Monday, April 2, 2007

Recently arrived Haitian migrants to Florida risk being deported

Activists are fighting to prevent the deportation of over one hundred Haitian migrants who reached Florida last Wednesday (image). Community leaders, local politicians, and clergymen are trying to prevent the Haitian migrants from being split up to holding facilities across the country before being deported out of the U.S. According to one immigration advocate:

“We have agencies here used to working with Haitian refugees. When people have good representation, they have a better chance of presenting their cases appropriately.”

The “wet-foot, dry-foot” policy that has helped thousand of Cuban migrants gain asylum in the U.S. has long been a lightening rod of controversy in the Haitian community; Haitians are resentful of a perceived double standard that helps Cuban migrants at the expense of those from Haiti.

Links- CBS13.com, International Herald Tribune, New York Sun, Miami Herald, BBC News

Image- CBS News

2 comments:

  1. Cubans fled and are fleeing Castro's brand of communism, and that's why they are greeted with relatively open arms. Haitians are fleeing poverty, violence and a corrupt government. To me, these are equally good reasons to flee a country. But to America, only the Cuban reasoning is lucrative enough.

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  2. One wonders what will happen to the "double standard" once Cuba becomes a democracy.

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