| Help Asylum Seekers: 5 Things You Can Do
Asylum seekers in the United States need your help.
Background:
Refugees who come to the United States to seek asylum do so because they
fear harm and persecution in their home countries – persecution
in the form of rape, torture, ethnic violence or other official harassment.
Refugees often arrive in the U.S. without proper travel documents (those
who flee persecution are rarely provided with official permission to travel).
When these individuals arrive at a U.S. airport or border without proper
travel papers, they are detained by immigration authorities – and
then taken to jail or detention facilities -- often in handcuffs, and
often without any clear understanding of why they are being detained.
Asylum seekers are eligible for parole from detention if they satisfy
specific criteria established by the Department of Homeland Security (criteria
such as community ties and that they present no risk to the community).
Yet in practice, even asylum seekers who meet these criteria continue
to be detained. Immigration officials too often ignore or selectively
apply the parole criteria. Those who flee persecution and seek protection
in the U.S. should be treated humanely and fairly. They should not be
arbitrarily and indefinitely jailed.
HOW YOU CAN HELP.
1. Write Secretary Chertoff.
Please send an e-postcard to Secretary Ridge asking him to improve how
the Department of Homeland Security treats refugees.
2. Visit or write a refugee in detention.
Sojourners is a non-profit that arranges pen pals and visits for refugees
in detention. Refugees dream of coming to America to live in safety. Prolonged
detention has a range of negative health consequences for asylum seekers
– including depression
(read
a study on the health consequences of detention).
Visits and letters from caring people help ease this sadness, and give
refugees hope. To find out more, contact: akidane@theriversidechurchny.org.
3. Contact non-profit, non-governmental
organizations to see how you can help!
Donate time or resources to help asylum seekers. Volunteer as an attorney,
translator, doctor, or visitor.
4. Support Human Rights First
Each year, through our pro bono legal program, the Human Rights First
represents 1,000 asylum seekers from 80 countries. We win 90 percent of
our cases. Please help us continue this essential work. To make a donation
online, please visit http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/about_us/contribute/contribute.htm
5. Learn more about asylum.
To learn more about the treatment of asylum seekers, please link to our
reports:
http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/refugees/reports/refugee_pubs.htm
In
Liberty's Shadow: U.S. Detention of Asylum Seekers in the Age of Homeland
Security
Refugee
Women at Risk: Unfair U.S. Laws Hurt Asylum Seekers
(Human Rights First, December 2002).
Testing
the Faithful: Religion and Asylum Summary
Results of Survey
(Human Rights First, November 2002).
Review
of States' Procedures and Practices Relating to the Detention of
Asylum Seekers
Is
this America? The Denial of Due Process to Asylum Seekers in the United
States
Refugees
Behind Bars: The Imprisonment of Asylum Seekers in the Wake of the 1996
Immigration Act
Slamming
the "Golden Door": A Year of Expedited Removal
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