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Absender : ac119@FREENET.TORONTO.ON.CA (Tom Patterson) Org.-Empf. : LABOR-L@YORKU.CA Weiterleiter owner-labor-l@YORKU.CA Antwort an : LABOR-L@YORKU.CA Betreff : STOP THE WAR ON IMMIGRANTS AND REFUGEES!!! National Day of Action Datum : Mi 13.05.98, 19:44 (erhalten: 14.05.98) Groesse : 6112 Bytes ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ## Nachricht am 14.05.98 archiviert ## Ursprung: /labor-l@also.ol.ni.schule.de
---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 13 May 1998 12:21:26 -0400 () From: Polkaroo!!! <yu217096@YorkU.CA> Subject: National Day of Action, May 29th (fwd)
STOP THE WAR ON IMMIGRANTS AND REFUGEES!!!
Currently the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration is undergoing an overhaul that will increase the white supremist and anti-poor attacks on Immigrants and Refugees trying to come to Canada. The overhaul comes in the form of a series of recommendations entitled Not Just Numbers: A Canadian Framework for Immigration. These recommendations provide for two major attacks on the rights of Refugees and Immigrants: the complete destruction of any democratic process for deciding who qualifies as a Refugee, and the granting of draconian powers to the enforcers of Ministry policies. "These recommendations are part and parcel of a global war against Immigrants and Refugees," stated Hassan Varash of the International Federation of Iranian Refugees.
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NATIONAL DAY OF ACTION
Friday, May 29th has been declared a national day of action in support of Immigrants' and Refugees' rights.
*Toronto A rally will take place at 11am at the Liberal Party Headquarters, 10 St. Mary, just south of Bloor and Yonge. The event will be sign language interpreted for the hearing impaired, and food will be provided by Food Not Bombs. For more information contact the International Federation of Iranian Refugees at (416)777-0722 or the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty at (416)925-6939.
*Guelph A bus will leave for the Toronto rally from Willow West Mall at 8:30am and from Royal City Plaza at 9:00am. A planning meeting for the day of action and other local events is scheduled for Thursday May 14th, 6:00pm at the Guelph International Resource Centre, 23 Woolwich. For more info call (519)766-9018 or email <gs@uoguelph.ca>.
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BACKGROUND INFO
*Canada's Racism and deciding who is a Refugee
The first major change recommended in Not Just Numbers is to force
Refugees to apply for Refugee status in their country of origin. The
dangers of this are readily apparent. Though the recommendations provide
vague ideas of a "fast track" process for people in danger, the reality is
that people in danger will be in further danger as the governments they
are attempting to escape from realize that they are trying to flee.
Furthermore, by making decisions in other countries, the government
escapes any form of accountability to the public, and will be able to
operate in virtual secrecy. According to the Canadian Council for
Refugees, "The result will inevitably be injustice -- and Refugees
returned to imprisonment, torture, or death."
Currently, such decisions are made by a quasi-legal, supposedly
independent board called the Immigration Review Board (IRB). These boards
are, of course, biased, making decisions based on the whims of the current
political leadership; however they do hold some semblance of a fair
process. The task force report proposes that these boards be destroyed and
be replaced by a single bureaucrat. This civil servant would have no
independence from their Ministry's governmental mandate to limit numbers
of incoming Refugees and Immigrants. Lastly, the ability of Refugees to
appeal these decisions to an actual court will be severely restricted.
The report also recommends forcing all family class Immigrants
over the age of six to pay the tuition fees in order to learn English or
French. Not Just Numbers also recommends that people who have received
welfare benefits in the last 12 months NOT be allowed to sponsor members
of their family to join them in Canada. these recommendations increase the
barriers to immigration for economically disadvantaged people, many of
whom are economically disadvantaged because of racism or sexism.
*Compliance: building Hate in the System
Refugee Claimants in Canada will now have a new status, called
"provisional", under which they will be fingerprinted and tracked like
criminals. And even this inhumane status will ONLY be granted to people
who are "cooperative" (p.8). The current system already contains "danger
to the public" legislation which allows for the detention and removal of
people who commit minor property crimes, or just have politics Canada
doesn't like (like Manickavasagan Suresh, the Tamil leader currently in
detention for over two years). These recommendations will make the system
even worse, as well as granting extended power to those who enforce these
rules, as well as criminalizing every Refugee Claimant. What this
basically means is that Immigrants and Refugees just arriving to this
country will not be guaranteed the same basic rights and freedoms that
Canadians are legally entitled to -- the same rights and freedoms for
which many people immigrate to Canada in the first place.
*Corporate Interest at work
"Tell me who's to blame for the hate that hate produced?"
-- Paris Guerrilla Funk
We are living in the New World Order, the system created by
agreements such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the
Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI). In this system, corporations
are free to move wherever they want: stealing resources and exploiting
labour wherever they can. In this context, corporations rely on local
governments to enforce the exploitative conditions they demand. If people
are free to flee these governments, or to move where labour is organized
or conditions are better, then corporations are in trouble. It is in this
context that we see the crackdown, the "war" on Immigrants.
THESE RECOMMENDATIONS ARE JUST THAT - RECOMMENDATIONS. THEY CAN
AND MUST BE STOPPED.
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Last Modified: July 1998