The
Canadian government is trying to curb the number of asylum seekers from
Nigeria who are flooding into Canada via the United States.
According to Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen,
about 2,500 migrants, mostly Nigerian nationals, entered Canada
illegally in April, bringing the total so far this year to more than
7,300. They crossed on foot along a forest trail from New York state to
Quebec province.
He will travel to Nigeria in the coming days
to press the issue. At Ottawa’s request, US authorities have also
recently tightened their visa rules for Nigerians to try to prevent
tourists from flying to the US and then hopping across the border to
file Canadian refugee claims.
An average of 70-80 migrants per
day have been making the trip of late, said Public Safety Minister
Ralph Goodale. Nearly 21,000 border jumpers were intercepted by federal
police in 2017 and allowed to file a refugee claim. “Just over 90
percent of irregular migrants do not meet our criteria (for asylum) and
they will have to leave Canada,” Garneau said, adding that 200 currently
face imminent deportation after their refugee claims were rejected.
The
first arrivals in 2016 were mostly Haitians who faced repatriation at
the end of US temporary special protections granted after storms
battered their desperately poor island nation. But the wave expanded
last year to also include Djiboutian, Eritrean, Nigerian, Pakistani,
Sudanese, Syrian, Turkish and Yemeni nationals, among others.
The
border jumping started with the election of US President Donald Trump,
who promised to expel more than 11 million undocumented migrants.
Canada moves to block Illegal migration and asylum seekers from Nigeria
Tuesday 8 May 2018
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