bury her brother, who died last year.

Ottawa introduced a time-limited “Guardian Angel” immigration program in December to eligible asylum seekers who work in Canadian health care. However, Gabriel did not qualify because she’s never made an asylum claim here.

Three years ago, she needed to be admitted to a hospital emergency department for a gynecological surgery and the medical bill was more than $8,000. She still owes the doctor $5,000.

“There’s no living without status in Canada. There’s only existing dead end jobs for survival,” she told the Tuesday news conference. “Landed status to all is necessary, especially when the immigration process is slowly choking the life out of us.”

The Migrant Rights Network is calling on the federal government to implement a “regularization” program to grant permanent status to all temporary residents currently in Canada.

“It is not a gift or a privilege,” Hussan said. “It is the only existing mechanism for migrants to access the same rights as other residents of the country.”

Source: Canada rejected humanitarian bids to stay in the country at a much higher level during the pandemic. Critics want to know why

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Black Canadians more likely to be hesitant about COVID-19 vaccines, survey suggests

2021/07/17 Leave a comment

Not just governments but governments do have a role in reducing economic barriers to vaccination (paid time off work etc). Access has become less of an issue given pop-up and other clinics, compared to earlier periods when it was more significant:

Black Canadian leaders say governments must do more to help overcome vaccine hesitancy in their communities.

Toronto orthopedic surgeon Dr. Ato Sekyi-Otu, leader of the health-care task force of the Black Opportunity Fund, says a new survey confirms unpublished public health data that hesitancy is higher among Black Canadians than among white or non-Black racialized people.

“There’s a 20-point gap with respect to the rate of vaccination in Black Canadians compared to the Canadian average,” Sekyi-Otu said in an interview. “When you look at vaccine confidence, unvaccinated Black Canadians are least likely to say that they’ll definitely get the vaccine.”

Sekyi-Otu said the Black Opportunity Fund partnered with the African Canadian Civic Engagement Council and the Innovative Research Group to try to understand why Black Canadians appeared to be getting vaccinated in lower numbers.

The survey found that as of early June, when more than 60 per cent of Canadians had received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, 45 per cent of Black Canadians surveyed said they were at least partially vaccinated, compared with 65 per cent of white Canadians and 43 per cent of non-Black visible minorities.

Sixty per cent of Black Canadians surveyed who didn’t have at least one dose expressed some level of hesitancy to get vaccinated, compared with 55 per cent of white Canadians and 44 per cent of non-Black visible minorities.

The figures are in line with vaccination data in Toronto, where the neighbourhoods with the lowest vaccination rates also have some of the largest Black populations.

Dunia Nur, president of the African Canadian Civic Engagement Counsel based in Edmonton, said addressing hesitancy in Black communities will require “a variety of policy shifts” from government that take into consideration language needs, as well as differences in education and socio-economic disparities.

“These include investing in strategies that work with Black-led and Black-focused community organizations to address COVID-19 vaccine knowledge gaps and related trust barriers,” Nur said in a statement.

Black Canadians responding to the survey were less likely to be hesitant about vaccines if they trusted their health-care providers and the vaccine makers, could take paid time off work to get vaccinated, and were confident in where and how to go about getting a shot.

“When we talk about hesitancy, we speak about the ABCs,” said Sekyi-Otu. “I’m talking about access, belief and confidence.”

He said access is affected when Black Canadians are more likely to work in jobs where taking paid time away to be vaccinated is difficult or impossible. Belief in the vaccines can be eroded if you don’t trust the people providing the information about them, and confidence that the vaccines work is harmed when people who are already less trusting of the health-care system get mixed messages about vaccine safety and effectiveness.

“It’s not surprising that if someone has a bad experience with one institution, for example, criminal justice, when he or she is 19 years old, he or she may not want to take the vaccine in 2021 when he or she is 45 years old,” he said.

Sekyi-Oto says governments need to ensure that people can take time off work to be vaccinated and take immediate steps to provide culturally sensitive and appropriate delivery and education about vaccines in Black communities.

“You have to build a system where the people who are leading the system look like the people using the system,” he said. “And so we want to create a culturally sensitive system, engage with the community so that they can come up and take the vaccine.”

The survey is being released as the Public Health Agency of Canada reports new data showing COVID-19 death rates in the first eight months of the pandemic were highest in communities with lower incomes and higher visible minority populations.

The data is the latest report from the agency that outlines the inequities surrounding COVID-19 in Canada.

Source: Black Canadians more likely to be hesitant about COVID-19 vaccines, survey suggests

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Education minister under fire after introduction deleted from Ontario’s new Grade 9 math curriculum

2021/07/17 Leave a comment

Appears that the substantive aspects related to systemic barriers and inclusion remain while the ideologic reference to “non-Eurocentric mathematical knowledges” has been dropped. Much of math has non-European roots (numerals, algebra etc):

Premier Doug Ford’s government has deleted a preamble to Ontario’s new Grade 9 curriculum that said math “has been used to normalize racism and marginalization of non-Eurocentric mathematical knowledges.”

While the updated syllabus remains unchanged, introductory language for teachers was quietly edited earlier this week.

The modernized curriculum was introduced June 9 as the first step of ending the streaming of students so early in high school. That practice that has been tied to poor outcomes for Black and Indigenous youth.

As first reported by the Toronto Sun on Saturday, the Progressive Conservatives initially approved of a curriculum introduction that said “a decolonial, anti-racist approach to mathematics education makes visible its historical roots and social constructions.”

“Mathematics is often positioned as an objective and pure discipline,” said the preamble to the curriculum, which was made public last month.

“The Ontario Grade 9 mathematics curriculum emphasizes the need to recognize and challenge systems of power and privilege, both inside and outside the classroom, in order to eliminate systemic barriers and to serve students belonging to groups that have been historically disadvantaged and underserved in mathematics education.”

