For Haitian migrants in limbo, calls to close Roxham Road clash with Canada’s friendly image

2023/03/07 Leave a comment

Of note:

Standing outside a migrant shelter near Mexico’s border with the U.S., Smyder Mesidor recounted a 10-country odyssey to get here. Driven out of Haiti by gang violence and Chile by a lack of work, the 30-year-old cook had been robbed by bandits and shaken down by customs officials as he walked across much of Latin America.

This road would end, he hoped, in either Florida or Quebec, both places where he has family.

So he reacted with a mix of bemusement and insouciance to word that Canadian politicians want to make it harder for migrants to enter by shutting down Roxham Road, the irregular border crossing south of Montreal.

Bemusement because such rhetoric seemed to clash with Canada’s immigrant-friendly image. Insouciance because, after what he’d been through, he was ready to brave the vagaries of the immigration system in a country that held out the hope of a better life.

“I don’t listen to that sort of talk,” Mr. Mesidor said. “Everyone speaks well of Canada.”

Among the thousands of Haitian migrants gathered here in Reynosa, a city of 700,000 across the Rio Bravo from Texas, there is persistent interest in reaching Canada, usually as a backup option if it proves too difficult to stay in the U.S. There is an even more persistent disregard for attempts by either country to stop people from coming.

Given the brutality and lack of economic opportunity back home, they don’t feel they have much choice but to push forward.

“We’re a little bit upset when we hear politicians say those things, because we don’t have a voice. We want to come and help them build their country,” said Kency Etienne, a 30-year-old teacher living in an encampment of several dozen tents on a concrete pad next to a Mexican government office. “But we don’t really think about it.”

Sitting nearby were Jean and Marie Petilme, who made the trek with their four children. Ms. Petilme is eight-months pregnant with a fifth. Hiking through Panama’s Darien jungle, Mr. Petilme said some migrants with them had their clothes stolen at gunpoint, others were swept away while fording a river and a few starved to death. Life hasn’t been much better in Mexico.

“We’ve been here for three months and we don’t get much to eat. We don’t have phones to fill out asylum applications,” said their daughter Miscalina, 12. “This is how we live.”

Mireille Joseph, 32, also travelled pregnant, including a five-day stretch on foot. She left her husband and two children behind in Haiti. Her hope is to get to safety and then work on having them join her. “I don’t really care at all what the politicians say. I want to come to either Canada or the U.S.,” she said.

The lifting of pandemic border restrictions, along with deteriorating economic and security conditions in Haiti and parts of Latin America, have driven a rise in northward migration this past year. In Haiti, armed gangs have tightened their control of the country, carrying out frequent kidnappings for ransom and blocking access to Port-au-Prince’s shipping terminals. The capital has suffered repeated shortages of food, fuel and medicine.

Under the Canada-United States Safe Third Country Agreement, migrants arriving in Canada from the U.S. are prohibited from making Canadian asylum claims, allowing for their swift deportation. But the rule only applies at official points of entry, leading asylum seekers to enter the country at irregular border crossings.The vast majority do so at Roxham Road near Plattsburgh, N.Y., because of its relative accessibility.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has vowed to renegotiate the Safe Third Country Agreement to apply to the entire border. The White House, however, has shown little interest in changing the status quo. Meanwhile, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has been busing migrants from his state to northern cities such as New York, where Mayor Eric Adams has sent many of them on to the Canadian border.

The influx has led Quebec Premier François Legault and federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre to ramp up pressure on Mr. Trudeau to stem the tide. “We as a country can close that border crossing. If we are a real country, we have borders,” Mr. Poilievre said last month.

In a letter to the Prime Minister, Mr. Legault said that the province’s social services could not handle any more asylum seekers. He also warned that the new arrivals, who predominantly speak Haitian Creole or Spanish, would contribute to “the decline of French in Montreal.”

The number of people who made refugee claims after crossing at Roxham Road last year – almost 40,000 – is high by the standards of Canada, used to being geographically insulated from migration. In Mexico, it seems modest, a fraction of the more than 200,000 who tried to cross into the U.S. in December alone.

In Reynosa, the shelters are full, leaving many to live on the streets, in parks and in vacant lots. Hot, dusty and perpetually sunny even in late winter, the city feels a world away from the snow-covered forest surrounding Roxham Road. At one intersection near a large encampment, a dozen small businesses have sprung up under tarps strung between trees, with everyone from barbers to fruit sellers providing services to the migrants.

Over a charcoal fire, 19-year-old Natalie Joseph helped prepare gorditas. She has spent much of her life on the move: She left Haiti at the age of 5, she said, with her family settling in Chile. Two years ago, worried about her prospects for finding work, she decided to hit the road with two friends. “You can get the basic necessities in Chile but we wanted something better,” she said.

Across the street, Maricianne Pierre said she had been waiting in Reynosa 2½ months. “I’d love to go to Canada. There are possibilities of school, social programs, work. I’m stuck here right now,” said Ms. Pierre, 40.

Hector Silva, a pastor who runs two shelters in the city, said he wasn’t sure what to tell people who were setting their sights north. He only hoped that the leaders of wealthy countries wouldn’t shut anyone out.

“We have a lot of people asking, ‘How can we do it – if we get the paper from the U.S., how do we get all the way to Canada?’ We don’t know,” he said as a U.S. Border Patrol chopper buzzed overhead. “They’re not criminals. Many people are running for their lives. Leaving the country looking for a better life is not against the law.”

At another shelter a few blocks away, Ricot Picot and his wife watched their two small children play. Mr. Picot, 42, who was a teacher in Haiti, said everyone would be better off if the people with power to decide immigration policy allowed them to complete their journey. “I pray for them,” he said. “We don’t have anything – no jobs, no support. We are not achieving anything staying here.”

Source: For Haitian migrants in limbo, calls to close Roxham Road clash with Canada’s friendly image

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In Niagara Falls, Roxham Road asylum seekers find less space and more strife as tourist season nears

2023/03/06 Leave a comment

Not all that surprising:

It had been a long time since Marie Saintil had last been to church, when she found herself at the pulpit of the Faith Tabernacle in Welland, Ont., on a recent Sunday evening.

“Est-ce que tout le monde parle Créole?” she asked the small Haitian congregation, a half dozen or so of whom had been shuttled to the service in their Sunday best from the various hotels in nearby Niagara Falls where they are living. The congregation nods in unison – yes, they all speak Créole.

