Thread: Once a Frightened Newcomer, Argentine Consul Now Seeks to...

www.nytimes.com

July 29, 2005
Once a Frightened Newcomer, Argentine Consul Now Seeks to Guide Immigrants
By NINA BERNSTEIN
Twenty-six years ago, as a young political refugee from Argentina, Hector Timerman was afraid to ask police officers for directions. When the landlord of his Greenwich Village apartment failed to provide heat, he just moved. And when he faced a judge in small-claims court, he trembled, remembering judges in Argentina under the military dictatorship that had imprisoned and tortured his father.

Today, Mr. Timerman, 51, is consul general of a democratic Argentina in New York, a city where he feels thoroughly at home. But he has not forgotten what it is like to be a newcomer. He has just published the consulate's first guide for Argentine immigrants in the New York metropolitan region, who he estimates have grown to 100,000, both legal and illegal. Many are part of an exodus that began in 1994 and soared after Argentina's economic collapse in 2001. They are far needier, and far more likely to be in the United States illegally, than an earlier wave of middle-class professionals who began arriving in the 1960's, or political exiles like Mr. Timerman, whose father, the distinguished journalist Jacobo Timerman, was one of the junta's most celebrated prisoners.

At a time of growing American anger over illegal immigration, Mr. Timerman is well aware of the diplomatic risks of producing the free 115-page guide, which answers 195 questions in Spanish about negotiating life in the city, or as he puts it, "from where to buy Argentine pizza to how to complain about police brutality."

He stressed that the 5,000 copies would be distributed only to those who have already emigrated, unlike a pamphlet produced by the Mexican government that caused a furor because it instructed migrants on how to safely enter the United States illegally and live here undetected.

"We are not promoting immigration from Argentina - on the contrary," said Mr. Timerman, who returned to Argentina in 1989 after spending a decade in New York, where he helped found the advocacy organization Human Rights First. "The reality is that they are already here. I have to look after them. We cannot abandon them - they are part of Argentine society."

During an interview at the consulate, a neo-Georgian mansion at 12 West 56th Street, just west of Fifth Avenue, Mr. Timerman reflected on the historic turns that made such a guide necessary, and that put him, the grandson of humble Russian Jewish immigrants to Buenos Aires, in the position to publish it.

For most of its history, Argentina was a country of immigration. But in 2001, the economy collapsed. Whether citizens blamed policies of the International Monetary Fund or government corruption, they were suddenly unable to cash a paycheck. Bank accounts were frozen, and 55 percent of the population sank into poverty. "People saw no future, especially for their kids," the consul said.

Most of those who left went to Spain or Italy, but many came to the United States, which between 1994 and 2002 included Argentina among countries whose citizens did not need a visa to visit. By the time Argentines were removed from the visa waiver program, hundreds of thousands who had arrived as tourists were working in the country illegally, trying to rebuild their lives.

The economy is now improving, and some Argentines are heading back. Ernesto Semán, the consulate's director of community affairs, said about 40 a month show up at the consulate for the necessary customs forms. But many others ask how to survive in New York.

To illustrate how badly the guide is needed, Mr. Semán, who wrote it, recalled the case of a woman who was recently waiting in line to renew her passport. She looked so pale, he said, that a staff member kept asking if she was all right. Finally she disclosed that she had been suffering from a urinary tract infection for three weeks, afraid to seek medical attention because she was not a legal immigrant. By the time she was treated, he added, she had to spend a week in the hospital.

The guide, which is available at the consulate, details the city services available to such immigrants, including public clinics, and emphasizes that workers are forbidden from disclosing immigration status . Along with practicalities like check-cashing establishments and apartment-hunting Web sites, it lists tango spots and Argentine bakeries that are "helping with nostalgia," said Mr. Timerman.

His own, different brand of nostalgia surfaced when he learned that the photographer shooting his portrait for this article was the same one who had taken his picture in 1979. Then, he was in flight from the regime that would kill thousands of "desaparecidos" (the disappeared), among them Mr. Semán's father and two uncles.

"I was very lucky," said Mr. Timerman, recalling the influential Americans who embraced him, including members of the Carter administration and Osborn Elliott, then the dean of the journalism school at Columbia University, who swiftly arranged for him to publish an opinion article in Newsweek and sent him to earn a master's degree in international relations.

"You have backlash against the immigrants now, after Sept. 11," he said. "But it's the only country in the world to reach out that way."

"We are not promoting immigration from Argentina - on the contrary," said Mr. Timerman, who returned to Argentina in 1989 after spending a decade in New York, where he helped found the advocacy organization Human Rights First. "The reality is that they are already here. I have to look after them. We cannot abandon them - they are part of Argentine society."

Then, your job is to HELP THEM return to Argentine Society in Argentina!!

See how that works? Educate them that they are violating American law, Americans are fed up, Americans want it stopped, Americans want illegal Argentinians to return to Argentina. Argentina is a nice country with a nice society, eh? Why wouldn't they wnat to go home and participate in their own Society instead of OURS which is becoming hostile and unfriendly towards illegal aliens?

HELP THEM RETURN TO ARGENTINA!!