But within the past few days, that entire 124-word paragraph entitled “An equitable mathematics curriculum recognizes that mathematics can be subjective” was deleted.

Sources told the Star that “while the section referenced is not in the core curriculum taught to students, we revised it to ensure there is no confusion when it comes to making sure our students are being taught fundamental math concepts.”

“The curriculum did not change. It continues to educate on cultural understandings of math, of the history of these concepts, and attempts to advance that lens throughout the curriculum. What changed was language in the preamble only,” an official said.

In a statement Wednesday, Education Minister Stephen Lecce’s office said the Tories “ended streaming in the Grade 9 math curriculum — a system that disproportionately affected Black, racialized and Indigenous students — along with launching new and specialized supports to ensure these students graduate, enter post-secondary education and get good-paying jobs.”

But the new president of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation, which supports destreaming, said the education minister “needs to take responsibility” for the episode.

“It’s time for a mea culpa. If you make a mistake, you have to own up to it,” said Karen Littlewood, who took over the union’s presidency on June 22.

Littlewood said “it seems to be very reactionary” for Lecce to amend the language in the wake of media coverage.

“The preamble really sets the stage for the changes to the curriculum and why it was necessary,” she said.

Despite the editing, the lesson plan still addresses inequities in society.

The revised curriculum emphasizes “there are groups of students (for example, Indigenous students, Black students, students experiencing homelessness, students living in poverty, students with LGBTQ+ identities, and students with special education needs and disabilities) who continue to experience systemic barriers to accessing high-level instruction in and support with learning mathematics.”

“Systemic barriers, such as racism, implicit bias and other forms of discrimination, can result in inequitable academic and life outcomes, such as low confidence in one’s ability to learn mathematics, reduced rates of credit completion, and leaving the secondary school system prior to earning a diploma,” it states.

“Achieving equitable outcomes in mathematics for all students requires educators to be aware of and identify these barriers, as well as the ways in which they can overlap and intersect, which can compound their effect on student well-being, student success, and students’ experiences in the classroom and in the school,” it continues.

“Educators must not only know about these barriers, they must work actively and with urgency to address and remove them.”

Still, the New Democrats expressed concern about the deletion.

“The Grade 9 math program was changed specifically because Ontario had to finally recognize that the existing system treated Black, Indigenous and racialized students inequitably,” NDP MPPs Laura Mae Lindo (Kitchener Centre) and Marit Stiles (Davenport) said in a joint statement.

“It’s pretty clear we need more of an equity and anti-racism lens in schools, not less.”

Source: Education minister under fire after introduction deleted from Ontario’s new Grade 9 math curriculum

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Malaysian mothers fight government over ‘sexist’ citizenship law

2021/07/17 Leave a comment

Of note:

Former Malaysian squash champion Choong Wai Li has a cabinet full of trophies from the five years she played for her country, but if her son were to inherit her sporting talents he would not be able to represent the nation.

That is because Malaysia is one of 25 countries that do not give mothers and fathers equal rights to pass their nationality to their children.

Choong’s son Michael has his father’s Irish nationality and is considered a foreigner in Malaysia, the country they call home.

Along with five other Malaysian mothers, Choong has launched legal action against the government over “sexist and outdated” citizenship rules, which they say risk trapping women in abusive relationships and can leave children stateless.

Lawyers say a victory could have implications for tens of thousands of binational families and increase pressure on other countries to reform their own laws.

“I feel very betrayed after everything I’ve done for my country,” said Choong, once Malaysia’s top junior player.

“Malaysia is our home, but my son is living here as a foreigner,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

The problem arises when children are born overseas to Malaysian women with foreign spouses. Although Malaysian men can automatically confer citizenship to children born abroad, women do not enjoy the same right.

“It’s an embarrassment this situation still exists in 2021,” the women’s lawyer Joshua Andran said, adding that such laws could have tragic consequences.

Some women end up trapped in abusive marriages for fear they will lose custody of their children, while others may end up separated from their children if their marriages break down.

Andran said the pandemic had underlined the urgency of resolving the issue, with some mothers overseas unable to return home due to entry restrictions on foreign nationals – including their children.

“The law is the product of a patriarchal system,” he said. “The damage it’s causing these families is very significant.”

TIME FOR CHANGE

Choong has battled for years to get Malaysian nationality for Michael, now seven, who was born while the family was living in Hong Kong where she worked as a headhunter.

Although Malaysian women can apply for citizenship for children born overseas, decisions often take years and rejections are common.

“It’s time for change. We just want equal rights,” Choong said from Kuala Lumpur.

Children like Michael do not have the same rights to free education and healthcare as Malaysian children, and the pandemic has made it harder to renew visas.

Campaigners said school fees, health insurance and visa costs could create a serious financial burden for families.

This often deters women from returning home to raise their families, as does the fear that their children will have to leave the country once they are adults.

In May, the Malaysian government asked the High Court to throw out the women’s lawsuit, deeming it “frivolous”.

But the judge ruled it was an important issue and said the government must provide justification for the apparent discrimination.

The government, which is appealing the ruling, did not respond to a request for comment. The case is expected to be heard next month.

Campaign group Family Frontiers, also a plaintiff in the case, said the number of binational families was increasing every year and the law needed to catch up.

“It makes no sense for the government to make it so hard for professional women to return home at a time when the country is keen to reverse a brain drain,” said spokeswoman Chee Yoke Ling.

She said some of the cases they dealt with were “heart-wrenching”.

“Some women stay in very toxic marriages because they are so scared that if they leave then their children, not being Malaysian, won’t be able to come back with them.”

In cases where the father also cannot confer his nationality children have ended up stateless, leaving them very vulnerable, Chee said.

Stateless people are deprived of basic rights and often unable to access education, healthcare, jobs and housing.

CLOSED DOORS

Malaysian businesswoman Rekha Sen, another plaintiff in the case whose three children were born in neighbouring Thailand, was granted citizenship for one child, but not the others. No explanation was given.

