Immigrant adults being detained indefinitely

VANCOUVER -- A lesson learned after the first of four boatloads of Chinese refugee claimants arrived has resulted in the detention of adults from all subsequent vessels, an immigration spokesman said Wednesday.

The department also wants to see the law changed to make detention easier.

Since July, four decrepit vessels carrying a total of 599 migrants -- men, women and children -- from Fujian province in China have arrived off British Columbia's coast.

Seventy-six people from the first boat were released on a promise to appear for their refugee hearings.

But 38 have since disappeared, prompting Immigration Canada to issue warrants.

"The change is we learned a little bit from history," immigration spokesman George Varnai said Wednesday. "We have released no adults from boats two, three and four."

Immigration can detain an individual on one or more of three grounds: no identification; a danger to the public; or a reasonable expectation that the person won't appear at a subsequent hearing.

"Once we came up with the second boat and third and fourth boats, we realized what we're dealing with is largest organized attempt at evading Canada's immigration laws forever, maybe," said Varnai.

That alone made the situation different from the far greater total number of refugee claimants who arrive at airports, he said.

"These are people who set out and risk their lives to come across the ocean to enter Canada without examination, surreptitiously at place other than a point of entry."

The disappearance of some of the boat people prompted immigration officials to argue before refugee hearing adjudicators that "they're not likely to reappear for the next stage. And we've been successful."

"That's a change in policy for this movement."

Varnai said the department has been considering for some time recommending changes to immigration legislation to enact a more aggressive detention policy.

"There is a possibility of the legislation changing insofar as detention goes," he said.

The current law, however, allows the department to make its detention arguments, he said.

Peter Golden, a lawyer who represents some of the refugee claimants from the first two boats, conceded Immigration was within its rights.

"It's highly unusual (but) it's legal on its face, although there may be somebody who'll challenge an adjudicator's decision to keep somebody in detention," said Golden.

Golden said his primary concern was that there were what he considered some legitimate refugee claims from people on the first boat who disappeared nonetheless out of fear.

"They're good cases based on religion, or persecution," he said.

"I'm concerned that there have been threats (from organizers, also known as snakeheads) to those people that have forced them not to show up as they should have."

Experts say the migrants, mainly from the impoverished Chinese province of Fujian, pay smugglers thousands of dollars for an opportunity to start a better life in the United States. Most end up as little more than slaves until they repay the debt.

Golden said more energy should be put into protecting the migrants within the community.

"I don't know that detaining them (is proper) because it's very costly."

Meantime, another immigration spokeswoman, Janis Harper, said the most up-to-date figures show 429 people in detention at Canadian Forces Base Esquimalt and six other provincial corrections facilities in the Greater Vancouver area.

Another 80 children and juveniles are in the care of the B.C. Children's Ministry, while 98 deportation orders have been issued following initial hearings. Most are under appeal.

Some migrants currently housed at Esquimalt and the other facilities are expected to be transferred to a mothballed jail in Prince George.

Only one person from the 599 has so far reached the Immigration and Refugee Board stage, which resulted in a rejection.

"More are coming up soon," said board spokesman Paul Hardie.

All migrants from the first boat are expected to have their fate determined by Christmas; the second boat by March, said Hardie. Appeals could follow the decisions.

It will likely be next summer before all the current migrants are either granted refugee status or rejected.

In Ottawa, Reform party immigration critic Leon Benoit said he had heard from an immigration official, Jim Redmond, that "they're expecting multiple arrivals of boats over these next few days.

"They're preparing for the arrival of 400 or more new arrivals by boat."

But immigration spokeswoman Lois Reimer said Redmond had never spoken to Benoit. The Reform MP must have got his incorrect information from a townhall meeting in Esquimalt on Monday, she said.

Redmond never said more boats were coming, but was answering a question about the potential capacity of the naval base, which has been expanding its facilities in case more boats arrive.

Reimer also insisted there are no boats currently on the way, as far as Immigration is concerned.

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