Clampdown on Refugees, from Vancouver to Montréal

[lagatta]

And perhaps eastwards?

An opinion piece and a news story about the impact of the Harperite clampdown on refugee claimants:

http://tinyurl.com/tamilsvancouver Why we should welcome boatful of Tamil refugees into Canada, about a lot of the history, going back to the times of the SS St. Louis

and from here, http://tinyurl.com/montreal-asile Montreal deserted by asylum seekers (in French: cyberpresse). Haitian claimants are especially hard hit as so many arrived in the US via unseaworthy crafts and somehow made it up here where many have family and friends (and of course many Haitians do speak French, as well as Creole). There are practically no refugees in the many welcoming centres here!

[Croghan27]

...... I went down to the demonstration
  To get my fair share of abuse

Just returned from a demonstration in support of the Tamils that arrived off BC last week. It was organized by a group called "No One Is Illegal".

A not bad turnout for a week day .... 30-40 people (it was at a corner and I could not see around the to the other side.)

The police contingent was not of the G8/20 school of crowd control - perhaps because it was in the middle of 10,000 public servants at noon - and stayed back, no doubt talking about union stuff.

There was one grumpy looking fellow sitting across the street with a sign that said that being a refugee was not a right but a privilege ... after reading that pearl of wisdom, I paid him no more attention.

Did some chanting, listened to some speeches .... a well done expedition all 'round.

(The only crime I saw was that I think it must be illegal for so many people to so young!  )

[Holly Stick]

Were the demonstrators mostly young in years, as opposed to young at heart like you, croghan? 

[Croghan27]

Were the demonstrators mostly young in years, as opposed to young at heart like you, croghan? 

(Putting on his best Charles Boyer accent, crogh says) The charming Ms. Stick is more zen kind. :)

They were, overwhelmingly young in years .... but high up there in enthusiasm ... the only other person approaching my exhaulted age was the grumpy fellow sitting across the street extolling the virtues of silly signs.

[skdadl]

Were the demonstrators mostly young in years, as opposed to young at heart like you, croghan? 

Wot she said. 

[Alison]

Good for you, Croghie. Clogs in the streets

[lagatta]

Of course the real villains here are the "mainstream" hard-right government, but such actions attract the far-right like rotting food attracts vermin.

The Link, an Indo-Canadian paper, has a short piece on how the notorious neo-Nazi Paul Fromm has latched on to this cause. Canadian Media Clamouring to give well-known racist/neo-Nazi a platform: http://www.thelinkpaper.ca/?p=2605

Anti-Racist Canada also quotes this: http://anti-racistcanada.blogspot.com/2010/08/paulie-protests-in-london.html

The danger with these characters is not any risk of them taking power - the so-called mainstream right is doing just fine implementing racist policies, whether Harper, Sarko or Berlusclowni. The danger is violent attacks on vulnerable groups, or anyone they might think is a Tamil (in this case). They aren't known for their acumen in that respect.

[lagatta]

Tory anti-refugee measures and rightwing persecution of Hungarian Roma

I had been thinking of starting up a specific thread about the Cons' latest proposed anti-refugee legislation, with the restrictions on refugees from "democratic" countries such as Mexico and most especially the European Union states, but thought reviving this one was logical, and it also values the contributions of our late friend and comrade Croghan.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/the-next-stop-for-the-roma-canada/article1441459/

This article does provide a good summary of what is going on in Hungary, where a very hard-right party with ties to the thuggish, Neo-Nazioid Hungarian Guard, will likely make gains on the current government (already very far right and persecuting Jews, "subversive" intellectuals and most especially the Roma community).

Alas, duckduckgoing (and not googling) "Roma refugees Canada" bring out our own racist and ethnocentric scum, including those saying the Roma are seeking a taxpayer-expenses-paid holiday in Canada...

[lagatta]

Joe Fiorito of the Star has a good article today about Hungarian Roma people seeking refuge in Parkdale:
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1154919--fiorito-roma-seek-refuge-in-parkdale?bn=1 Like many of his pieces, it is a case study.

