Stop the Hogs!

Canada's response to refugee crises today a stark contrast to past efforts

[ http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/nat ... e26223762/ ]

Sean Fine The Globe and Mail Published Thursday, Sep. 03, 2015 11:00PM
EDT Last updated Friday, Sep. 04, 2015 8:25AM EDT
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“We never lose with refugees. Refugees arrive with no place to go but up.” - Mike Molloy, Canadian official (PC Joe Clark government) who oversaw the airlifting Vietnamese boat people, 1979
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The Syrian refugee crisis has exposed a wall of bureaucratic hurdles in Canada’s renowned refugee-sponsorship system that did not exist during previous crises, when the country brought in huge airlifts of desperate people.

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Decades before the current crisis, Canada airlifted 5,000 people from Kosovo in the late 1990s, 5,000 from Uganda in 1972, and 60,000 Vietnamese in 1979-80. From January, 2014, to late last month, Canada resettled 2,374 Syrian refugees.

Mike Molloy was the Canadian government official who oversaw the airlifting of the Vietnamese boat people and removed bureaucratic obstacles. “The motto out there was not ‘do the thing right,’ it was ‘do the right thing,’” the 71-year-old, who lives in Ottawa, said in an interview.

The approach was spearheaded at first by Joe Clark’s Progressive Conservative government in 1979.

“The goal was initially to move 50,000 people in 18 months,” Mr. Molloy said. That became 60,000 in two years under Liberal Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau in 1980. The government offered to match all private sponsorships, galvanizing the public. It was the formal launch of a system that involved communities in guaranteeing the care, shelter and early costs of refugees. That system has since brought in more than 200,000 refugees.

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Green Party Calls on the Government to Use Military Transport to Bring Syrian Refugees to Canada

[ http://www.greenparty.ca/en/media-relea ... n-refugees ]

September 05, 2015

(OTTAWA) - The Green Party of Canada is calling on Stephen Harper to utilize the Canadian Armed Forces to help bring Syrian refugees to Canada by the most efficient means possible, whether that is transport planes or ships.

“Using our Armed Forces in a humanitarian crisis of this proportion is justified when you consider that we do not hesitate in the case of natural disasters,” said Green Leader Elizabeth May, (Saanich - Gulf Islands).

“In the past, we have opened our arms to bring 50 000 boat people, 37 000 Hungarians, and 11 000 Czechs to Canada. Canadian hearts are as big as this country. We are ready to step up again,” said Elizabeth May.

The Green Party of Canada also supports the Canadian Council for Refugees and Amnesty International Canada, who called Thursday for Syrians with family in Canada to be allowed entry immediately to complete their processing in safety.

“We ask for special measures, like temporary resident permits, so refugee cases are treated with the urgency they deserve,” said May.

“We also need to overhaul the Harper-created laws around treatment of refugees - this is entirely possible while maintaining high security in screening; we must find the political will to make this happen.”

“With the scale of the crisis, Canada should be ramping up the number of Syrian refugees to 40 000 over the next 5 years. It's clear that we must do more to end the conflict, including living up to our commitments to the UN High Commission for Refugees,” concluded May. -30-

For additional information or to arrange an interview, contact:

Julian Morelli
Director of Communications
Green Party of Canada
cell: (613) 614 4916
office: (613) 562 4916 (224)
julian.morelli@greenparty.ca

Or

Kirsten Strom
Executive Assistant to Director of Communications
t: 613.562.4916 (200)
Toll Free 1.866.868.3447
kirsten.strom@greenparty.ca

Migrant crisis weighs as party leaders respond to Canada's refugee policy

[ http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/pol ... e26226003/ ]

Bill Curry OTTAWA — The Globe and Mail Published Friday, Sep. 04, 2015 11:36AM EDT Last updated Friday, Sep. 04, 2015 5:35PM EDT

Stephen Harper and Thomas Mulcair traded attacks over the merits of Canada’s military efforts in Iraq and Syria as the Conservative Leader repeated Friday that refugee policy alone is not the answer to the region’s escalating humanitarian crisis.

