Pilgrims seek refugee status despite tough visa screening

By CHRISTINE BOYD, The Globe and Mail
With a report from Estanislao Oziewicz
Saturday, July 27, 2002

Réjean Cantlon, a spokesman for the department, confirmed yesterday that an unspecified number of participants in the Roman Catholic festival -- "less than 10" -- have claimed refugee status. But Mr. Cantlon refused to give details about what countries they were from, where they made the claims or why they had applied.

"When there's less than 10 individuals making claims, it wouldn't be sensible to release that information," he said. "These are people that have made their claims for refugee status, have been found to be eligible by a Citizenship and Immigration officer and their claim has been referred to the Immigration and Refugee Board for determination of their claim."

The claims have been made despite the department's aggressive efforts to screen out those it deemed too risky to allow into the country. Last week, Immigration Minister Denis Coderre said in a statement that his department had rejected 25 per cent of about 26,000 visa applications it had received. The usual rejection rate is about 20 per cent, the department said.

The tough screening has provoked complaints in recent months from refugee advocates and people who helped organize the pilgrimages. They said the department was disproportionately targeting people from developing countries such as Burundi, Cameroon and Venezuela.

But a World Youth Day spokesman said yesterday he is disappointed to hear some pilgrims had made claims for asylum after event organizers worked closely with Citizenship and Immigration to prevent such occurrences.

"Certainly it's not something that we wanted to happen," Paul Kilbertus said. "The point of this event was to come, have a wonderful time, get your spiritual batteries re-energized -- and go home."

Refugee advocates said they were surprised the number isn't higher.

Fadumo Abukar, who co-ordinates First Contacts, a Toronto centre that provides information to new Canadians, said she scheduled extra staff to work during the festival, anticipating a flood of pilgrims seeking information about how to stay in Canada.

Only about a half-dozen have dropped in so far, she said, and she doesn't know whether any of them made a refugee claim.

Kemi Jacobs, president of the Canadian Council for Refugees, said the council has not been approached to help World Youth Day delegates who have made claims.

"I would have expected that there would be some claims," she said.

"People are coming from all over the world. In many parts of the world there are conditions where people need to escape from. So I think that some people would see this as an opportunity to get out of that situation and make a claim in Canada."

Ms. Jacobs said claims are made whenever Canada plays host to such gatherings as the Olympics and Commonwealth Games.

About 44,000 people claimed refugee status in Canada last year, an average of about 121 a day.