Ms. Saintil, a lawyer of Haitian background herself, was there that evening to deliver not a sermon, but a primer on the refugee claims process.

When she took a job with the Niagara Community Legal Clinic in January, she was looking for a change of pace after two decades of practising immigration law in Toronto. Instead, she has found herself in the throes of a migration crisis, with thousands of asylum seekers unexpectedly placed in a tourist town that is not equipped to absorb them, transferred by the federal government from Quebec after crossing at Roxham Road.

More than 2,841 asylum seekers have been transferred to Niagara Falls by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada since last June, spread across more than 1,400 hotel rooms in the city after being shuttled on from their arrival in Quebec.

Another 702 have been placed in Ottawa, 618 in Windsor, and 1,396 in Cornwall, according to the IRCC. They began transfers to Atlantic provinces at the end of last month, with 63 so far transferred to Halifax and 30 people transferred to Fredericton.

But nine months in – as understaffed settlement and social services scramble to support the newcomers, and with as many as one in 12 hotel rooms occupied as the city’s tourism season looms – tensions are starting to build.

“These people are taken from Roxham Road in Quebec, and they’re put into a bus, and they’re dumped. And the word is dumped – they’re dumped here,” Ms. Saintil said.

“And now they’re being told, you’re not really wanted because we have tourists coming … It was fine to have them here during the slow season, in the wintertime, but now that the tourists are coming, you’re not wanted.”

Ms. Saintil cannot represent them, she told the congregants at the church, as she handed out information packets and business cards. This has not been her clinic’s mandate, but she feels compelled to help given how few lawyers in the area do this work.

The migrants did not choose Niagara Falls. They ended up here after being repeatedly shuffled along by American and then Canadian authorities – perpetually treated as someone else’s problem. Regardless of where their journeys began, these migrants have often crossed several borders before arriving in Canadain an effort to flee violence, persecution and poverty – and have faced hostility along the way.

At the Mexico-U.S. border, thousands of people are crossing each day. And once in the United States, they have faced increasing hostility, including from political leaders in southern states such as Texas and Florida, whose Republican governors have transported thousands of asylum seekers to places such as New York, Washington and Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts.

In New York, Democratic politicians have responded to an influx of migrants by offering one-way tickets to Plattsburgh, N.Y., a short distance from the Canadian border at Roxham Road.

Under the Safe Third Country Agreement between Canada and the U.S., asylum seekers must file their claims in whichever country they arrive in first, which means they will be turned back if they attempt to get into Canada at official border crossings. Because that agreement covers only official border points, crossings at the unofficial Roxham Road entry have risen sharply.

Now in Canada, the migrants are finding themselves unwelcome in Quebec, too. With the numbers at Roxham Road continuing to rise – close to 40,000 migrants entered Canada there last year – Quebec’s Premier François Legault has protested the “strain” the influx has put on his province’s social services and urged Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to shut it down, or send them elsewhere.

“Everybody is sending the ball to somebody else,” Ms. Saintil said. “It’s a blame game.”

With a population of 95,000 people, Niagara Falls depends heavily on tourism and is known as much for the massive falls that straddle an international border as it is for the garishness of its main drag, lined with haunted houses and wax museums. The city has upwards of 16,000 hotel rooms, Mayor Jim Diodati said, and at first the IRCC contracts seemed like welcome news for hotels that have been struggling after three years in a pandemic.

“We’ve got lots of rooms, we’ll do our part and help out as much as we can – that’s kind of the attitude as it started,” he said. But as the numbers began to grow, he said the mood has shifted. “They went from 87 to 300, to 687, to 1,500 … And then we were told 1,700 and 2,000 were the next steps,” he said. “And, you know, we weren’t really sure how much we can handle, and at what point it would become disruptive, because we’ve never been through anything like this before.”

After a video call with Sean Fraser, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, and his staff last month, the mayor said he still doesn’t know how long the hotel rooms are booked for. He said he’s concerned about the impact on the coming tourism season, which he describes as the “the goose that lays the golden eggs here.”

“A tourist is going to spend money in restaurants, the attractions, the casinos, the wineries … whereas these folks are just staying in the rooms,” he said. “A lot of people are counting on it to feed their families and pay their mortgages and pay their rents. So we’re asking, ‘What’s the plan?’ ”

IRCC spokesperson Jeffrey MacDonald wouldn’t provide a timeline on how long the hotel rooms have been leased, citing confidentiality. In an e-mail, he said the department takes into account availability, cost, transportation and access to support services.

Mr. Diodati said he was told numbers were likely to peak in the coming weeks, as they began to transfer people to other areas, including the Atlantic provinces. But in the meantime, he warns the mood of the town has begun to shift. “Most conversations that people have with me start off with ‘I don’t want to be insensitive, and I’m not complaining … but where are we going with this?’ ” he said. “And we’re trying to get answers.” The mayor said he has asked the federal government for more money to help the city and local organizations keep up with demand. IRCC said in a statement that it was working with the local government to ensure they are prepared and to respond any concerns.

On a Friday evening almost one week after the mayor’s meeting with the immigration minister, the lobby of the Ramada hotel on Lundy’s Lane was crammed with 100 or so people lined up for dinner.

This type of scene, Ms. Saintil believes, is the real unspoken concern. “It just doesn’t look good to see all these refugee claimants in the hotels. That’s what it is,” she said. “It doesn’t look good in pictures with American tourists.”

On a frigid Sunday afternoon, Henry Carmona and a group of fellow Venezuelan migrants headed down from their hotel to take in the icy view of the falls.

The economic collapse and rise of political violence in Venezuela have led to one of the largest displacement crises in the world. It is a mass exodus that has sent a quarter of the country’s population – more than seven million people – fleeing to neighbouring Colombia and then onward.

It took these men years to get here. They each show off photos of the families they had to leave behind because of the dangerous nature of their journeys.

Truck drivers by trade, the men are eager to get their work permits, learn English and begin to find work. But they landed in Niagara only a few days earlier, bused in from Quebec after their arrival at Roxham Road.

They have appreciated their treatment in Canada so far, they said. They laughed as they took in the various gimmicky attractions on Clifton Hill. Next door to the Museum of the Stars, a stiff-moving dinosaur head called out to them from the Looney Tunes-esque Bone Blaster Shootin’ Gallery.

And though they’d expected to be in Quebec, they are content in Niagara for now; whenever their work permits are ready, they plan to go where the work is. Other asylum seekers who spoke with The Globe and Mail, some from Colombia and others from Haiti, said the same.