Sen, who founded her jewellery company in Malaysia but lives in Bangkok, said her country risked losing a lot of working professionals by creating barriers to their return.

“Malaysia is home to me and I’ve always wanted to give back to my country, but I feel in many ways that door is now being closed to me.”

She said the pandemic had highlighted the harm caused by discriminatory citizenship laws, with some families left separated as countries restricted entry to non-nationals.

“COVID-19 has amplified the issue,” added Sen. “These laws really do cause distress.”

Six countries have similar rules to Malaysia including Barbados, Iraq and Liberia.

Another 18 – including Nepal, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia – do not let mothers confer citizenship to their children even if born in the country.

But the Global Campaign for Equal Nationality Rights said there was growing momentum to address the issue with more than 20 countries having amended discriminatory citizenship laws since 2003, although reforms were often partial.

The Malaysian mothers say the constitution’s provisions on citizenship violate Article 8 of the constitution, which bans gender discrimination, and are seeking a declaration that mothers can pass citizenship to children born overseas.

“This law has no place in 2021,” said Sen. “It’s archaic and makes no sense.”

Source: Malaysian mothers fight government over ‘sexist’ citizenship law

Filed under Citizenship Tagged with ,

‘We Can’t Take Immigrants for Granted’: Minister

2021/07/16 Leave a comment

Bit of an odd comment by the minister – “ranking immigrants one against the other” – given that the old point system and current Express Entry application process do just that. Or maybe he was simply trying to communicate an increased focus on lower-skilled essential workers.

But perhaps the massive draw earlier this year with minimal comprehensive ranking score of 75 suggests that the government’s objective in meeting this year’s target of 400,000 makes previous merit assessment approaches less important:

Minister Marco Mendicino has emphasized the need to modernize Canada’s immigration system so that future public health crises don’t threaten the economy the way COVID-19 has, though he was scant on details about how to achieve it.

Speaking at an online event on Friday organized by First Policy Response, Mendicino said bringing immigrants into the country is critical for the Canadian economy, while also recognizing the “contributions (of immigrants) that we took for granted before the pandemic.”

“We believe that we are an open country, an inclusive country, but our system needs to be transformed, needs to be modernized, so that it can accommodate the great demands that are placed on it,” he said.

Mendicino believes the $1 billion slated in the 2021 budget to “modernize and transform” the immigration system will lead “not only to better service…but to faster outcomes” for people trying to immigrate into the country. As he sees it, it is part of a “shift in the paradigm in the way we talk about immigration,” which should include getting rid of discriminatory practices like “ranking immigrants one against the other” – namely those considered low-skill versus those with higher qualifications.

“I think the pandemic has allowed us to really understand that each and every newcomer has something to contribute to our economy, to our communities and to our country,” the Minister said.

The government has taken some steps during the pandemic to continue some level of immigration. These have included writing new laws and policies to authorize entry based on “the needs of the economy;” the digitization of permanent residence and citizenship application processes; and the extension of permanent residence to immigrants already working in the country but lacking status through programs like the Essential Workers Pathway and the Guardian Angel programs, the latter of which allowed “asylum seekers to stay in Canada thanks to their contributions in hospitals and long-term care homes,” Mendicino said.

“We prioritized the needs of the economy. Immigration will create jobs, further opportunities and strengthen our long-term prosperity.”

But other than “investing in hiring additional people, introducing new technologies and putting in place policy flexibility,” there were few, if any, details on what will be done going forward to ensure immigrants don’t fall into precarious employment. Raju Mohandoss, one of the four panelists and the director of newcomer programs and services at WoodGreen Community Services, a settlement organization in Toronto, referred to these employments as “survival jobs.”

“When newcomers come – even qualified ones – they get into survival jobs that sustain them during a period when they are putting other things together and trying to access other services to integrate,” he said after the Minister had finished speaking and left. “But all these survival jobs are in the hospitality, retail, or manufacturing sectors…all of which are completely wiped out because of the pandemic situation.”

To his credit, before leaving, Mendicino had mentioned the importance of “making sure we protect (migrant workers’) rights” and “ensure that their workplaces are safe and healthy,” but he again failed to specify how this would be done.

He also made no mention of the precarious nature of most of those so-called “survival jobs.” And while he recognized that speaking of immigration must include a discussion on how to “attract people not only for the purposes of adding to our economy…but to protect that promise of Canada” as a welcoming, safe country, he gave no details on what will happen to people whose permanent residence applications are stuck in limbo or in a backlog, other than “keep the faith” and “we hear you.”

The four-member panel that followed Mendicino’s presentation, which consisted of immigration experts from various fields, failed to find the Minister’s announcement as much more than a self-congratulatory moment.

Rupa Banerjee is the Canada Research Chair and Associate Professor at the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson. She said that while she agreed with Mendicino that “a lot of news early in the pandemic really [was] quicker” than what is expected from governments, little work has been done to help newcomers integrate into society.

Mendicino “talked about selection and modernization,” she said, “but, at the end of the day, those do not exist in a vacuum…Newcomers face challenges once they arrive in Canada, and those challenges need to be integrated into the selection system as well.”

What is needed immediately in order to help newcomers, added Mohandoss, are dollars. While the $1 billion investment is “good to hear,” Mohandoss stressed that “no new dollars” have been made available for settlement agencies, which are crucial in helping newcomers find, understand and access available resources. According to him, there hasn’t been any investment in the settlement agencies sector for “more than a decade and a half.”

“We have these targets – that’s great – but what happens to (newcomers) when they’re here?” he said. “Unless we’re improving settlement services, these people are going to continue to struggle being here…So, dollar investments in digitizing and innovating stops short of investing in settlement services.”

