Thursday, July 22,
1999 122 refugees experienced 'your worst
nightmare'
Asians staying at
base
Jeff Lee
The Vancouver Sun,
with files from The Canadian Press
 Nick Didlick, the Vancouver
Sun
The 122 refugees who arrived in
Canada aboard an unmarked boat were taken by school buses to
Esquimalt naval base in Victoria at 2:10 a.m. yesterday. They
will spend the next week sleeping on folding camp cots erected
in the base's
gymnasium.
| VICTORIA -
More than 100 would-be Chinese refugees arrived in Victoria
yesterday after a 39-day Pan-Pacific trip that one federal official
described as "your worst nightmare."
The 122 passengers, most of whom were probably being smuggled
into the country, were aboard a decrepit ship, crammed into a hold
that was unlivable, said Jim Redmond, an official with Citizenship
and Immigration.
"Think of your worst nightmare in a ship and that would be it,"
he said yesterday at the Esquimalt naval base in Victoria where the
migrants are being detained.
"The vessel was abysmal . . . The conditions on board were
generally filthy, filthy. There was human waste throughout the hold
area where the migrants were being forced to live."
The 40-metre unregistered ship, which had no discernable markings
and no flag, was discovered by federal officials Tuesday off the
western Vancouver Island coast.
The operation to unload the ship and ferry the would-be refugees
to Victoria took place in the middle of the night, far from the view
of the general public.
The process was complicated by the lack of bio-hazard suits
available to officers until late Tuesday night. Shortly after 9 p.m.
members of the RCMP Emergency Response Team from the Vancouver
Island town of Courtenay dressed in white protective suits and
carrying automatic rifles, boarded the ship.
RCMP Corporal Grant Learned said the officers were met with no
resistance, and found no weapons. After medical officers from Health
Canada determined that only two of the 122 aboard required medical
assistance, the ship was taken under tow.
Shadowed by the Coast Guard cutter Tanu and the RCMP catamaran
Higgit, the ship was towed into the Bowater pulp mill's deep-water
port at Gold River, B.C., shortly after 1 a.m.
Officers on board the ship kept tight control of the passengers,
warning them not to talk or move about without approval. At 2:10
a.m. the first of three school buses arrived, and the passengers
were shepherded off five at a time and frisked for weapons. Some
were handcuffed.
Mr. Redmond said RCMP and other officials have identified 11
passengers as the possible ringleaders of the smuggling operation.
"We're keeping them as separate from the others as possible," he
said.
Mr. Redmond said none of the migrants arrived with any
identification, although some had sketchy cards that didn't reveal
much.
Mr. Redmond said one person told a Mandarin interpreter he had
paid $38,000 (US ) for the voyage.
"They were relieved to get on the bus on dry land," said Mr.
Redmond, describing many of them as having "sea legs."
The passengers -- 104 men and 18 women -- appear to have come
from Fuzhou in southern China, said Lieutenant-Commander Chris
Henderson.
They arrived mostly healthy except for some hunger and
dehydration. Some clapped as the buses pulled into the base.
They will spend the next week sleeping on 125 folding camp cots
erected in the base's gymnasium.
Dining and sitting areas have been set up and the migrants were
given food and showers when they arrived. They were given clean
clothes and their own garments were put into quarantine, Mr. Redmond
said.
Corporal Grant White, an officer from Courtenay, confirmed
conditions on board the old ship were horrendous.
He said there were no bunks other than about 12 wooden berths
near the galley, and sanitation facilities were virtually
non-existent.
He described the smell of the ship as appalling and said the
stench was cloying to his nostrils.
"It was like the smell of a dead body. I can still smell it in my
nose."
Editorial, Page A19
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