BC Civil Liberties Association, Media Release, Feb. 22 2011

The BCCLA notes with concern the Federal Court’s recent ruling that the position taken by the government in a case involving a Tamil migrant from the MV Sun Sea would result in the abuse of judicial process, and calls on the government to observe due process and stop using endless appeals to keep migrants in detention.

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CTV News, Feb. 20 2011

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A federal court judge has chewed out government lawyers for using tactics in court that would keep Tamil migrants in jail indefinitely. Justice Edmond Blanchard said it was unacceptable for Department of Justice lawyers to file multiple, concurrent judicial reviews of release orders — especially after the court has already upheld a decision to release a migrant.

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by Isabel Macdonald, The Dominion, Feb. 18 2011

While the Canadian government introduces refugee & immigration reforms they say will improve the system, others are worried that it still fails to meet the needs of asylum seekers. The Vides family, who were recently deported back to El Salvador, are one example, having faced renewed danger and death threats since being expelled from Canada. Image by Marie Zahradnik.

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Meredith Hoffman, New America Media,  Feb. 18 2011

Under thick February clouds, Jerry Poulard, 29, strode across Worth Street, to the New York office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). After a sleepless night in his Rockland County, NY, home, he’d prepared his possessions, but simply couldn’t ready himself for ICE’s message to him: deportation to Haiti. “If I’m going back I’m accepting a death sentence.” said Poulard, a US resident since age 14. “Where will I stay? I just ask they let us wait until the country is rebuilt.”

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by Ben Sichel, Halifax Media Co-op, February 16, 2011

HALIFAX – A local family of five facing deportation to Pakistan will have to wait a little bit longer to learn its fate. Fakhira Chaudhry and Chaudhry Roouf Ahmad listened from the front row of a Federal Court of Appeal packed with supporters to arguments on whether they and their three children would be allowed to stay in Canada, but at the end of the 3-hour hearing Justice Robert Barnes reserved judgment in order to further examine evidence.

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