Much of the rest of the conversation between the panelists involved discussing what they saw as Canada’s “two-tier immigration system,” referring to the premium the government puts on the Canadian Experience Class versus so-called “low-skill” immigrants. The result, said Shamira Madhany, World Education Services’ managing director, is that Canada ends up “with a lot of people who come to Canada through the two-tiered system but don’t grow our economy” as their experience abroad is discounted and thus often goes underutilized, forcing them onto precarious so-called survival jobs.

“Even with pathways to permanent residence, people still struggle greatly after transition,” added Banerjee.

Madhany suggested a three-pronged approach to help boost the economy by properly utilizing newcomers’ experiences and skills as they integrate without having to sacrifice their safety: a national strategy to enhance immigration and labour market integration; policies that are intentionally passed with those who are “impacted greatly” in mind, such as racialized women and people relegated to low-wage labour; and developing innovative tools and approaches to recognize and assess skills and experience gained abroad.

“We need to think about being intentional about leveraging the skills people bring,” she said. “This isn’t just about bringing people in and taking any job…but using people’s deep experience.”

Source: https://ca.news.yahoo.com/t-immigrants-granted-minister-185607613.html

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#Citizenship for sale: fugitives, politicians and disgraced businesspeople buying Vanuatu passports

2021/07/16 Leave a comment

No surprises here:

A controversial “golden passports” scheme run by the Pacific nation of Vanuatu saw more than 2,000 people, including a slew of disgraced businesspeople and individuals sought by police in countries all over the world, purchase citizenship in 2020 – and with it visa-free access to the EU and UK, the Guardian can reveal.

Among those granted citizenship through the country’s development support program were a Syrian businessman with US sanctions against his businesses, a suspected North Korean politician, an Italian businessman accused of extorting the Vatican, a former member of a notorious Australian motorcycle gang, and South African brothers accused of a $3.6bn cryptocurrency heist.

The passport scheme allows foreign nationals to purchase citizenship for US$130,000 in a process that typically takes just over a month – all without ever setting foot in the country.

Marketed by agencies as one of the fastest, cheapest and most lax “golden passport” schemes anywhere in the world, the development support program grants unfettered, visa-free access to 130 countries including the UK and EU nations. Vanuatu also operates as a tax haven, with no income, corporate or wealth tax.

Experts have warned the scheme is ripe for exploitation, creating a back door for access to the EU and UK and allowing transnational criminal syndicates to establish a base in the Pacific, and Vanuatu’s taxation laws make the country an attractive site for money laundering.

A path to new identities

The passports program, which netted the Vanuatu government more than US$116m last year, has been highly controversial since its relaunch in 2017.

But until now, knowledge of who has bought passports through the scheme has been murky.

A series of internal government documents obtained by the Guardian via the country’s freedom of information scheme, details the name and nationality of every recipient of a Vanuatu passport through the country’s development support program and Vanuatu contribution program in 2020 and January 2021.

After a months-long investigation, involving searching publicly available court records, electoral rolls, death records, social media trails, and discussions with police and sources from around the world, the Guardian has been able to confirm the identities of dozens of the individuals on the list.

Vanuatu issued roughly 2,200 passports in 2020 through these programs – more than half (around 1,200) were to Chinese nationals. After Chinese, the most common nationality of recipients was Nigerian, Russian, Lebanese, Iranian, Libyan, Syrian and Afghan. Twenty people from the US, six Australians and a handful of people from Europe were also among those who applied.https://interactive.guim.co.uk/charts/embed/jul/2021-07-07T05:01:43/embed.html

The citizenship-by-investment (CBI) scheme is not illegal and many countries around the world offer CBI programs. There are many legitimate reasons for applying, including improved freedom of movement or tax-free offshore banking privileges.

However, security experts warn that the ease with which people can buy passports from the country, as well as the travel it permits, could make it an attractive scheme for members of transnational criminal syndicates, allowing them a legitimate base in the Pacific.

“It’s not just that they can travel through the EU or set up businesses … one of the issues is being able to create these networks to the Pacific, especially as the Pacific becomes more of a trafficking hub for drugs,” said Jose Sousa-Santos, a Pacific policy fellow at the Australian Pacific Security College. “And Vanuatu’s tax semi-haven laws make it very attractive for money laundering.”

The Guardian has found that a number of Vanuatu applicants are heavily implicated in a complex web of offshore business, with some owning shell companies with no discernible business activity.

Sousa-Santos added that another potential danger was people obtaining Vanuatu citizenship and then legally changing their name in Vanuatu, which effectively gave them a new identity.

“It’s one of the real risks,” he said. “If you are somebody who is a person of interest and who was able to somehow clear the Vanuatu Financial Intelligence Unit process, once you have Vanuatu citizenship, you’re able to change your name and, of course, be able to enter countries where your criminal background would not allow you to.”

In one brochure advertising the country’s development support program by a registered agent, the agency answers a question about whether passport recipients can change their name. “Once you are granted citizenship, you can change your name by sending us a letter that explains your motivation to change your name and your passport will be issued with your new name,” the brochure reads.

In response to these concerns, Ronald Warsal, the chairman of the Vanuatu Citizenship Office and Commission, said: “Vanuatu is a signatory to … most internationally sanctioned treaties and has ratified such treaties in recent years prohibiting transnational criminal syndicates to operate within its [jurisdiction] and as such, it is hard for international criminal syndicates to establish a base in Vanuatu.” He also said the country required checks before allowing a legal change of name.

EU concerns

Both the EU and the OECD have continued to express concerns regarding due diligence measures, forcing Vanuatu to promise it would step up background checks last year in an attempt to clean up the programs’ image. 

