Concerns about refugees making risky treks into Canada from the U.S. because they fear being deported has University of Victoria law professors and colleagues calling for changes to border procedures.
Donald Galloway, a professor specializing in immigration and refugee law at the University of Victoria, is one of about 240 Canadian law professors asking the federal government to halt enforcement of the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement.
“The partnership only makes sense if you are dealing with a country that takes its obligations under the [United Nations] Refugee Convention seriously,” Galloway said.
Statements and actions by the U.S. government, including a 120-day ban on refugees, have seen people trekking across open country to enter Canada to make a refugee claim.
Two men from Ghana, both seeking refugee status, lost fingers to frostbite while walking across snow-covered fields to cross the Manitoba-North Dakota border on Christmas Eve.
Galloway said the Safe Third Country Agreement prevents refugee claimants from bouncing across the border, shopping for an easy claim.
Claimants must seek refugee status in the first country in which they land, be it Canada or the U.S.
Jean McRae, head of the Inter-Cultural Association of Greater Victoria, said about 20 people claim refugee status each year in Victoria. Usually, it’s family connections that attract them from other parts of Canada.
Such claimants are distinct from the 250 government-sponsored and 150 privately sponsored refugees recently arrived in Victoria, mostly from Syria.
Refugee claimants assert international rights to be considered as refugees because their home country is no longer safe for them.
“Making a refugee claim is not illegal,” McRae said. “It is a legal process and we are obliged, under international law, to participate.”
Under the U.S.-Canada Safe Third Country Agreement, Canadian authorities will turn back claimants who arrive at border crossings if they have already sought refugee status in the United States.
Similarly, American authorities will turn back claimants who arrive at border crossings if they have already sought refugee status in Canada.
However, if people cross the border illegally into Canada and then are arrested, they can stay while their refugee applications are processed.
The agreement was put in place in 2004.
Galloway said that if the agreement were suspended, refugee claimants would stop making dangerous cross-country hikes, sometimes accompanied by children. Instead, they could present themselves as refugee claimants to Canadian authorities at any border crossing.
On Feb. 8, immigration and refugee specialists from Harvard University released a report saying that President Donald Trump’s policies mean the U.S. can no longer be considered a safe country to pursue a refugee claim.
They called on the Canadian government to rethink the Safe Third Country Agreement.
Galloway said the agreement allows either country to temporarily suspend all or parts of it for three months, with an option for a three-month extension of such a suspension afterward.
Such a temporary measure might allow time for negotiations and investigation.
It would create an interval for safer treatment and conditions for refugee claimants, Galloway suggested.
“The level of risk that is being taken is commensurate with the fears these people have in the United States,” he said. “It explains why people would make these 20-hour treks.
“They are seriously concerned about being able to make a refugee claim in the United States and be taken seriously.”
