TERROR VICTIMS SEEKING U.S. ASYLUM BLOCKED BY RIGID ANTI-TERROR POLICIES

by Sarnata Reynolds

(PNS) -- A bipartisan body, the federal Commission on International Religious Freedom, which Congress asked to review asylum procedures, recently warned that Homeland Security authorities continue to treat asylum seekers harshly.

Asylum seekers were sometimes cuffed, strip-searched and jailed, the commission found. To protect people fleeing persecution the commission called for safeguards in the system of expedited removal, which authorizes border patrol to deport people quickly and without a court hearing. However, the obstacles asylum seekers confront in their search for protection extend beyond the errors of border patrol.

Indeed, anti-terrorism laws are now so broad they hurt the victims of terrorism, punish them for being the subject of abuse, and foreclose the possibility of their attaining protection in the United States.

On January 11, 2007, the Department of Homeland Security ("DHS") recognized the dire consequences of these laws and agreed to provide waivers to eight discreet groups of refugees, and consider duress waivers on a case-by-case basis.

This limited concession, however, applies to a very narrow category of people and provides no remedy whatsoever to detained asylum seekers who do not fall within the waiver categories. Worse, DHS has yet to provide a procedure to apply for a waiver, so even those asylum seekers who may benefit have no way of requesting one.

Meanwhile, immigration judges are forced to refuse protection to bona fide asylum seekers, not because they are a national security threat to the U.S., but because they had some link, even if minimal and involuntary, to armed groups in their home countries.

Through swift passage of the USA Patriot Act of 2001 and the Real ID Act of 2005, Congress overhauled and greatly expanded terrorism definitions. For the first time, victims of terrorist organizations were labeled material supporters of terrorism precisely because they were targeted, tortured and enslaved by the very groups the United States is attempting to exclude.

The extremely broad definition of "material support" of terrorism includes the provision of goods or services to a group of "two or more individuals, whether organized or not, [which] engages in, or has a subgroup which engages in" activities as broad as using an "explosive, firearm or other weapon or dangerous device."

Having been forced to provide the support -- no matter how minimal -- does not exempt a person from being barred entry into the United States as a refugee, or provided status as an asylee.

As a result, Liberian women brutally raped and kidnapped by armed militias and then forced to cook for them are labeled material supporters of terrorism precisely because of their domestic enslavement.

Colombians, forced at the threat of torture or death, to provide money to armed militias are identified as material supporters of terrorism. Nepalese citizens terrorized into providing shelter or water to rebels are barred from protection because the aid is considered material support of terrorism.

Today, terrorism definitions are so broad that DHS admitted in oral argument they may even bar from protection the Iraqi national who helped secure the rescue of American soldier Jessica Lynch, because U.S. soldiers originally stationed in Iraq may constitute a terrorist organization as defined by our irrationally expansive anti-terrorism laws.

Exceedingly broad anti-terrorism definitions have a devastating effect on our allies in the war on terror and on democracy advocates around the world. Denying protection to refugees and asylum seekers because they were victimized by terrorist organizations does not advance our shared values and violates our obligations under international law.

Providing limited waivers to discreet groups of people does not begin to address the disastrous consequences of current anti-terrorism legislation. Nor has the administration demonstrated that the system could work Ð while it has recognized the availability of waivers, no procedure exists for people to take advantage of the waivers. In the meantime, thousands of refugees Ð victims of terrible human rights violations -- are stranded in refugee camps abroad and detention centers in the United States.

Correcting the law so that it expressly excludes people who acted under duress, and expressly protects individuals who assisted pro-democracy groups is the only durable solution to the quagmire of current anti-terrorism law.