At the YMCA of Niagara, Deanna D’Elia, manager of employment and immigrant services, has scrambled to move some part-time workers to full-time in an effort to address the spiralling need.

Of their 65-member team, 25 or so are focused specifically on settlement. Others work on helping them find employment, though a major part of that process depends on work permits – which, given the backlog, can take many months or even years to be issued.

“Individuals and families have come to Canada to seek a better life and they are eager to work,” Ms. D’Elia said. In the meantime, many must rely on social assistance, which in today’s rental market can barely cover a room in the city. It’s a situation that she says has “amplified” discussions about the housing crisis, both regionally and across the province and country.

It’s a pressure that is being felt in social services across the region, which were under pressure even before the asylum seekers arrived.

On a recent Friday morning, Pam Sharp and her team at Project SHARE were preparing for a busy day at the largest food bank in Niagara Falls. They’d had to close the day before for an ice storm, and knew it was likely to be busier as a result.

Demand in the community was already very high. In addition to the food bank, they also provide homelessness prevention supports and other services, and served the equivalent of one in 10 residents last year, she said.

They see, on average, 100 families a day, and the infusion of 3,000 new vulnerable people is stretching them to their limits. Both the regional and city council have declared a state of emergency on homelessness, mental health and opioid addiction.

Ms. Sharp has noticed more and more asylum seekers coming in – for example, of the 157 families they served one day this week, 60 identified as asylum seekers –and the team has on occasion done outreach at the hotels directly.

“We want to make sure that anyone coming into our city is able to meet their basic needs,” she says.

Janet Medume, executive director of the Welland Heritage Council and Multicultural Centre, which is leading the local settlement efforts. said they weren’t told in advance about the asylum seekers’ arrivals but began to hear word through community networks last summer. Since then, more than 20 community organizations have banded together to develop a strategy, but she said they need both funding and staffing boosts from all levels of government to keep up.

“Let’s inject more resources so we can focus on ensuring individuals get the help they need, and hopefully get employment quick enough, so we can get them out of there as soon as possible,” she said. “Give us those resources and we’ll be okay.”

At the church Sunday evening, Ms. Saintil lingered after the service, passing out information pamphlets and business cards. She wore a sad smile as she watched a trio of siblings – ages 8, 7 and 1 – playing in the foyer. The older two, sisters, showed off cartwheels and boasted about their favourite school subjects.

She urged their father to get them scarves for the cold weather, and he nodded enthusiastically. They’ve been here eight months in a hotel, Ms. Saintil said, after they waved goodbye. The parents were only recently able to meet with a lawyer for the first time.

“Everybody’s doing their best,” she said. “But if they’re hoping this is not going to be a crisis in a month or two, they have to start acting now.”

Source: In Niagara Falls, Roxham Road asylum seekers find less space and more strife as tourist season nears

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Macklin: What happens when Roxham Road is closed

2023/03/01 Leave a comment

Useful commentary as always on some of the likely impacts. However, I am not convinced that all of the asylum seekers at Roxham Road would pursue more risky routes as their risk/benefit calculation would likely lead some not to pursue a more hazardous route.

No way of testing this hypothesis but arguably, many of the Roxham Road asylum seekers are in less desperate situations than those South of the USA border or crossing the Mediterranean.:

The other risk is of course to public support for immigration over this perceived loophole and the perception the government is not managing the border and immigration more generally:

Quebec Premier François Legault, supported by federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre, urged the federal government to shut down Roxham Road. This is the spot where, over the past six years, thousands of refugee claimants crossed into Canada and asked for refugee protection. 

The numbers who enter may seem high to some Canadians, but relative to the number of asylum seekers seeking protection in other countries, it is a trickle. It is also a fraction of those we have welcomed from Ukraine in the past year. No one can validly claim to know in advance whether the people who cross at Roxham Road meet the refugee definition, so attempts to distinguish them from Ukrainians on that basis is disingenuous.

The premier of Quebec complains about the alleged unfairness of Quebec bearing costs associated with asylum seekers who enter at Roxham Road. Canada allocates a proportion of federal funding to Quebec for newcomer settlement that is not indexed to the actual number of newcomers that Quebec admits. Quebec receives proportionately more money than other provinces to settle newcomers and does not account for how it spends it. Legault’s claim that Quebec lacks money and capacity to manage Roxham Road arrivals deserves little sympathy. 

Up until 2004, asylum seekers travelling overland would have entered in a safe, orderly way by presenting themselves at an official port of entry at the Canada-U.S. border. Then, the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement turned ports of entry into brick walls for asylum seekers. 

Canada did this by exploiting a loophole in the Refugee Convention, which prohibits states from sending refugees back to countries of origin, but is silent about deflecting them to third countries (in this case, the U.S.). Fast forward a few years, and we discover that some asylum seekers are crossing into Canada at Roxham Road. It is not unlawful for a refugee to enter a country “irregularly” under the Refugee Convention or Canadian immigration law. Refugee law recognizes that desperate people will take desperate measures. 

Roxham Road is an open secret. No one needs a smuggler to find out about it, or to find it. If Roxham Road is blocked, will people become less desperate? Not likely. But they will be forced to take more dangerous and clandestine measures to avoid detection and apprehension. So here are the government programs that politicians are really proposing when they advocate making it legally impossible for asylum seekers to enter Canada:

Job Creation Program for Smugglers: Once prohibited from presenting themselves to Canadian authorities in a safe and orderly way at a port of entry, asylum seekers will increasingly rely on smugglers to guide them into Canada surreptitiously. The smuggling business will grow in response to this government-created demand and become increasingly lucrative, as well as violent and lethal. 

People will pay, and if they don’t have the money, they will borrow it and become indebted to traffickers, who will exploit them. Smuggling will proliferate. We will hear more stories about more people who suffer debilitating injury or freeze to death trying to cross the border from U.S. into Canada or vice versa. Smugglers will be blamed for facilitating border crossing, and for the injuries and deaths that ensue. Wait for it.

Stimulus Package for Military and Security Contractors: Pundits and politicians will demand that Canada invest in surveillance, military and physical infrastructure along a 9,000 km Canada-U.S. border in order to halt the “invasion” of people seeking refugee protection. 

