Resettlement

“ Full respect for the human rights of the uprooted population shall be an essential condition for the resettlement of this population.
3. Uprooted population groups deserve special attention, in view of the consequences they have suffered from being uprooted, through the implementation of a comprehensive, exceptional strategy which ensures, in the shortest possible time, their relocation in conditions of security and dignity and their free and full integration into the social, economic and political life of the country. ”

“ Our nature being at all times essentially the same, I presume that after a certain period of ferociousness and horrors, a resettlement of some sort, probably of the most despotic governments, would have taken place. ”

“ The only issue before the Court is whether a refugee is totally barred from any consideration under § 203 (a) (7) by virtue of resettlement following flight. In view of the language of the statute and its legislative history, I cannot but conclude that under § 203 (a) (7) the respondent was eligible for the adjustment of status that he sought. ”

“ Support the Government’s efforts, along with international partners and neighbouring countries, to create an environment conducive to the voluntary, safe and dignified return of internally displaced persons and refugees, or voluntary local integration or resettlement ”

“ The United States has continued to play its traditional role of safehaven for those who flee or are forced to flee their homes because of persecution or war. During 1980, the United States provided resettlement opportunities for 216,000 refugees from countries around the globe. In addition, the United States joined with other nations to provide relief to refugees in country of first asylum in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. ”

“ The President outlined his plan to reduce migration by addressing its root causes, increasing resettlement capacity and lawful alternative immigration pathways, improving processing at the border to adjudicate requests for asylum, and reversing the previous administration’s draconian immigration policies. ”

“ Noting with appreciation the efforts undertaken to date by the Secretary-General in support of the Central American peace process, including his continuing efforts to promote voluntary demobilization, resettlement and repatriation, as reflected in his report of 15 March 1990, ( [1] )
1. ”

“ With regard to uprooted persons who desire to remain abroad, the Government shall take the necessary steps and conduct the necessary negotiations with the host countries so as to ensure that the migrants are living in a stable situation. ”

“ While Congress did not carry the words 'firmly resettled' over into the 1957, 1960, and 1965 Acts from the earlier legislation, Congress did introduce a new requirement into the 1957 Act-the requirement of 'flight.' The 1957 Act, as well as the present law, speaks of persons who have 'fled' to avoid persecution. [4] Both the terms 'firmly resettled' and 'fled' are closely related to the central theme of all 23 years of refugee legislation-the creation of a haven for the world's homeless people. ”

“ The second object, and the most interesting to us, as coming home to our physical and moral characters, to our happiness and safety, is to provide an asylum to which we can, by degrees, send the whole of that population from among us, and establish them under our patronage and protection, as a separate, free and independent people, in some country and climate friendly to human life and happiness. That any place on the coast of Africa should answer the latter purpose, I have ever deemed entirely impossible. ”

“ Recent information also leads me to hope that the emigrants from Her Majesty's Provinces who have sought refuge within our boundaries are disposed to become peaceable residents and to abstain from all attempts to endanger the peace of that country which has afforded them an asylum. ”

“ It must also be borne in mind, that these distant territories offered an asylum to many who fled from the vengeance of the laws, men without principle, thieves, rogues, and vagabonds, who escaping there, would often interfere with the happiness and peace of some small yet well-conducted community, which had migrated and settled on these fertile regions. ”

“ If during the operation of the immigration scheme something like a proper system of selection had been adopted, many of the unsuitable persons brought to the colony would have been allowed to remain at Home, to their own and the colony's advantage. Still further, it has to be borne in mind that many of our asylum inmates, such as epileptics and silly, useless, but harmless creatures, would not in the Home country be ranked as lunatics or be placed in asylums. ”

“ Hence the Enchanted Isles become the voluntary tarrying places of all sorts of refugees; some of whom too sadly experience the fact, that flight from tyranny does not of itself insure a safe asylum, far less a happy home. ”

“ The best, and as a rule, the only practicable chance of escape open to the pursued, lay in the possibility of his reaching a sanctuary before the hunters came up with him. If a man took sanctuary, his life was safe, but he remained a close prisoner within the precincts of the asylum in which he had found refuge until he received the King's pardon, or until he purchased his freedom by "abjuring the realm," an undertaking which entailed upon him perpetual banishment, besides the forfeiture of all his belongings. ”

“ Incomparably more important than even the right of holding public meetings has been the permission habitually accorded to refugees from one country to become naturalised in another. The right of asylum is perhaps more likely to be extended than withheld. ”

“ To provide places of temporary asylum to which refugees whom it may be possible to evacuate from European countries may be removed, these refugees to be supported in camps for the duration of the war, with the understanding that they will then be repatriated in their own country or be provided with permanent homes in other ways. ”

“ The emigrants were soon confronted by the desperate alternative of either roaming about without shelter, help or advice in a foreign land, or of wandering back shamefully to their no less alien and loveless home-country. This emigration was for our people nothing but a new date in its martyrology. But this aimless wandering in the labyrinth of exile, to which our people have always been accustomed, does not advance them a step; they rather sink deeper in the morass of their wanderings. In the last emigration no sign of progress toward a better state of things is to be observed. ”

“ It is one of the factors which the Immigration and Naturalization Service must take into account to determine whether a refugee seeks asylum in this country as a consequence of his flight to avoid persecution. ”

“ Prisoners of war or other German nationals who do not desire to be repatriated may be excluded from repatriation; but the Allied and Associated Governments reserve to themselves the right either to repatriate them or to take them to a nutral neutral country or to allow them to reside in their own territories. ”