All three major political parties resumed their regular campaign events Friday after a dramatic day as Canadian refugee policy suddenly attracted international attention. The shocking image of three-year-old Alan Kurdi’s dead body and the revelation that the Kurdi family had hoped to come to Canada continued to weigh on the campaign as party leaders put forward their positions as to the best government response.

Mr. Mulcair, the NDP Leader, criticized Mr. Harper for focusing his comments this week on highlighting the importance of Canada’s bombing campaign in the region.

“No amount of military action would have saved that child on that beach yesterday. So let’s start acting to save lives immediately,” said Mr. Mulcair, who repeated his call for the Canadian government to accept 10,000 Syrian refugees before the end of the year.

The NDP Leader argued that the region’s troubles date back to the misguided military invasion of Iraq in 2003 and that there is no role for the Canadian military in attempting to choose sides in a Syrian civil war.

“The NDP disagrees with the use of Canada’s Armed Forces in that conflict. We’ve been clear on that since the beginning,” he said at an event in Brossard, Que.

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Harper must be held accountable for failing Syrian Refugees

[ http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=22221 ]

Outrage continues to mount in the wake of the tragic drowning of a three year-old Syrian toddler, Ayan Kurdi, [
http://ipolitics.ca/2015/09/03/on-the-r ... t-napping/ ] his 5 year-old brother and their mother, refugees fleeing the war in their country, and in light of the ever increasing evidence that Canada has put almost impenetrable bureaucratic hurdles before those seeking refuge in Canada. [
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/nat ... e26223762/ ]

Much of the criticism has been deservedly laid at the door of the inept and grossly insensitive Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, Chris Alexander, who put his campaign temporarily on hold and flew to Ottawa. [ http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada- ... -1.3213869 ] His stated reason was to address the immigration crisis, but it soon became clear that the real reason was to engage in largely futile damage control, in the face of the damning evidence that the Kurdi family had sought help from Canada – his help in fact – and had received none.

What is lacking to date is equal amounts of Canadian public and pundit outrage over Prime Minister Harper’s blatant attempt to change the channel [ http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/harper- ... -1.3215028 ] by alleging that the real solution was not better Canadian refugee asylum procedures but increased bombing of Islamic State. Even if the military air strikes against Islamic state were proving effective, which anti-ISIL Coalition spokespersons admit is not the case, [
https://www.opendemocracy.net/paul-roge ... nd-reality ] it would take a very long time to produce decisive results, thus doing absolutely nothing to help refugees fleeing the war and in desperate need right now and, in the meantime, creating even more refugee flows.

But even if increased military action against Islamic State were to prove effective in the short term, this still would do absolutely nothing to stop the flow of refugees fleeing bombings and other attacks from the other parties to the conflict in Syria, namely the Assad government on the one hand and the array of opposition forces, in addition to Islamic State, fighting against Assad on the other hand. Additionally, since Islamic State is the most capable force fighting against President Assad, one can make a strong argument that their elimination would lead to even more, not less, refugees fleeing Assad government bombings. If Harper is really looking for an end to the war, the answer lies where it always has, in a UN-brokered peace deal with Assad, however unpalatable that might be. [ https://www.opendemocracy.net/arab-awak ... -for-syria ]

Prime Minister Harper’s assertion that the real solution to the Syrian refugee crisis is greater military action against Islamic State simply does not stand up to scrutiny. It is a diversion, a case of bait and switch, and the sooner he is called to account for it, the better.

Yours in peace,

Peggy Mason,
Rideau Institute and Ceasefire.ca
63 Sparks St, Suite 608
Ottawa Ontario K1P 5A6
Canada

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“Canada’s Syrian Responsibilities–and Others’” - Sept. 6, 2015
[ https://cgai3ds.wordpress.com/2015/09/0 ... nd-others/ ]

Migrant crisis weighs as party leaders respond to Canada's refugee policy – Sep. 4, 2015
[ http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/pol ... e26226003/ ]