They will describe this as a “humanitarian” program to protect hapless asylum seekers from predation by ruthless smugglers and traffickers. Military and security contractors will line up to proffer their high-tech gadgets and high-priced solutions. Turning a 9,000 km border into a high-tech wall is an expensive, cruel and futile fantasy. The border will be a perpetual crisis zone, where no walls are high enough, no tactics are effective enough, and no amount of money spent is ever enough. Wait for it.

These are the lessons from Fortress Europe and from Australia’s Pacific Solution. Rumours already abound that the Liberals are pressing the United States to somehow “extend” the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement along the full length of the Canadian border. President Biden is proposing a similar rule at its southern border. Wait for it.

Source: Macklin: What happens when Roxham Road is closed

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Legault pitches English Canada for closure of Roxham Road and transfer of migrants

2023/02/23 Leave a comment

While Premier Legault has a point, he and many commentators in Quebec and the Rest of Canada all too often forget about the annual grant for immigration and integration to Quebec under the 1991 Canada-Quebec accord: funding cannot be reduced no matter how much Quebec decreases the number of immigrants it selects and no matter how great the decrease compared to the Rest of Canada.

The numbers for 2022 illustrated this: $697.03M for 69,000 Permanent Residents, rest of Canada $832.41 M for 366,000 Permanent Residents. Or, about $10,000 per Quebec Permanent Residents compared to about $2,300 for the rest of Canada. This overstates the difference somewhat given what is included in the Accord but not dramatically so.

The Minister’s comments, as quoted, suggests the government has no realistic solution to the underlying problem, which likely is the case, but then some honesty and frankness would be welcome:

After demanding for months that Ottawa stop the flow of migrants into the country, Quebec’s premier is making his pitch to English Canada for the closure of an irregular border crossing popular with asylum seekers — and for their transfer outside his province.

The number of would-be refugees entering Quebec “has exploded,” François Legault wrote in an English-language letter published Tuesday in The Globe and Mail, adding that the province’s social services have been pushed to their limits. The sooner the federal government closes Roxham Road — an irregular border crossing in southern Quebec frequently used by asylum seekers — the better, the premier said.

“This situation even raises several humanitarian considerations, as it is becoming increasingly difficult to receive asylum seekers with dignity,” Legault said.

The letter is similar to the one Legault wrote to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Sunday. But unlike the letter to Trudeau, Legault’s message in the Globe does not include concerns that the arrival of thousands of asylum seekers is putting the French language in Montreal at risk. The premier also doesn’t mention that he’s asked Trudeau for more money to pay for the costs of caring for would-be refugees.

“We have therefore asked the federal government to settle new asylum seekers in other provinces that are capable of supporting them with dignity,” Legault wrote in the Globe. The letter called for Ottawa to transfer to other provinces all new asylum seekers who enter irregularly, “while Quebec catches its breath.” Ottawa should issue work permits and process refugee applications faster, he added.

“In the meantime, Mr. Trudeau’s government should send the message loud and clear to would-be migrants not to come via Roxham Road anymore.”

For months, the Legault government has been calling on Ottawa to close Roxham Road and to transfer asylum seekers to other provinces. The influx of would-be refugees in Quebec has put significant strain on the housing, education and social services sectors, the government says.

According to federal government statistics, more than 39,000 people claimed asylum in Quebec in 2022 after crossing into Canada outside official ports of entry, mostly through Roxham Road. About 369 people who crossed irregularly over that period claimed asylum in the rest of the country. In total, around 64 per cent of all asylum claims in Canada in 2022 were made in Quebec.

In response to Legault’s letter to Trudeau, the office of federal Immigration Minister Sean Fraser said Monday that Ottawa had transferred thousands of migrants to Ontario to take pressure off Quebec, adding that the government was working with other provinces and municipalities to find other temporary accommodations.

Source: Legault pitches English Canada for closure of Roxham Road and transfer of migrants

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Close Roxham Road border crossing within 30 days, Poilievre urges

2023/02/23 Leave a comment

Could we not have some more serious discussion of solutions rather than simplistic Conservative virtue signalling and, for that matter, simplistic Liberal virtue signalling?

Ironically, arguments that Canada is “broken” apply particularly in the case of immigration and thus no need for cheap points:

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is calling for the federal government to close the Roxham Road border crossing within 30 days amid a rising influx of migrants entering Quebec irregularly and spurring calls from Quebec leaders who say their communities cannot keep up with the pace.

Speaking to reporters in Ottawa on Tuesday, Poilievre laid the blame for the surge of migrants squarely at the feet of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who he accused of encouraging irregular crossings at Roxham Road and not addressing a backlog of refugee claims.

The Conservative leader argued that Trudeau had already demonstrated Roxham Road could be closed without violating the Safe Third Country Agreement with the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic, and urged the government to do so again — failing to mention the entire border was shut down during that time.

“If we are a real country, we have borders. And if this is a real prime minister, he is responsible for those borders,” he said.

The Safe Third Country Agreement requires asylum seekers arriving in Canada or the U.S. to make their claim in the first country they arrive in and forbids them from first arriving in one country and then making a claim in another. However, migrants who cross the border between official posts can claim asylum after they are intercepted by police as they are already on Canadian soil.

Poilievre’s comments come as Quebec Premier Francois Legault this week called on Trudeau to make the Roxham Road crossings a top priority for next month’s meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden and to renegotiate the agreement.

He reportedly told Trudeau in a letter on Sunday the pact has pushed asylum seekers to Roxham Road, and that a renegotiated treaty should apply to all entry points.

On Tuesday, the Globe and Mail published an English-language letter by Legault where he said the number of would-be asylum seekers entering Quebec “has exploded,” pushing the province’s social services to their limits. The premier also pitched other provinces to take in some of those migrants.

The public letter did not include concerns reportedly expressed by Legault in his letter to Trudeau that the influx of migrants is threatening the French language in Montreal, or his request for more money to pay for the costs of caring for asylum seekers.

Federal statistics show that more than 39,000 people claimed asylum after they were intercepted by the RCMP crossing Canada’s land border into Quebec in 2022, compared with only 369 in the rest of the country.

In total, around 64 per cent of all asylum claims in Canada in 2022 were made in Quebec.

Last year’s numbers were a sharp increase from 2021, when 4,095 migrants were intercepted on Quebec’s southern border.

Poilievre did not offer specifics about how to address the immigration backlog — currently sitting at more than 910,000 applications — but did say money can be redirected from policing the irregular crossing to bolstering the legal immigration system, which he said would help reduce wait times.

“We probably have the best immigration system in the entire world. But Trudeau is breaking it,” he said.