Despite this, the documents show that as recently as January 2021, Vanuatu was selling passports to individuals with links to fraud or sanctions and others who were sought by police in their home countrie

Other people granted passports by Vanuatu include:

  • Raees and Ameer Cajee, the founders of cryptocurrency investment platform Africrypt, who have been accused by lawyers for their former investors of a “crypto heist”, allegedly disappearing with bitcoin valued at roughly $3.6bn (£2.6bn), claims they deny.
  • Gianluigi Torzi, an Italian businessman accused of extorting Vatican officials of €15m (US$17.7m) during the purchase of a valuable London property. Torzi has denied wrongdoing.
  • Hayyam Garipoglu, a Turkish banking mogul imprisoned over a multimillion-dollar embezzlement scandal, and also sentenced to prison for harbouring his nephew after his nephew murdered a 17-year-old girl.
  • Ghali Belkecir, the controversial former head of Algeria’s Gendarmerie, the country’s military force in charge of law enforcement, who has four warrants out for his arrest.
  • Khaled al-Ahmad, a Syrian businessman and close advisor to President Assad, also obtained Vanuatu citizenship in June 2019, according to documents separately obtained by the Guardian.

In response to the Guardian’s inquiries about the individuals, Floyd Mera, the director of Vanuatu’s Financial Intelligence Unit, said: “Reading your list, most have allegations, pending investigations and ongoing court proceedings. A few have cases against them only after obtaining Vanuatu citizenship … If there are substantial convictions against any of these names, their citizenship may be revoked.”

He added: “Going forward, the FIU will conduct enhanced checks on the names provided in your list. If any of these persons have criminal convictions, FIU will promptly inform Citizenship Office of the updated information.”

The Guardian also believes there may be a senior North Korean politician and his wife who were granted citizenship after applying for the scheme using Chinese passports.

The names of a man and a woman who applied for passports last year match those of a well-known senior North Korean politician and his wife, though the Guardian has not been able to confirm the couple’s identity.

On paper, Vanuatu prevents citizens of Syria, Iraq, Iran, Yemen and North Korea from obtaining citizenship unless they can prove they have been a resident outside these countries for more than five years. However, the Guardian was able to identify a number of applicants from those countries who were resident within the black-listed countries at the time of applying.

A Syrian construction and real estate magnate with sanctions against a number of his businesses appears on the document. Abdul Rahman Khiti purchased Vanuatu citizenship just a few weeks after the US imposed sanctions on a number of his businesses.

Warsal, of Vanuatu’s Citizenship Office and Commission, said: “Abdul Rahman Khiti’s application was lodged prior to sanctions on a number of his business and by the time his application came before the screening committee and the FIU there was no adverse finding against him and the commission approved his application.”

Warsal said that Khiti also provided proof of his residency outside Syria for five years prior to applying. He added that the Citizenship Commission would be further investigating Khiti’s citizenship.

A source of revenue

Vanuatu is one of the poorest countries in the world, with the World Bank putting GDP per capita at US$2,780. The country is heavily in debt, in large part due to the natural disasters that have hit it. After a crippling cyclone in 2014, the country’s debt stock-to-GDP ratio climbed from 23% to 47% in 2018.

The sale of passports is the largest source of revenue for the Vanuatu government, with analysis by Investment Migration Insider finding it accounted for 42% of all government revenue in 2020.

In June 2021, the government reported a budget surplus despite the Covid-19 pandemic, largely thanks to the continued demand for citizenship, and the government has used the profits to pay down debts.

“There is merit [to the scheme],” said Ralph Regenvanu, the opposition leader of Vanuatu. “It just needs to be done a lot better than we’ve done it to date.”

Asked what advantage there is to Vanuatu, Regenvanu is blunt.

“Money. For a country with very limited resources, it’s money.”

Regenvanu said more robust processes needed to be implemented to screen applicants, in particular the enactment of an order that was issued by the former government – in which he was foreign minister – in March, which ordered an international specialist firm to be involved in due diligence checks.

“The only checks are the Financial Intelligence Unit and that’s obviously, as you found out, just totally inadequate … Our FIU obviously doesn’t have the capacity.”

Warsal said “the government is in its final stages to engage a European international reputable firm to assist the VFIU in its due diligence processes.”

But many in Vanuatu see the scheme as an affront to the sovereignty of the young country, which achieved independence from France and the UK in 1980 after almost a decade of struggle.

Ati George Sokomanu was a key figure in the country’s struggle for independence in the 1970s and was appointed as Vanuatu’s foundation president in 1980 after independence. He said the cash-for-passports scheme “tarnished” the vision of a free and proud Vanuatu they fought for during the independence movement.

“The gospel that we preached was to do with the return of the land from the hands of the foreigners – that we should have our own passport, that we would be a free people, we should have our own flag, and you know, be somebody in the face of this world,” he said.

“We struggled for our freedom and we gained it. And why should we break our sovereignty and our own dignity by making us become slaves again by selling our own passport to other people?”

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/15/citizenship-for-sale-fugitives-politicians-and-disgraced-businesspeople-buying-vanuatu-passports?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Related article: Want a new life in Vanuatu? Take the lift to the 23rd floor of a skyscraper in Hong Kong

If you wanted a new life on a tropical island and had US$130,000 to spare, you might end up visiting the 23rd floor of a nondescript building in downtown Hong Kong.

In the busy district of Wanchai, on a corner peppered with home decoration shops, car dealerships and small eateries full to the brim during lunch break, is the Tung Wai commercial building.

A bright entrance – now equipped with disinfection trappings and temperature-taking devices – leads to the fast lifts that will take you from the traffic din to what could be described as the Vanuatu floor.

Room 2303 hosts the Consulate General of the Republic of Vanuatu, with a large sticker on the glass door with Vanuatu’s coat of arms – a Melanesian warrior holding a long spear with one hand, standing against a mountain, with two crossed namale fern fronds and, behind the greenery, a curly boar’s tusk. Underneath it is Vanuatu’s national motto, Long God Yumi Stanap, which is Bislama (one of the three official languages of Vanuatu, together with English and French) for “In God we stand”.

Next to the consulate is the Vanuatu Trade Commission, which sits next to the office of Vanuatu Companies Limited, and the two offices of the PRG (Pacific Resource Group) Consulting Limited and PRG ImmiMart Limited.

