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By Allan Dowd
VANCOUVER (Reuters) - About 150 illegal immigrants from China, including small children, waded to an isolated Canadian beach in stormy conditions Wednesday after being unloaded from a vessel that had smuggled them across the Pacific Ocean, officials said.
The fishing boat, which had been chased by Canadian authorities by air and sea, attempted to escape after leaving its human cargo at Gilbert Bay on the Queen Charlotte Islands but later was seized, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said.
The estimated 150 men, women and children who waded to shore through stormy seas were reported safe, but authorities were attempting to evacuate them before weather conditions in the area grew worse.
``There is no evidence of loss of life. However, the Coast Guard considers this a search and rescue,'' said George Varnai, regional director with Citizenship and Immigration Canada in Vancouver.
``I know they're wet and they're cold. It's very stormy weather,'' Constable Tracey Rook told Reuters from the Queen Charlotte Islands, located about 500 miles (800 km) northwest of Vancouver, near the Alaska panhandle.
The vessel, whose identification markings had been painted over, is at least the second boat in less than a month with Asian immigrants on board to have made an illegal landing in Canada.
The incidents have prompted calls for Canada to get tough on illegal immigration. But Elinor Caplan, the federal minister of immigration, Wednesday rejected calls for smuggling ships to be turned away when they enter Canadian waters.
The vessel was spotted Monday in international waters by a Canadian military aircraft on routine patrol. It reached Canadian waters early Wednesday but heavy seas prevented it from being seized.
Authorities were able to watch the unloading and the immigrants reportedly waved to them as they waded through the cold water to shore. They are all believed to be from China's Fujian province.
``This vessel seems to have a significant number of women, although we do not have an exact count, and quite a number of very small children ... three to five years old,'' Varnai told reporters.
The ship was seized several hours after unloading the passengers and eight crew members from either South Korea or North Korea were arrested without incident, officials said. Authorities said they were still trying to determine the origin of both the ship and its crew.
In July, a dilapidated boat with 123 Chinese on board was discovered off Vancouver Island. Authorities have expressed concern that Canada is facing a smuggling problem similar to one already experienced by Australia and New Zealand.
The smuggling of people from China, often from Fujian, to the United States
and other countries has become a major business for organized crime groups, who
are believed to have charged the boat people who arrived in July up to $38,000
each to make the journey.
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