Immigration Minister Sean Fraser said in a statement to Global News that proposing to close Roxham Road within 30 days “without advancing a plan to manage the consequences will not solve the problem” and would only promote more irregular border crossings elsewhere.

“The ideas put forward by Pierre Poilievre are not only reckless, but they lack depth and understanding,” Fraser said.

“As Canada works to navigate a global migration crisis, it is our responsibility to implement real, long-term solutions.”

Fraser acknowledged that Quebec has faced “immense pressure” and said Ottawa has transferred thousands of migrants elsewhere in Canada since last June.

A spokesperson for Fraser’s office clarified that to date, those transfers have been to Ontario, but a “pan-Canadian” approach is in the works.

“We are continuing to work with other provinces and municipalities to identify communities that have the capacity to accommodate additional asylum claimants as we work toward a long-term solution,” Fraser said in his statement.

The minister also encouraged people who want to enter Canada to consider other ways to enter the country.

Source: Close Roxham Road border crossing within 30 days, Poilievre urges

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Soucy: Cohérence médicale pour les migrantes enceintes

2023/02/22 Leave a comment

Soucy makes a valuable distinction between birth tourists and vulnerable and precarious migrant women, some 2,000 according to RAMQ. Will be interesting to see whether Quebec provides a waiver to the non-resident medical surcharge or not:

Les enfants ne naissent pas d’une fleur : la santé de la mère est intimement liée à celle de l’enfant. La jolie formule utilisée par Médecins du monde résume bien l’incohérence de refuser aux mères ce qu’on a bien voulu accorder à leurs petits à venir, soit une couverture de santé bétonnée par un accès sans condition (sinon celle d’être présents sur le territoire plus de six mois) aux régimes d’assurance maladie et d’assurance médicaments, peu importe leur lieu de naissance ou le statut migratoire de leurs parents.

Il n’est pas inutile de rappeler que le projet de loi 83, qui a permis cette avancée, a été adopté à l’unanimité à l’Assemblée nationale en juin 2021. Guidés par des objectifs « d’équité et de solidarité », les partis n’avaient alors pas manqué de réclamer la même chose pour les mères en devenir. Il est bien documenté que l’absence de suivi de grossesse vient avec des risques accrus notamment de fausse couche et de césarienne, mais aussi de prématurité, de détresse foetale et de petits poids chez les nouveau-nés.

Outre leurs effets délétères sur les humains concernés, ces éléments pèsent lourd sur notre système de santé engorgé, en plus de nous coûter collectivement plus cher à long terme. Sensible à tous ces arguments tant éthiques et sanitaires qu’économiques, le ministre de la Santé, Christian Dubé, avait immédiatement mandaté la Régie de l’assurance maladie du Québec (RAMQ) afin qu’elle évalue les options qui s’offrent pour combler cette brèche.

Déposé en juin dernier, son rapport présente quatre solutions, dont le statu quo, qui va contre la volonté parlementaire. Au vu et au su des cas déchirants rapportés par les médias ces derniers mois, et dont le nombre grandit à vue d’oeil, il est clair que cette option n’en est pas une. Au Québec, un accouchement sans complications après un suivi de grossesse normal aura coûté entre un peu moins de 10 000 $ et jusqu’à près de 20 000 $ à qui n’a pas d’assurance maladie. Pour nombre de femmes enceintes à statut précaire, une facture de cette ampleur agit non seulement comme un frein, mais aussi comme un accélérateur de paupérisation terrible.

Ceux qui agitent l’épouvantail du tourisme médical dans ce dossier n’ont pas complètement tort. Ce phénomène existe bel et bien au Canada, nourri notamment par ce qu’on pourrait appeler une double citoyenneté de complaisance. Le Québec n’y échappe pas, lui qui a un fructueux historique en matière de tourisme obstétrique, rappelle la RAMQ. Mais ce n’est pas de cela qu’il s’agit ici.

Ce dont il est question, c’est d’une couverture d’assurance maladie pour les soins de santé sexuelle et reproductive accessible à toutes les femmes qui vivent au Québec (et non pas celles qui y transitent pour en soutirer le meilleur avant de repartir avec leur petit bonheur sous le bras), indépendamment de leur statut migratoire. Plusieurs pays offrent déjà ce genre de formules, comme la France, la Belgique, l’Allemagne et même quelques États du voisin américain, pourtant peu réputé pour sa générosité en matière de soins de santé.

Le Québec peut en faire autant pour les quelque 2000 femmes concernées par année, selon l’évaluation de la RAMQ. Celle-ci a retenu trois formules qui pourraient avoir des bienfaits notables dans la trajectoire de ces femmes et de leurs enfants à naître. Cela va de l’élimination de la surcharge de 200 % des coûts engagés imposée actuellement à la gratuité pour toutes, en passant par la gratuité pour les femmes migrantes qui répondent à des critères de vulnérabilité (comme la pauvreté et la sous-scolarisation).

Le ministre Dubé dit attendre les conclusions du groupe de travail censé soupeser ces options et en évaluer la faisabilité pour trancher. L’affaire n’est pas simple : il faudra être équitable tout en empêchant tous les abus possibles afin de garder une saine gestion du régime. Souhaitons, surtout, qu’il ne tarde pas.

À force de se déchirer sur le chemin Roxham, on a fini par perdre de vue une valeur cardinale chère aux Québécois, celle de prendre soin de notre monde. Indépendamment du nombre d’immigrants que le Québec veut ou peut accueillir — et qu’il faudra bien définir un jour —, des femmes sans statut vivent leur grossesse ici, maintenant. C’est fâcheux, mais une grossesse ne se met pas sur la glace.

Source: Cohérence médicale pour les migrantes enceintes

Filed under Birthright Citizenship, Citizenship Tagged with , , ,

Nadeau: Les ballons de l’immigration

2023/02/21 Leave a comment

A reminder from Quebec service provider organizations that the provincial government has failed to act in terms of settlement services and in its public messaging blaming the federal government:

Cela fait plus d’une semaine, mais Mary Claire ne décolère pas. « Lorsque je vais m’être calmée, je vais appeler Denis. Je vais l’appeler, certain ! » Denis qui ? Trudel. Le député du coin, élu sous la bannière du Bloc québécois.

