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Refugee asylum accord under fire
Rights groups launching legal challenge
U.S. shouldn't be considered safe, critics say
Dec. 29, 2005. 04:16 PM
OLIVIA WARD
STAFF REPORTER


A refugee asylum agreement between Canada and the United States should be struck down because of its "devastating" effect on the safety of asylum-seekers, says a report by a prominent refugee rights coalition.

The Montreal-based Canadian Council on Refugees is joining Amnesty International and the Canadian Council of Churches to launch a legal challenge in Federal Court against the Safe Third Country Agreement, claiming that the United States should no longer be declared safe for refugees.

The agreement, which came into effect one year ago, on Dec. 29, 2004, says that because both the U.S. and Canada are safe countries, asylum-seekers must make claims only in the first country in which they set foot.

Until this year, refugees could land in the United States, then apply for asylum to Canada. It is easier for many refugees to reach the United States because the U.S. receives international flights from more countries.

Since the Safe Third Country Agreement, the refugee council report says, there has been a "dramatic drop" in Canadian refugee claims.

This has raised fears that thousands of would-be claimants may end up in countries where they would be tortured or killed.

"We cannot stand by and see the government close the door on refugees on the pretext that the United States can be relied on to protect them," said Liz McWeeny, president of the council for refugees.

"Canadians know that non-citizens' rights are not necessarily protected by the U.S. government, now of all times. We are asking the courts to rule that the agreement is unconstitutional and in breach of international law."

The three organizations will argue that the U.S. doesn't meet the criteria for a safe third country because it ignores its obligations under the international conventions against torture and the treatment of refugees.


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`The U.S. was not safe for Maher Arar and it isn't safe for refugees.'

Liz McWeeny, president of the Canadian Council for Refugees

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By returning claimants to the U.S., they said, Canada is violating its international obligations to refugees, and to the upholding of human rights.

"The U.S. was not safe for Maher Arar and it isn't safe for refugees," McWeeny said, referring to the deportation by the U.S. of an Ottawa man to Syria, where he was detained and tortured.

The Canadian Council for Refugees' report, "Closing the Front Door," says that in 2005 Canada will have received only 19,562 asylum claims, its lowest number since the mid-1980s.

"This is significantly below the average of 29,680 claims annually since the current refugee determination system came into effect in 1989," it said, adding the government's efforts to clamp down are having a "serious impact on asylum seekers' ability to travel to a country where they might find protection."

"We believe it's intolerable in a country that claims to be upholding human rights," said Janet Dench, the refugee council's executive director. "We are turning a blind eye to human rights abuses, and denying protection to people whose lives may be at risk.

"We believe it is a clear sign that the government wants to have fewer people making claims in Canada. In that objective they have succeeded," Dench said.

Although the agreement assumes that the U.S. is safe for refugees, the report says Ottawa is "turning a blind eye to egregious abuses of human rights by the U.S. government and does not inquire into the fate of those denied access to Canada's refugee determination system."

Washington has made it increasingly difficult for asylum-seekers, the report said, citing as examples increased demands for documentation of abuse, emphasis on the asylum-seeker's "demeanour" when making a claim, and barring of those whose families are associated with groups classed as terrorist.

Thousands of asylum-seekers are also held for long periods in U.S. jails, where detainees say they have been abused.

People denied legal access to Canada turn to unlawful, sometimes dangerous ways of entry, Dench said. It gives an incentive for crossing illegally, and it also gives business to smugglers."