Canadian authorities deny entry to three Mexicans for "looking very poor"

by EMIR OLIVARES ALONSO; 26/06/2007 - La Jornada
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/25/index.php?section=poli...

[Note: To view the original article in Spanish, go to the link above.]

The following is a rough translation of the orignal:

Under the criteria of appearance, Canadian immigration authorities denied entry to three Mexicans who were trying to enter the country as tourists, because "they didn't appear to have money and looked very poor".

The co-nationals suffered humiliation during more than 24 hours, one of the victims said. He said that authorities did strip searches and revisions (searches?) of their belongings at least four times and then took them to
the Vancouver police headquarters (detention centre?) where they were handcuffed, booked and detained.

Two of the Mexicans were carrying 300 U.S. dollars in cash and the other, $150; between the three they had 14 credit and debit cards and also had return tickets to Mexico. Despite this, they couldn't enter Canada because the immigration police felt that they intended to enter the U.S.

The Mexicans arrived in Vancouver around 10 a.m. on Monday, June 18th. They were held at the airport almost all day and later taken to the police station...to be taken, the next morning, back to the airport handcuffed and barefoot and sent this way back to Mexico where they arrived on Tuesday, June 19th at 8 p.m.

"We wanted to be in Canada for 4 months," said one of the men, "as tourists we can stay in the country for up to 6 months. But we didn't succeed. The Canadian immigration agents behaved rudely and as tyrants and asked us about everything. Their pretext was that we didn't have a set itinerary or hotel reservations. But we were traveling a bit adventurously and were depending on a list of hostels".

He confirmed that they were kept in different holding cells in which there were mostly Mexican and Chinese citizens.

Even though the three Mexican tourists insisted to the police that they only wanted to see the country, the agent replied to them that the Canadian government had refused them entry because "it was apparent that we were very poor".

When they began to insist, "one of the officers told us that he had the power to decide who could and could not enter into his country" they [said].

They recounted that one of the three held a U.S. Visa [to enter the U.S.] and when they told the agents this, they responded that this wasn't a negotiation and if they continued to argue things would get worse and they could even lose the visa.

After this they made them sign a document (of which they have a copy) which states that their human rights were respected at all times. Nevertheless, they were advised that they could not call the Mexican consulate.

Jorge recounted that when they were allowed to call the consulate - to the attention of Rodolfo Diaz, the staff [for] that person informed them that they couldn't do anything in their defense because these were Canadian laws and they had to accept them. "They didn't give a shit!"

The adventure didn't end there; with the change in immigration "guard", the situation for the three Mexicans "worsened". Despite the fact that one of the youth, Jorge, suffers from high cholesterol and informed the officers right away that he needs to take bezafibrate at night to avoid problems, the guard "didn't care about the official document that indicated that I needed the medication and when I asked for the pill, the officer threw the paper on the ground".

After holding them almost the entire day in the airport, they took them to the Vancouver police station (detention centre?). "We travelled handcuffed, and even though one of the officers tried to attach our seat-belts, the other one removed them. By that time, all we wanted to do was sleep".

Jorge recounts that "the worst" came when they reached the police station (detention centre?): "They put us in a steel cubicle that smelled like urine. There they took our clothes off and searched us once again, they took off everything besides our underwear and I thought they were going to put their finger up my anus, because the officers put on latex gloves. Every action was an uncertainty. They interrogated us again, they registered us with profile pictures, side shots and even pictures of our scars".

They only gave them a pair of sandwiches, juice and an orange, their first bit of food in hours; they then locked them in cells. The next morning they were driven back to the airport, handcuffed again and barefoot, with their faces contorted with sadness and exhaustion.

"It was humiliating to walk through the airport handcuffed and barefoot; everyone was looking at us badly and we felt terrible". Upon return to the airport terminal, they were checked again and "immigration didn't leave us at any moment, they accompanied us until [we got to] the airplane door".

Unlike his two friends, Jorge will file...complaints with the (Mexican Minister of Foreign Affairs?) and the Canadian embassy in Mexico [City] in addition to appealing to various human rights organizations "so that it doesn't end at that. I would like an apology and that at the very least they compensate me for the cost of my ticket (790 dollars), because I worked and saved up for one year for this trip".

Finally Jorge remembers that the officers insisted at all times and until the end that "we weren't being deported from Canada, that we had only been denied entry, but that we could come back whenever we desired to".