WORLD NATIONAL SPORTS BUSINESS ENTERTAINMENT
Canada considers sending police to China in
effort to stop migrants
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An Immigration officer watches as illegal migrants leave
the navy frigate at Esquimalt. (CP/Chuck Stoody)
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VANCOUVER (CP) - As the number of Chinese migrants
apprehended in B.C. waters this summer reached 596 with the arrival
of a fourth boat, Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy said
Canadian authorities may be sent to China's Fujian province to try
to stop the flow.
Speaking from New Zealand, where he's attending
meetings leading up to the APEC summit, Axworthy said a memorandum
of understanding signed by China and Canada last spring on jointly
fighting criminal activity paves the way for Canadian police to
monitor people-smuggling activities in China.
"In order to provide some kind of interdiction of
(the boats), we have to have a better knowledge of who is doing it
and how we can anticipate or interdict people before it happens,"
said Axworthy.
The RCMP has been able to obtain very little information from the
migrants about the smugglers who brought them to Canada.
"There's been some reluctance from the migrants," RCMP Const.
Tracey Rook told a news conference Friday.
"And that's been . . . consistent with all of the boats."
The 146 Chinese migrants - 132 adults and 14 juveniles - whose
boat was apprehended Friday about 18 nautical miles (30 kilometres)
off Vancouver Island are now in a gymnasium at Victoria's CFB
Esquimalt.
"They're lying in their cots, trying to recuperate," said base
public affairs officer Lieut. Nathalie Garcia.
The latest boat intercepted is now believed to be the sixth to
arrive in B.C. waters this summer.
Two so-called ghost ships sank after arriving undetected and
unloading an undetermined number of passengers, Immigration
spokesman George Varnai.
Since July, three other ships from China's coastal Fujian
province have been detected and intercepted on the West Coast. The
three ships carried a total of 444 people, including an
eight-year-old girl.
Immigration spokeswoman Lois Reimer said Saturday the Refugee
Board will accelerate the hearing process for all 263 migrants from
the first and second boatloads.
"They expect to have decisions on the people . . . by the end of
December and that's quite a bit quicker than we would normally
expect to see it."
The normal process takes about eight months, Reimer said.
The first migrant to go through the refugee process has been
denied his claim. Officials did not believe his story about
religious persecution in China.
Reimer said Immigration officials have issued Canada-wide arrest
warrants for 37 migrants who failed to show up for their hearings.
That's almost half of the 76 adults from the first boatload who
were released into the community.
Authorities believe the missing individuals went to Toronto on
their way to New York, their destination of choice.
The Ministry of Children and Families has informed Immigration
officials that 10 of 66 minors in foster homes have also
disappeared, Reimer said.
Canada Immigration will issue arrest warrants for them also if
they do not turn up, she said.
Immigration spokesman Rob Johnston said Friday that authorities
are "taking a much stronger approach to detention because we do not
believe the individuals will appear for removal from Canada. He
would not elaborate.
Attorney General Ujjal Dosanjh said B.C. may be turning to other
provinces to help care for the minors who arrived aboard the first
two ships.
© The Canadian Press, 1999
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