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Chinese teen migrants flee from B.C. group homes
WebPosted Tue Jun 6 09:00:01 2000

VANCOUVER - More than two dozen teenage Chinese migrants have disappeared from group homes after arriving illegally in B.C. last summer. Authorities can do nothing to track them down or prevent others from leaving.

Locked behind bars

Young migrants under 19 years old are placed in group homes and taken care of by B.C.'s Children and Families Ministry. The migrants get rules such as a nightly curfew but the ministry has no power to keep them in the group home.

The immigration department says if migrants are not detained at the time they enter Canada then they can't be detained later unless something has changed in their case.

Over the weekend, seven adult migrants escaped from a Prince George detention centre. RCMP used a helicopter and tracking dogs to recapture them. But officials say there's little they can do to find young migrants who have vanished.

Almost all the 30 teens who have left are between 16 and 18 years old. Officials believe most have gone to the U.S.

Another 30 migrants turned 19 since they arrived and now live on their own. Most of them have stayed in touch with the Children and Families ministry.

A total of 78 young migrants are still in group homes in Vancouver and Victoria.

The children are part of about 600 Chinese citizens who paid thousands of dollars and risked their lives to sneak into Canada on rickety boats last summer. They were detained by immigration officials as soon as they reached the B.C. coast.

The Immigration and Refugee Board has already rejected the refugee claims of about 400 migrants. Many have been sent back to China. Others face deportation.

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