The first company assists with investments and trade in Vanuatu, while PRG ImmiMart Limited has been appointed as the “Worldwide Exclusive Sole Master Marketing Agent to promote the Contribution Program” by the Vanuatu government via the company Vanuatu Glory Limited (VGK).

PRG handles all preliminary work for those who wish to purchase Vanuatu citizenship through the country’s Vanuatu Contribution Program (VCP), which costs $130,000 per person, or $180,000 for a family package.

Last year, more than 650 people were granted citizenship through the VCP. The huge majority were Chinese nationals, with just nine people applying for the scheme with nationalities other than Chinese.

The sale of passports is the largest source of revenue for the Vanuatu government, with analysis by Investment Migration Insider finding it accounted for 42% of all government revenue in 2020. The appeal of a Vanuatu passport includes that it offers visa-free travel to UK and EU countries and that Vanuatu – with no wealth, income or corporate taxes – operates as a tax haven.

PRG ImmiMart Limited is the sole agent in the world licensed to market this program, and according to one of the agents at the office, the company keeps $100,000 of the $180,000 fee for a family application, with the remaining $80,000 going to the Vanuatu government. They did not clarify what portion of the fee for an individual application went to the company.

The VCP is a separate scheme to the Development Support Program (DSP), which is managed by different agencies. The Guardian’s investigation into the identities of those who obtained citizenship of Vanuatu was focused on the DSP and not this scheme.

In the visitors’ office – an air-conditioned room with the flag of Vanuatu next to the Hong Kong SAR flag and a breath-taking view over Eastern Hong Kong island – Hin Ho, an agent, shows the brochures and the itemised table with the citizenship fees and charges, and explains how to apply for a Vanuatu passport and legally recognised citizenship.

The application process is straightforward, and shouldn’t take longer than eight weeks and does not require applicants to set foot in Vanuatu. It is such a well-established system that the brochure even specifies that the screening committee normally meets on the last Thursday of every month, while the citizenship committee meeting takes place on the last Friday of every month.

Money and no criminal record seem to be the main requirements for the “high quality new immigrants” scheme, with applicants required to provide a police clearance certificate, and asset proof of no less than $250,000 – excluding the amount that is being paid to the VCP to obtain citizenship.

Once approved, applicants can take an oath of allegiance in the building, after which they are handed a citizenship certificate and passport, and they can go down the fast lifts and exit into Gloucester Road having become a legally recognised citizen of the small Pacific Ocean archipelago.

Given the high cost, VCP may not be much help to the large numbers of people who want to leave Hong Kong for security reasons since the introduction of the National Security Law. But for wealthier passport chasers, keen for the peace of mind that may be granted by an alternative passport, the little green book of a Vanuatu passport might be just the ticket.

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/15/want-a-new-life-in-vanuatu-take-the-lift-to-the-23rd-floor-of-a-skyscraper-in-hong-kong

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Climate Change Is Not a Reason to Give China a Pass on Human Rights

2021/07/16 Leave a comment

Indeed:

In a widely-publicized July 8 letter, four dozen American advocacy groups—including the Sunrise Movement and the Union of Concerned Scientists—demanded that President Joe Biden and Congressional Democrats reverse their “antagonistic posture” in favor of a more cooperative relationship with Beijing to “combat the climate crisis.” The signatories also attempted to frame the current administration’s China approach as a surrender to pressure on the right that’s counterproductive to global governance as well as responsible for xenophobia against individuals of East and Southeast Asian descent, and therefore “doing nothing to actually support the wellbeing of everyday people in either China or the United States.”

Alas, they seem oblivious to realities on the ground for those of us who live in the shadow of Chinese Communist Party hegemony. It’s not “progressive” to ignore a regime that opposesmulticulturalism, weakens  trade unions, regulates women’s choices through centralized population control, persecutes the LGBTQ+ community, militarizes international waters, and incarcerates ethnic minorities in concentration camps. Without shared values, solidarity is impossible.

Make no mistake: climate change is indeed an urgent, existential danger. Amid the record-breaking heatwave sweeping across the Pacific Northwest and floods that pummeled cities on the East Coast, China, too, is hit with extreme weather patterns, even as the government is more than happy to downplay that. A proposed “shift from competition to cooperation” at the state level would convey legitimacy and moral equivalence for Beijing. While the letter was correct to note that “climate change has no nationalistic solutions,” doesn’t appeasement of geopolitical expansion and well-documented atrocities precisely privilege the interests of nations over peoples?

Recent White House occupants, from Richard Nixon to Barack Obama, all embraced China’s rise, often at the expense of genuine human-rights concerns there. The abandonment of Maoism in the late 1970s produced only materialism and inequality, not (as many pundits predicted) any other form of liberalization.  Serious champions of climate justice, rather than misdirect their anger at the long-overdue bipartisan unity against Chinese crimes against humanity, should offer realistic means for Beijing to change its atrocious behavior first.

This isn’t a matter of prioritizing human rights over climate change. Practically nothing in their record suggests that Chinese leaders have any intention of honoring their end of the bargain in binding, bilateral agreements. Look no further than the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration on Hong Kong and 1987 Sino-Portuguese Joint Declaration on Macau, each of which promised these territories 50 years of political autonomy. Unfolding now in both, however, is the systematic dismantling of every pillar of free society, from press freedom and due process topeaceful protests and open elections. No wonder Human Rights Watch’s latest reportcharacterized this as “the darkest period for human rights in China since the 1989 massacre.”

The moral grandstanding behind opposing a so-called new Cold War—as if current tensions were solely the result of U.S. actions—fails to acknowledge that Beijing is capable of perpetuating imperialism in its own right. One case in point is the Belt and Road Initiative, a massive program of investments and infrastructure projects abroad. Designed to overcome China’s own overproduction dilemma at a time of stagnating wages and inadequate domestic demand, it targets developing countries in the region with extraterritorial legal arrangements, debt-trap diplomacy, and, unsurprisingly, environmental exploitation.

