forced migration

The first questions came in a foreign language — one Oklahoma State freshman Joseph Manilafasha couldn't understand at the time. His new fifth-grade classmates had never met someone like him before, so they asked any question that came to their minds. "Did you chase lions?" one of them would say.

It’s probably analogous to winning the lottery for them and what it means for their future and their lives — getting an education and getting to go back and have that degree   -Dave Smith

 

The Sri Lankan government says people living in camps since the conflict with Tamil Tiger rebels will have freedom of movement as of next month. The camps were set up to house Tamils fleeing the final stages of the 25-year civil war which ended in May. A special adviser to President Mahinda Rajapaksa also confirmed an earlier promise to close the camps, which still house 130,000 people. He said all the residents would be resettled by the end of January.  

The Federal Court says the refugee board must reassess the case of a lesbian soldier who deserted from the U.S. army and fled to Canada, saying the board made mistakes in rejecting her bid to seek refugee status. Judge Yves de Montigny said the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) erred in determining whether Pte. Bethany Smith, also known as Skyler James, had an objective basis for her fear of persecution. "My first reaction was 'Oh my god, yes!'" said Smith Friday in Ottawa, where she now lives.

fall within the specialized knowledge of the board.   -Jamie Liew

 

A leading rights group Saturday called on the Thai government to allow 158 Lao Hmong refugees, who have been detained for three years pending deportation, to be resettled in four western countries. New York-based Human Rights Watch said the group were being "held in poor and abusive conditions" and should be allowed to leave for the United States, Canada, the Netherlands, and Australia, which have agreed to resettle them. "Thai authorities have kept Lao Hmong refugees in fear and uncertainty for years

held in poor and abusive conditions   -Human Rights Watch

 

The historical backgrounds of Arakan ironically implied as evidences that the existence of Rohinga Muslims in Arakan is for centuries . But They claimed as world's most oppressed ethnic minority which is unbelievable to all instantly. In practical, the Rohingyas are victims of religious and racial discrimination in a Buddhist majority country for why at least 50% of the total Rohingya population were compelled to refuge in other countries as political refugees.  

Guido Westerwelle is making his first mark as Germany's new foreign minister by blocking a controversial appointment by the lobby of Germans expelled from Eastern Europe after World War II -- a move that puts Chancellor Angela Merkel in a bind. Mr. Westerwelle, head of Ms. Merkel's governing partner, the Free Democratic Party, vowed to veto an effort by the lobby's leader, Erika Steinbach, to join the board of a planned state museum about the expulsions, saying her appointment would jeopardize reconcilia

One has to wonder if Westerwelle has lost sight at times of which country he is supposed to be serving as foreign minister   -Allgemeine Zeitung

 

Friday afternoon, several Somali Bantu women stepped from the drizzling rain into a Northwest Side apartment complex clubhouse for a class concerning the toddlers clinging to their brightly colored dresses. They passed a cluster of men and women from Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) leaving a class sponsored by the Family Services Association about American laws and child abuse. As the Somali Bantu women took their seats, a Burmese child wiggled in her mother's arms.  

The President of Australia's Refugee Council, John Gibson, says there are no grounds for the government to revisit the previous administration's so-called Pacific solution to processing asylum seekers. High level officials in both Papua New Guinea and Nauru this week indicated preparedness to reopen facilities to help solve the Australian government's ongoing boat people problems. From 2001 until last year, Australia used facilities on PNG's Manus Island and Nauru for offshore detention of asylum seek  

Sri Lanka says it has resettled almost half of the country's 280,000 displaced civilians trapped in refugee camps, since it won its fight against Tamil Tiger rebels. However, Mahinda Samarasinghe, the minister of Human Rights and Disaster Management told reporters on Friday that 143,161 internally displaced civilians still remain in refugee camps. The camps are under tight security since the end of the three-decade-long conflict in May, he said, and added that the government has kept civilians in thei