« Quand j’ai vu la publicité du Bloc, qui dit que c’est comme un “tout-inclus” pour les immigrants au Québec maintenant, j’avais envie de leur dire de commencer par venir voir c’est quoi, les conditions réelles de ces gens-là, avant de dire n’importe quoi ! C’est pas un “tout-inclus” pantoute ! Ça n’a pas d’allure de dire ça ! »

Sur la Rive-Sud dans la région de Montréal, Mary Claire Macleod dirige L’Entraide chez nous. Aucune demi-coquille de noix de coco, remplie à ras bord de piña colada, ne traîne dans ses locaux. À midi, une poignée de bénévoles et de permanents mangent leurs sandwiches. Ils attendent qu’arrive, sur le coup de 13 h, un lot de nécessiteux, comme on disait autrefois.

L’Entraide chez nous est installé dans le sous-sol d’une église plantée au milieu d’un quartier défavorisé, comme on dit aujourd’hui pour éviter d’être confronté au sens des mots pauvreté et inégalité. L’organisme a été fondé en 1970 par Mme Robidoux. Elle avait accouché de vingt-trois enfants, Mme Robidoux. Vingt-trois. Elle éprouvait la fragilité de son milieu. Un milieu laissé à lui-même, avec pour seule promesse d’avenir son lot de misères. C’était à l’heure où Robert Bourassa, nouveau premier ministre, se gargarisait de projets de béton et d’acier, au nom d’une modernité dont le monde d’en bas était exclu d’emblée. Bourassa est passé. La misère du quartier est restée.

Yvane Fournier et Diane Roberge distribuent du pain, des fruits, des légumes, de la viande congelée. Ça fait trente ans qu’elles travaillent là. « C’est pire que jamais », dit Yvane.

Ces bénévoles gardent leur téléphone portable à portée de main. Ils l’utilisent à tout moment pour traduire, en espagnol, quelques mots de français. « Le plus dur est de voir des hommes à mon bureau se mettre à pleurer. Ce sont eux qui craquent le plus, on dirait. Ils sont à bout », dit Mary Claire Macleod d’un air dépité.

« Les familles de nouveaux arrivants se retrouvent à devoir vivre les unes avec les autres », explique Lydie, une des responsables de l’accueil. Elle me parle de six adultes, forcés de vivre dans un 5 ½, avec une dizaine d’enfants. « Ils n’ont même pas de matelas pour tout le monde. »

Pour obtenir de quoi manger, il faut présenter sa carte. Les habitués de L’Entraide, avant, l’appelaient « la carte pain ». Cela dit bien le degré de précarité dont témoigne ce bout de carton plastifié.

« Avant, on offrait environ mille services de dépannage par an. Là, en moins de six mois, on en a déjà offert plus que ça », expose Mary Claire. Ce n’est pourtant pas la première fois que la situation est difficile. En 2001, après les attentats aux États-Unis, il y avait eu un afflux de demandes, se souvient-elle. En 2008 aussi, avec la crise financière. Et de nouveau en 2010, avec le tremblement de terre en Haïti. En 2017, pour aider les demandeurs d’asile, le Stade olympique avait été réquisitionné. Mais là, le soutien venu d’en haut fait défaut. Les organismes d’aide sont laissés à eux-mêmes. « En plus, la boîte de tomates coupées en dés que je payais 99 ¢ coûte maintenant le double. »

Pour Eva Gracia-Turgeon, coordonnatrice de Foyer du monde, un centre d’hébergement pour familles demandeuses d’asile, le gouvernement de la CAQ réussit un exploit en matière de communication politique. « La CAQ projette l’illusion que cette situation chaotique dépend entièrement du gouvernement fédéral. Beaucoup de gens achètent ça. Pourtant, c’est faux ! En fait, il faut savoir que, depuis la réouverture des frontières après la pandémie, le provincial n’a pas revu les services. Si ça va mal, c’est beaucoup par sa faute. C’est un gros shitshow. »

En principe, les demandeurs d’asile sont pris en charge par les services québécois du PRAIDA, un programme provincial remboursé par Ottawa. Ses assises remontent à 1956. En 2021, le bel édifice historique qu’occupaient les bureaux du PRAIDA, rue Saint-Denis, a été vidé. N’aurait-il pas pu servir encore, en ces temps où tout déborde ?

Durant la pandémie, le nombre de places d’hébergements du PRAIDA a été réduit, en raison de la fermeture temporaire des frontières. Les places n’ont pourtant pas augmenté depuis, même si tout est redevenu comme avant. Des dix sites d’hébergement, il n’en reste plus que deux, soit 1150 places au total. Ce qui est largement insuffisant. Des hôtels, que le fédéral utilisait pour des quarantaines, sont désormais réquisitionnés pour héberger les migrants, dans des conditions qui laissent beaucoup à désirer. On est loin de Playa del Carmen. « C’est le fédéral qui ramasse les pots cassés, parce que l’administration du PRAIDA ne relève pas de lui », explique Eva Gracia-Turgeon.

« Ça arrange Québec de ne pas bouger », dit Eva. « Ça donne l’impression que, par la seule faute d’Ottawa, nous n’avons pas la capacité de nous occuper de ces gens. Ce n’est pas vrai ! Si ça ne fonctionne pas en ce moment, c’est beaucoup parce que le gouvernement du Québec ne fait rien, qu’il laisse les groupes communautaires s’arranger tout seul, qu’il s’en lave les mains, tout en accusant le fédéral. » Personne ne penserait pour autant donner une médaille du mérite au fédéral.

Pendant ce temps, nos bretteurs aux épées de fer-blanc, ceux qui tiennent des propos incendiaires à propos des immigrants, ont trouvé là des cibles commodes et faciles. Hormis un temps d’arrêt pour considérer quelques ballons chinois, toute leur attention est pointée vers ces boucs émissaires, au nom d’une rhétorique identitaire. Au point de détourner l’attention publique de problèmes pourtant importants. C’est à se demander si nos vaillants tigres de papier, obnubilés par ce seul sujet, ne trouveraient pas le moyen de nous gonfler d’autres ballons si les migrants n’existaient pas. D’ailleurs, n’est-ce pas un peu ce qu’ils font déjà, en nous en parlant tout le temps ?