“ It gave us, however, some consolation to reflect that should it occasion much distress, the fertile regions of America would afford you a safe asylum from poverty and in time from oppression also; an asylum in which many thousands of your countrymen have found hospitality, peace, and affluence, and become united to us by all the ties of consanguinity, mutual interest, and affection." [See Note 8 at the end of this chapter.]
"We offer our most grateful acknowledgments for the friendly disposition you have always shown towards us. We know that you are not without your grievances. ”

“ The Congress have already proclaimed this, and that no other qualification or name is necessary but to become settlers, without distinction of countries or persons. The European peasant, who toils for his scanty sustenance in penury, wretchedness, and servitude, will eagerly fly to this asylum for free and industrious labor. The tide of emigration may set strongly outward from Scotland, Ireland, and Canada to this new land of promise. ”

“ The following people are allowed to settle beyond the Ural.—All peasants and meshtchane, those engaged exclusively in agriculture, and also artisans, workmen, factory hands, merchants and shopkeepers. People of other classes must, before emigrating, apply to the governor of the province in which they live.
The Government invites no one to emigrate, and is anxious only to show all possible help to those who have decided to take that step, and to make the emigration laws and the grants and privileges accorded to colonists clear to everyone. ”

“ But we shall not be able successfully to defend this dignity until we stand upon our own feet. As soon as asylum is found for our poor people, for the refugees whom our historic and predestined fate will always create for us, we shall also rise in the estimation of the nations. ”

“ Sometimes, doubtless, there are cases of very real suffering, sorrow, and poverty, to which exile in the United States affords a melancholy refuge. I was obliged to hear in one great city of a gallant soldier who, reduced to poverty by no fault of his own, had quitted England and given up the society of his friends, and lived in a small suburb of a town on the coast of the Pacific, his secret known only to one or two officials, shunning all contact with his countrymen and evading as far as possible all inquiries of his friends. ”

“ Certainly many refugees make their escape to freedom from persecution in successive stages and come to this country only after stops along the way. Such stops do not necessarily mean that the refugee's aim to reach these shores has in any sense been abandoned. ”

“ However, when the Refugee Relief Act of 1953 was extended in 1957, the 'firmly resettled' language was dropped in favor of a formula defining an eligible refugee as 'any alien who, because of persecution or fear of persecution on account of race, religion, or political opinion has fled or shall flee' from certain areas. ”

“ Where a refugee has been forcibly displaced during the Second World War and removed to the territory of a Contracting State, and is resident there, the period of such enforced sojourn shall be considered to have been lawful residence within that territory. ”

“ The condition of the refugees and repatriates, thrust into communities to which they came as paupers and crowded into buildings which were never planned for domestic purposes, has been far from enviable. ”

“ His friends were still apprehensive for his safety, and I was repeatedly approached with inquiries as to whether in case of need I should receive him at the American Legation, or possibly, even, send a guard detachment to bring him in. The latter I could not do; but, while it is not proper to give specific assurances of protection in advance, I could say that it was customary to grant asylum to political refugees. ”

“ Encouragement was not lacking to induce refugees to take up land; several fugitive aid societies were organized for this purpose, and procured tracts of land and founded colonies upon them. The most important of the colonies thus formed were the Dawn Settlement at Dresden, the Elgin Settlement at Buxton and the Refugees' Home near Windsor. [601] These three communities deserve special consideration, inasmuch as they illustrate an interesting movement in which benevolent persons in Canada, England and the United States coöperated to improve the condition of the refugees. ”

“ That actually in times of revolution and of persecution of certain classes of the population asylum is occasionally granted to refugees and respected by the local authorities, there is no doubt, but this occasional practice does not shake the validity of the general rule of International Law according to which there is no obligation on the part of the receiving State to grant to envoys the right of affording asylum to individuals not belonging to their suites. ”

“ Aside from having brought relief from the fear of extermination, hospitalization for the serious starvation cases and some general improvement in conditions under which the remaining displaced persons are compelled to live, relatively little beyond the planning stage has been done, during the period of mass repatriation, to meet the special needs of the formerly persecuted groups. ”

“ A number of us having left our homes, have found a dwelling and asylum under this government, where we live in peace and safety, protected by the equity and fostering care of the British government, and suffering no kind of injury or loss. ”

“ Eighteen—Repatriation, without reciprocity, within maximum period of one month, in accordance with detailed conditions hereafter to be fixed, of all civilians interned or deported who may be citizens of other Allied or associated states than those mentioned in clause three, paragraph nineteen, with the reservation that any future claims and demands of the Allies and the United States of America remain unaffected. ”

“ They stated, with truth, that from time immemorial it was their custom to afford an asylum to anyone demanding it, and that to surrender a man who had sought and found shelter with them would be a disgrace which they could not endure. ”

“ Only explicit and comprehensive guarantees of remigration of the refugees, given by the Anglo-Saxon Powers as a reinforcement of any assurances of repatriation which may be given by the Allied Governments in exile, can lead the neutral countries to adopt a more liberal and understanding attitude towards the Jewish refugees. <276> These guarantees should provide for the granting of facilities concerning the supply of food and funds for the maintenance of refugees during their stay in the neutral countries. ”

“ If unwise legislation and the state of the country deprive labour of either or both of these, the effect is instantly felt by the labouring classes; they are reduced to a state of suffering. This state of things was seen in our own country some few years ago. The evils pressing on these classes were such as to call for an instant remedy. Time alone could remove the true causes of the misery. The change of laws and of the state of the country could not be the work of a day, and so emigration presented itself as the immediate remedy. ”