Latest Right of asylum Stories
By John Ruwitch HONG KONG (Reuters) - When "Steve" fled Pakistan for Hong Kong to seek political asylum in early 2003, he never dreamed he would be stuck in limbo for more than three-and-a-half years and spend 21 months of that time in detention. "My brother and sister, they were lucky, they didn't come to Hong Kong. They escaped by Russia and went to Geneva," said the soft-spoken, 39-year-old former dress designer who says he was jailed and tortured for his political beliefs. He...
By Daniel FlynnDAKAR (Reuters) - Crippled by polio and fleeing civil war in his native Ivory Coast, Bakary Kone thought he had found asylum when Spanish coastguards picked up his small boat packed with West African immigrants.But his ordeal as a refugee had only just begun. After 40 days in a detention center on the Canary Islands, the Ivorian was put on a flight which left him stranded and penniless in dry Mauritania, far from his steamy home.Spanish authorities had explained he could apply...
By Jason Szep BOSTON (Reuters) - Unaccompanied children fleeing to the United States to escape persecution often meet a harsh, hostile reception, slipping through the cracks of a system designed for adults that compounds their trauma, a Harvard University study said on Tuesday. About 8,000 children sought sanctuary in the United States alone -- arriving with no family or adult guardian -- in 2003, the most recent year studied. Many had no legal counsel and were vulnerable to...
By Jonathan Saul and Elana Ringler KIBBUTZ EIN GEDI, Israel (Reuters) - Taking a deep puff on his cigarette, Sudanese refugee Sanka says sneaking across the desert border from Egypt into Israel was perilous, but worth it -- despite being sent to jail. "There were Israeli and Egyptian soldiers on both sides. I could have been shot at any time as that place is a firing zone," said Sanka, now taking refuge in this quiet Israeli communal farm overlooking the crystal waters of the Dead Sea....
By James Vicini WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Supreme Court overturned on Monday a ruling that federal law for political asylum in the United States covered a white South African family who faced threats from blacks angry at the racism of one of their relatives. The high court unanimously sided with the Justice Department and ruled that a federal appeals court was wrong to decide the issue on its own, instead of sending the case back to immigration authorities for additional review. The...
By Stephanie Nebehay GENEVA (Reuters) - Contrary to popular belief, the number of people seeking asylum in the West has halved over the last five years to the lowest level in nearly two decades, the United Nations refugee agency said on Friday. Asylum applications lodged in 50 industrialized countries fell sharply for a fourth year in a row to 336,000 claims in 2005, according to provisional annual figures, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said. This was 15 percent lower...
By Alan Elsner WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An Egyptian who spent almost eight years in American jails without ever being convicted of a crime walked free on Tuesday after a federal judge ordered his release over the objections of the U.S. government. Sameh Khouzam boarded a plane in Cairo to seek political asylum in the United States on February 11, 1998. He was arrested at John F. Kennedy airport in New York and had been held in jail ever since. Khouzam's detention of seven years and 361...
By Alan Elsner WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Statue of Liberty still proclaims, "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free," but human rights activists say the traditional U.S. role in accepting people fleeing persecution has been badly eroded in recent years. "Over the last several years, more and more hurdles have been imposed on people seeking asylum," said Stephen Yale-Loehr who teaches immigration law at Cornell University Law School. These barriers,...
CAIRO (Reuters) - The U.N. refugee agency said on Friday it had interviewed most of some 600 Sudanese whom Egypt wants to deport because it says they are illegal immigrants. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has asked the government not to deport any of the group, who were detained after a Sudanese protest last month ended in clashes with police. Twenty-seven Sudanese were killed in the violence. The agency has been given access to determine the legal status of those in...
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush on Monday authorized the admission of 70,000 refugees into the United States in fiscal 2006, the same ceiling that was set the previous year, the White House said. The actual number of refugees admitted in fiscal 2005 which ended September 30 was 53,813, which was below the authorized ceiling because of funding restraints, an administration official said. Bush issued a memorandum to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that authorized the...