Source: Nadeau: Les ballons de l’immigration

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , , , ,

Yakabuski: Déplacer le problème

2023/02/20 Leave a comment

Good analysis of the issues and the problem for the government, particularly should the Supreme Court rule against the STCA. Potential for a comparable impact to the 1985 Singh decision which required the government to provide due process to anyone who arrived on Canadian soil:

La ministre de l’Immigration du Québec, Christine Fréchette, s’est dite heureuse d’apprendre que les autorités fédérales avaient transféré vers l’Ontario la presque totalité des quelque 500 demandeurs d’asile arrivés par le chemin Roxham en fin de semaine dernière. Selon Mme Fréchette, voilà bien la preuve que le gouvernement du Québec « peut avoir des résultats » en exprimant sans cesse son mécontentement face à l’inaction d’Ottawa devant le flux grandissant de migrants irréguliers qui passent par le chemin Roxham depuis sa réouverture, en novembre 2021.

La ministre Fréchette a imploré le gouvernement fédéral de continuer d’envoyer ailleurs au Canada plus des trois quarts des demandeurs d’asile qui traversent ce poste frontalier non officiel pour ne laisser au Québec qu’une proportion de migrants équivalente à son poids démographique au sein de la fédération canadienne. « On espère que ça va se maintenir dans le temps, et que ça va être la nouvelle approche de gestion de la frontière », a-t-elle ajouté.

Toutefois, le bonheur des uns fait parfois le malheur des autres. Dans la région de Niagara, dans le sud de l’Ontario, l’arrivée des migrants en provenance du chemin Roxham suscite de vives inquiétudes chez les autorités municipales et les organismes de bienfaisance. Cette région est dotée d’un plus grand nombre de chambres d’hôtel que la moyenne en raison de sa vocation touristique, active surtout en été. Alors, il n’est pas surprenant qu’Ottawa l’ait choisie comme destination pour les migrants que le Québec dit ne plus avoir la capacité d’accueillir.

Or, alors que le gouvernement s’apprêterait à louer environ 2000 chambres d’hôtel afin d’y loger temporairement les migrants dans le sud de l’Ontario, certains intervenants expriment des réserves sur la nouvelle stratégie d’Ottawa. « Sans préavis, sans préparation, cela nous met dans une position très difficile, a affirmé cette semaine le maire de Niagara Falls, Jim Diodati, dans une entrevue au St. Catharines Standard. Comment pouvons-nous gérer une situation comme celle-ci quand nous avons déjà une crise du logement et une crise d’accessibilité au logement ? Cela va absolument exacerber un problème déjà existant. » À quelques semaines du début de la saison touristique printanière, il a dit prévoir « un gros problème » à l’horizon.

En agissant de la sorte dans ce dossier, le gouvernement du premier ministre Justin Trudeau démontre de nouveau ses piètres capacités en matière de gestion de crise. Il est pris entre sa base progressiste, qui souhaiterait ouvrir les frontières canadiennes à tous ceux « qui fuient la persécution, la terreur et la guerre » — comme M. Trudeau avait lui-même promis de le faire en 2017 dans un gazouillis dorénavant entré dans l’histoire —, et les contradictions de ses propres politiques d’immigration.

Les véritables réfugiés se voient damer le pion par des passeurs qui exploitent la vulnérabilité des migrants fuyant des conditions de vie difficiles en Amérique latine ou en Afrique pour leur retirer le peu d’argent dont ils disposent. On a beau vouloir être généreux envers ces personnes, l’intégrité de notre système d’immigration en prend pour son rhume et le Canada consolide sa réputation de passoire dont profite quiconque veut s’en prévaloir.

Ottawa se trouve dépourvu d’arguments face à un gouvernement américain qui n’a aucun intérêt à accéder à sa demande de « moderniser » l’Entente sur les tiers pays sûrs (ETPS). Les quelque 40 000 demandeurs d’asile qui sont arrivés au Canada par le chemin Roxham en 2022 ne constituent qu’une goutte d’eau dans l’océan migratoire américain. Même des politiciens démocrates comme le maire de New York, Eric Adams, ne voient pas pourquoi ils devraient se priver d’utiliser cette « faille » dans l’ETPS pour pallier quelque peu leur propre crise migratoire. Avouons-le, leur crise est infiniment plus sérieuse que la nôtre.

Alors, quoi faire ? Le transfert des demandeurs d’asile du chemin Roxham vers les autres provinces permet peut-être au gouvernement fédéral de réduire la pression sur le Québec, mais il risque de créer des tensions ailleurs au pays. Il est aussi possible que les passeurs voient dans la démarche fédérale un geste qui facilite leur travail. La capacité d’accueil du Québec atteint peut-être ses limites, mais le transfert par Ottawa des demandeurs d’asile vers l’Ontario crée plus de possibilités pour les profiteurs du système.

Espérons que le gouvernement Trudeau se dotera d’un plan B au cas où la Cour suprême invaliderait l’Entente sur les tiers pays sûrs. En 2020, la Cour fédérale avait trouvé que cette entente violait le droit à la vie, à la liberté et à la sécurité de la personne garanti par la Charte canadienne des droits et libertés. La Cour d’appel fédérale avait par la suite infirmé cette décision.

Toutefois, la notion selon laquelle les États-Unis ne constituent pas un pays « sûr » pour les demandeurs d’asile jouit de l’appui de beaucoup d’adeptes au Canada. En cas d’invalidation de l’ETPS, le Canada devrait accueillir tous les demandeurs d’asile qui arrivent en provenance des États-Unis, même ceux qui passent par un poste frontalier officiel. Cela créerait un méchant dilemme pour M. Trudeau, au point de peut-être même le forcer à répudier le fameux gazouillis dont il semble encore si fier.

Source: Déplacer le problème

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Ndiaye: Voici pourquoi il est difficile – et peu souhaitable – de « fermer » le chemin Roxham

2023/02/11 Leave a comment

We will see what the SCC rules. But not convinced that the shutting or Roxham Road would have a minimal impact on numbers. The reason why over 95% choose Roxham is because of its convenience, relatively low risk and accessibility. Some are likely to weigh the risks accordingly and thus results in fewer irregular arrivals:

« Fermer » le chemin Roxham a été invoqué à maintes reprises ces dernières semaines, tant par des chroniqueurs que des élus, créant même un imbroglio entre la ministre québécoise de l’Immigration, Christine Fréchette, et son propre gouvernement caquiste. En 2022, un record de 50 000 demandeurs d’asile sont passés par le désormais célèbre chemin, qui relie la Montérégie et l’État de New York.

Ces demandeurs d’asile évitent les postes-frontières officiels entre le Canada et les États-Unis en raison de l’entente sur les tiers pays sûrs, signée en 2002 et entrée en vigueur en 2004. En vertu de cette entente, « les personnes qui entrent au Canada à un point d’entrée terrestre ne sont toujours pas admissibles à présenter une demande de statut de réfugié, et seront renvoyées aux États-Unis à moins qu’elles ne satisfassent à l’une des exceptions prévues dans l’Entente ».