We need to deal with China as it is, not as we wish it to be. Climate solutions should be based on transnational partnership, democratic engagement, and adherence to a rules-based world.
Beijing, to this day, refuses to own up to its mistakes in the COVID-19 pandemic, not to mention its longstanding intellectual-property thievery and forced technology transfer. It’s also keen to export authoritarianism: threatening to invade Taiwan, supporting North Korea’s dictatorship, and shielding the coup d’état in Burma from condemnation.

To imagine this thuggish actor on the international stage—whose state-run media indulges in mocking Greta Thunberg—is somehow innocently waiting to advance a climate agenda (if only other countries would be nicer to it) is naive. Last year, it built more than triple the amount of new coal power capacity as the rest of the world combined and funded $474 million worth of coal-sector projects abroad. Thanks to its polluted megacities, it’s the single largest carbon-dioxide emitter that continues to increase at a higher rate despite already doubling that of the United States. Neither can we gloss over the solar panels made in Xinjiang using cheap coal-generated electricity and unfree Uyghur labor.

At the end of the day, granting Beijing blanket concessions and expecting positive outcomes constitute little more than wishful thinking. “We’re in a contest, not with China per se,” as Biden put it at the G-7 summit in England last month, “but a contest with autocrats, autocratic governments around the world.” Should Americans wish to lead, they must be willing to listen. The voices of the oppressed ought to matter more than any superpower; creating a more humane, habitable world begins with respecting everyone’s basic dignity.

Source: Climate Change Is Not a Reason to Give China a Pass on Human Rights

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For the first time in decades, major changes are coming to Canada’s workplace equity laws

2021/07/16 Leave a comment

Of note as would also apply to federal public service (where TBS is lead). Hopefully the focus will be on the substantive issues, not just the terminology:

Federal legislation that aims to ensure equal opportunities for employees from under-represented groups is heading for its most significant overhaul since its introduction 35 years ago.

The Liberal government announced today that it has convened a new task force to review the Employment Equity Act, which the government describes as “an important tool to promote fairness, equality and diversity in federally regulated workplaces.”

The legislation states that no person should be denied employment opportunities for reasons unrelated to ability. It says that creating those conditions “requires special measures and the accommodation of differences.”

Labour Minister Filomena Tassi said the legislation has improved the standing of various groups that have been marginalized in the workplace, but that the act was overdue for an update.

“It’s about bringing the act into the 21st century,” Tassi said.

Future changes to the legislation, she added, “are absolutely going to result in more equitable workplaces.”

The 13-member task force conducting the review is being asked to come up with recommendations to “modernize” the legislation. The task force will host its first meeting on July 15 and is expected to have a final report by early 2022.

About 1.3 million people, representing about six per cent of Canada’s workforce, are employed in federally regulated industries and workplaces.

Review could result in more precise categories of marginalized workers

The existing Employment Equity Act identifies four groups that have faced additional barriers in workplaces: women, Indigenous Peoples, people with disabilities and members of visible minorities.

Those categories were defined when the act was introduced in 1986. The legislation was largely inspired by the 1984 Royal Commission on Equality in Employment, which was led by Rosalie Abella before she was appointed to the Supreme Court.

Among other things, the task force will be charged with reviewing those groups, which likely will result in the creation of more precise and varied categories of under-represented workers.

Adelle Blackett, a law professor at McGill University who was named chair of the task force, said LGBTQ people, for example, probably will need representation in the next iteration of the act.

“The time is now,” Blackett told CBC News. “We have a really important opportunity to achieve equality.”

Blackett said the national reckoning over the atrocities committed in Canada’s residential school system, and the murder of George Floyd in the United States, are driving the effort to address systemic inequalites.

“It’s hard not to be thinking about how to build a legacy of meaningful inclusion, including in our workplaces,” Blackett said.

According to the latest report on equity within federally regulated workplaces, women, Indigenous Peoples and people with disabilities remain underrepresented in federally regulated workplaces.

Representation of visible minorities is more favourable, with those workers filling slightly more jobs than expected based on their overall share of the workforce.

Unifor says existing act has ‘failed to deliver’

The launch of the review task force comes following recent efforts by the Liberal government to reduce inequities across a range of sectors — including new pay equity legislation that will go into effect at the end of August.

Critics, including the federal New Democrats, have described some of the announcements as pre-election manoeuvring.

NDP critic for women and gender equality Lindsay Mathyssen said last week’s news on pay equity follows the Liberal’s recent track record of providing “pretty words instead of substantive actions.”

Unifor, the largest union representing workers in the federally regulated private sector, said changes to the act are badly needed.

“Despite being in force for 35 years, the Employment Equity Act has failed to deliver on its promise,” Unifor national president Jerry Dias wrote on Twitter. He called on the federal government to ensure that input from workers is considered during the review.

“Updating terms, expanding inclusion and prioritizing enforcement will go a long way,” Dias added.

Source: For the first time in decades, major changes are coming to Canada’s workplace equity laws

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#COVID19 Immigration Effects – May 2021

2021/07/16 Leave a comment

Updated data across all immigration programs. Given the travel restrictions and shutdowns spring 2021, some of the monthly percentage increases are exceedingly high, with comparisons to May 2019 more meaningful. 

Some of the highlights: 

  • 2021 Permanent Resident numbers to date remain below 2019 levels, 109,615 Jan-May 2021 compared to 125,850. To meet 2021 target of 401,000, over 40,000 new PRs per month needed over the next 7 months. Given the various measures taken to date, a stretch but not impossible. 
  • The decline in Permanent Resident admissions partially reflects decline in TR to PR transitions, perhaps suggesting limited existing “inventory,” with PR applications also down 
  • Temporary Residents relatively less affected with numbers fairly stable 
  • Slight decline in study permit applications and study permits 
  • Asylum claimants stable at low levels 
  • Citizenship slight recovery in numbers but still much lower than pre-pandemic 
  • Visitor visas remain largely shut down. 

