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A
minivan pulls into an inspection area at the Canadian
border crossing in Lewiston, New York .
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Special
Registration
From Gotham Gazette
Bangladesh, Indonesia, Egypt, Jordan and Kuwait
have been added to the list of countries whose male
citizens must register with the Immigration and Naturalization
Service if they intend to stay in the United States.
Canada
Bound
From Gotham Gazette
Attempting to avoid registration and the risk of
being detained and deported, thousands of undocumented
Pakistani and Arab immigrants in New York are fleeing
to Canada.
Rumor
Has It
From Daily Khabrain
Many Pakistanis waiting in line for registration
left the office and went back home after hearing a rumor
that Pakistan had been removed from the special registration
list.
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new rule by the Immigration and Naturalization Service requires
male citizens from 25 countries who reside in the United States
to register with the agency. How will this new requirement
affect immigrants in New York City? Commissioner for the Office
of Immigrant Affairs Sayu Bhojwani will answer your questions
about this issue and any others you may have, as well as guide
you through the improvements in the web
site of the Office of Immigrant Affairs, in Gotham Gazette's
online chat
on Friday, February 28, at 2pm.
Within weeks of its implementation, the special
registration requirement has turned many lives upside
down. "All of a sudden we got a lot of work to do," said immigration
attorney Jo Anne C. Adlerstein. Some immigrants take the registration
as just another time-consuming bureaucratic chore, but many
are afraid that they will be detained if they register. (Gotham
Gazette).
Many undocumented Pakistanis have avoided the registration
and fled to Canada (Gotham
Gazette) but this could become more difficult because
U.S. and Canadian officials are looking for a way to tighten
border security (Associated Press).
Even with a massive turnout for the registration program,
the immigration office in New York did not add more staff.
"They've had to pull people working on adjustments of status
and other projects," said attorney Christina Labrie. "Now
applications that take two or three years to process will
take even more. (The
Village Voice) "
Backlog problem aside, the immigration agency will start
reducing fees for processing applicants for such items as
work permits and green cards. "You could look on this as a
'going out of business' sale," said one INS official
referring to the move to the Homeland Security Department.
(Washington Post).
In this February edition of the Citizen, we look at an effort
to help undocumented immigrants who lost loved ones on 9/11,
housing problems in the Dominican community, a shortage of
Fujianese speaking social workers and why reading is the only
way to save your children. Also, articles from the Chinese,
Russian, Polish, Korean, Latino and Urdu press
and
much more.
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