Il y a en effet peu de chances qu’un demandeur d’asile puisse invoquer des persécutions aux États-Unis, un pays considéré comme « sûr ». De fait, sur les 62 113 demandes encore en instance devant la CISR en septembre 2022, seulement 274 considéraient les États-Unis comme pays de persécution.

La question qui se pose est la suivante : est-ce que l’entente sur les tiers pays sûrs pourrait être appliquée tout au long des 8 891 km qui nous séparent des États-Unis, afin de limiter le passage de ces demandeurs d’asile empruntant le chemin Roxham et d’autres chemins alternatifs ?

Du point de vue opérationnel, la réponse est non. Pas plus que le Québec ne peut fermer le chemin Roxham, car c’est le gouvernement fédéral qui a la compétence pour gérer les frontières canadiennes.

Par ailleurs, le Canada est soumis à des obligations résultant de la Charte canadienne des droits et libertés : il ne peut renvoyer les demandeurs d’asile vers un pays où il existe un risque de torture. En vertu du droit international, le Canada a aussi ratifié la Convention relative au statut des réfugiés et la convention contre la torture, qui implique ce principe de non-refoulement à toute personne risquant la torture, des traitements inhumains ou dégradants.

Professeure de droit des migrations à l’UQÀM, je suis directrice de l’Observatoire sur les migrations internationales, les réfugiés, les apatrides et l’asile (OMIRAS). Je propose ici un survol de ce que disent les lois internationales sur l’accueil de réfugiés.

Devant la Cour suprême

La saga judiciaire pour invalider l’entente sur les tiers pays sûrs a débuté en 2007 devant la Cour fédérale, ensuite devant la Cour d’appel fédérale, et s’est finalisée en 2009 par un rejet de la Cour suprême.

Depuis 2020, avec l’arrivée de dizaines de milliers de demandeurs arrivant des États-Unis par des points d’entrée non officiels, une nouvelle demande a été introduite par Amnistie internationale, le Conseil canadien des Églises, le Conseil canadien pour les réfugiés et des demandeurs d’asile afin de faire invalider l’entente. À la suite de plusieurs aller-retour devant la justice, une demande d’autorisation d’appel a été introduite. Le 16 décembre 2022, la Cour suprême a accepté de recevoir la cause et de réviser l’entente. Il faudra donc attendre la décision de la plus haute juridiction canadienne sur la validité ou non de l’entente

Un droit garanti en droit international

Le Canada accueille un nombre infime des demandeurs d’asile dans le monde. Le HCR les estime à plus de 4,9 millions. À eux s’ajoutent les 25 millions de réfugiés et plusieurs autres millions de déplacés internes. La plupart vivent dans les pays limitrophes de leur pays d’origine, comme la Jordanie, la Turquie ou le Liban, au Moyen-Orient, la Colombie, en Amérique du Sud, ou l’Ouganda et le Kenya, en Afrique (continent qui accueille le plus grand nombre de réfugiés).

Ultimement, le Canada est obligé de laisser les gens disant fuir des persécutions présenter leurs demandes d’asile, un droit garanti par l’ONU. Toutes ces demandes d’asile doivent être jugées recevables avant d’être transmises à la Section de protection des réfugiés, compétente pour examiner les demandes de protection internationale au Canada. Si les demandes remplissent les critères, les personnes seront reconnues comme des réfugiées au Canada.

Migrants irréguliers et demandeurs d’asile

Il y a présentement un amalgame entre migrations irrégulières et accueil des demandeurs d’asile. Pour ces derniers, l’entente sur les tiers pays sûrs leur permet d’arriver au Canada à travers le chemin Roxham (à leurs risques et périls). L’invalidation de l’entente permettrait aux personnes disant fuir des persécutions de présenter leur demande d’asile en toute sécurité au Canada, quel que soit leur lieu d’arrivée. Notons que des organisations de défense des migrants, dont Amnistie internationale, relatent des pratiques qui enfreignent les droits humains des demandeurs d’asile aux États-Unis.

Pour les migrations irrégulières, le Canada dispose d’un Programme d’aide mondiale aux migrants irréguliers (PAMMI) et des dispositions législatives pour éradiquer l’immigration irrégulière. Le Québec devra continuer la collaboration avec le gouvernement fédéral afin de lutter efficacement contre les migrations irrégulières notamment en ciblant les causes réelles de ces déplacements (inégalités économiques, changements climatiques, conflits et violences dans le monde).

D’autres chemins ouvriront

Le chemin Roxham présente des enjeux complexes. Mais il faut le situer dans son contexte mondial, avec la présence de plus de 100 millions de personnes en exil dans le monde.

Devant l’afflux de plus en plus de réfugiés, plus de 68 % des Québécois souhaitent la fermeture du chemin Roxham. Les pressions sur le système se font grandissantes. Il en coûte 20 millions de plus par mois à Québec en prestation d’aide sociale, notamment en raison du fait que le Québec accueille 64 % de ces demandes d’asile au Canada et que le Canada tarde à délivrer des permis de travail.

Malgré cela, il n’est pas pertinent de fermer le chemin Roxham, car d’autres points d’entrée le remplaceront, exposant les demandeurs d’asile à davantage de risques et de dangers. L’exemple de l’Union européenne est révélateur : dès qu’une route se ferme, d’autres encore plus dangereuses s’ouvrent et le nombre de personnes décédées ou disparues grimpent. À cela s’ajoutent les multiples violations des droits humains dont font l’objet ces millions d’hommes, de femmes et d’enfants fuyant les guerres et les persécutions.

Source: Voici pourquoi il est difficile – et peu souhaitable – de « fermer » le chemin Roxham

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ICYMI Globe Editorial: There’s a growing crisis at Roxham Road, and Ottawa doesn’t have a plan to fix it

2023/02/10 Leave a comment

Valid critique:

Is Canada in the midst of a border crisis? It’s hard to tell. Prior to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, however, there was no doubt about it.

In 2017, a dramatic surge in the number of people entering Canada illegally on an uncontrolled rural road running across the border between Quebec and New York State was the hot story of the summer.

…

Source: There’s a growing crisis at Roxham Road, and Ottawa doesn’t have a plan to fix it

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , , ,

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