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Candidate diversity is high on the agenda as Canada’s political parties prepare for a federal election

2021/07/15 Leave a comment

Of note, pending a more complete analysis:

During what’s widely expected to be an election year, Canadians have been confronted with the realities of discrimination, racism and reconciliation as never before.

That’s something major federal parties are thinking about as they craft their slates of candidates, who, if elected, will need to represent the interests of a diverse electorate.

The Liberals, Conservatives, New Democrats and Greens have all made efforts to connect with under-represented communities, mostly through updated recruiting requirements and fundraising initiatives.

But they’re less forthcoming about the specific targets they’re hoping to hit, such as what proportion of racialized or LGBTQ+ candidates would indicate a successful and representative nomination process.

Women, for example, make up just over half of Canada’s population, but it took until 2020 for just 100 of its 338 MPs to come from that group. Millennials are one of the largest populations in Canada, yet most federally elected officials are much older. And visible minorities, Indigenous people, the LGBTQ+ community and disabled Canadians are all under-represented in the House of Commons.

“Parties are largely vote seeking, organizational machines,” said Erin Tolley, Canada Research Chair in Gender, Race and Inclusive Politics at Carleton University.

“So if a party is looking out into the public landscape and sees that issues related to equity or to diversity or to representativeness are something that the public is hungering for … parties will respond to that in a way that is consistent with their ideological vision.”

Here’s how four major federal parties are looking at tackling the balance this time around. (The Bloc Québécois did not reply to requests for comment.)

The Liberals

As of Tuesday, the Liberals had nominated 191 candidates, with more announcements expected throughout the week. Women make up 43 per cent of that total, with racialized Canadians accounting for more than 20 per cent of those nominated. Seven candidates are Indigenous.

Navdeep Bains, who is chairing the Liberals’ national campaign along with Economic Development Minister Mélanie Joly, has been tasked with seeking out candidates for the governing party.

One of the changes the party has made is to widen requirements within its nomination process. Previously, local riding associations needed to prove they had sought out female candidates. Now, associations must show how they’ve attempted to bring anyone from an equity-seeking group into the fold.

“You’ve got to document, and really have to engage and have a thorough search for potential candidates,” Bains said. “We’re talking about women, Black and Indigenous (candidates), people of colour, the LGBTQ community, people with disabilities.”

The party is also dipping into two pre-existing funds to assist with that work. One is the Judy LaMarsh Fund, which supports female candidates running for the federal Liberals. The other is the Indigenous Electoral Endowment Fund, which is intended to help recruit and support Indigenous candidates.

The Conservatives

The Conservatives had nominated 240 candidates as of Monday. The party did not provide a breakdown of the groups to which those candidates belong because it’s still compiling that information, but party spokesperson Cory Hann identified several as Muslim.

Hann said party supporters and staff have been asked to “work their networks and encourage people from all backgrounds to get involved” as either candidates or campaigners.

“The candidates we’ve nominated so far all have varying backgrounds both professionally and personally, ensuring that, as (Conservative Leader Erin) O’Toole has said, Canadians from all over the country see themselves in our Conservative party.”

Where representation is concerned, the party appears to be focusing most on building bridges with racialized and Indigenous communities, although the party is tight-lipped on the specifics of those plans.

Conservative MP Garnett Genuis has been leading engagement efforts with “cultural and religious minority communities,” telling the Star he is “excited about the potential that we have for growth in that area in the upcoming campaign.”

Genius would not expand on which communities he was specifically courting, or how those efforts look in practice, citing the Tories’ “inside strategy.”

The NDP

In 2019, the New Democrats led the charge when it came to candidate diversity, hovering near the gender parity benchmark and reaching or surpassing representative levels for Indigenous, racialized and LGBTQ+ groups.

For the next election, the party is trying to ensure more than 50 per cent of its candidates are women — the only specific target cited by any federal party for any equity-seeking group.

The party has nominated 97 candidates so far, half of whom are women. Racialized Canadians make up 33 per cent of that total, while six per cent are Indigenous and 18 per cent are LGBTQ+. People living with a disability account for 12 per cent of nominated candidates, and 11 per cent have been identified as “youth.”

As with the Liberals, riding associations must demonstrate how they’ve sought to recruit diverse candidates. The party is also now requiring that any outgoing incumbent is replaced with someone from an equity-seeking group. Departing MP Jack Harris, for example, will be succeeded by one such candidate.

“This is a huge priority for us. It’s part of our DNA,” NDP national director Anne McGrath told the Star.

McGrath said that because the party has more resources heading into the next election than it did in 2019, more emphasis is being placed on recruitment.

The Green party

There may be no party for which running a diverse roster of candidates is more important than the federal Greens.

While Annamie Paul is the first Black and Jewish woman to lead a major federal party, she is currently embattled within a party structure that insiders charge is perpetuating racism and sexism.

What’s more, a confidential report prepared for the Greens and obtained by the Star found the party fell short of recruiting and supporting diverse candidates in the last general election. In 2019, the party ran fewer visible minority candidates than the far-right People’s Party, according to a report by The Canadian Press.

That’s something Paul is committed to changing, despite opposition she says she’s faced from some party officials.

“There’s a tremendous amount of power in making the invitation. Just making an open invitation to say we see you, we value you, we want you,” Paul told the Star.

As of Monday, 148 applicants had been approved through the drive and other recruitment streams, though only 39 have been formally nominated. Of the approved applicants, 41 per cent are women, followed by racialized Canadians at 19 per cent and youth under 30 at 15 per cent. Six per cent of approved applicants are Indigenous, while 17 per cent belong to the LGBTQ+ community and 12 per cent are persons with disabilities.

Source: Candidate diversity is high on the agenda as Canada’s political parties prepare for a federal election

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