The threats to Roma in Hungary are even more systemic than the article states, due to the political weight of the far-right, nostalgic for the Arrow Cross, local Nazi collaborators.

[lagatta]

http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/karl-nerenberg/2012/06/board-rabbis-slams-harper-government-over-bill-c-31

Ha! According to Karl Nerenberg, the Toronto Board of Rabbis is slamming the Harper government over bill c-31, notably the failure to recognize the risk to Hungarian Roma people with a neo-Nazi party around and about, and the restrictions on health care for refugee claimants. Also other prominent "mainstream" (aka Zionist) members of the Jewish community such as our old babble pal Bernie Farber...

Rather late in the day, as Nerenberg says, but he adds this:

"As long as the only objections to these aspects of C-31 came from the Roma community and human rights oriented groups, the government seemed to believe there would be no price to pay for its tough stance.
The intervention of the Toronto Board of Rabbis marks the first time that a major and official Jewish institution has taken on the Harper government.
This government has worked very hard to cultivate Jewish support, mostly by taking an almost over-the-top Israel-can-never-do-any-wrong stance.
Arguably, Conservative MPs Peter Kent, Mark Adler and Joe Oliver owe their Toronto area seats to Jewish votes.
In fact, some pollsters' analyses show that about 50 per cent of Canadian Jews voted for the Conservatives last time, the Conservatives' best ever showing with that community. The Jewish vote was a factor that helped Harper's Conservatives win urban seats, last time, after they had been largely shut out from urban Canada for the previous three elections.
The Senate was scheduled to have its final vote on C-31 on Wednesday afternoon. It passed and receives Royal Assent on Thursday.
The ball is now in the government's court. The Minister of Immigration now has the responsibility to officially designate safe countries.
If Harper and his colleagues can afford to ignore the politically powerless Roma and academics and human rights advocates who are not on their best friends list, can they afford to ignore the Toronto Board of Rabbis?"

[Mandos]

The European attitude towards Roma is one of those strange blind spots.  It's much worse than the attitude towards any other minority, in some ways,

[lagatta]

Nobel laureate and Auschwitz survivor Elie Wiesel has joined in with the Toronto Board of Rabbis in condemning the Cons' clampdown on refugees and cuts to health services for asylum seekers:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/nobel-laureate-joins-toronto-rabbi-group-in-condemning-refugee-health-cuts/article4397274/

Wiesel is an uncritical supporter of Israel and has a habit of accusing Israel critics of anti-semitism, unlike fellow survivor Primo Levi who wrote a strong condemnation of the Sabra and Chatila massacres and Israel's role therein, alongside fellow Italian writer Natalia Ginzburg (who was not in a death camp, but whose husband Leone Ginzburg, an antifascist of Russian-Jewish origin, was tortured to death by the Gestapo in Rome). If hardline Zionists like Wiesel are beginning to speak out against the Cons, this could be significant.

[lagatta]

This is a cruel cut indeed, RIVO (Réseau d'intervention Réseau d'intervention auprès des personnes ayant subi la violence organisée) is a centre providing psychotherapeutic help to torture and massacre survivors and other asylum seekers who have survived extreme trauma. It is a counterpart of the Canadian Centre for Torture Survivors in Toronto (CCTV) and a similar centre in Vancouver (sorry, forget the name but easy to look up). In 2011, the 20-year-old RIVO provided care to 600 refugees and asylum seekers who have been victims of torture or other forms of organised violence. And yep, its funding for this has been cut.

Of course, RIVO already operated on a shoestring. The picture shows Maison de l'Amitié, an old redbrick Mennonite centre helping refugees, on Duluth Street in the southwestern Plateau (between St-Laurent and St-Denis).

As you see NDP MPs Alexandre Boulerice (my MP, en passant) and Hélène Laverdière are meeting RIVO coordonator John Docherty, who estimates the centre has lost 85% of its funding due to the cuts. I believe that the centre is in Laverdière's riding.

http://tinyurl.com/RIVO-funding-cuts