Canada attractive to human smugglers -- Gangs in America ...and Beyond -- & -- Claudia Rosett

Canada attractive to human smugglers Jim Bronskill, CP, May 2, 2005

Almost 12 per cent of people who arrived in Canada without proper documents during a six-year period were directly linked to a smuggler or escort, a federal intelligence study reveals.

[. . . . ] The 63-page study, Illegal Migrant Smuggling to Canada, is the result of the RCMP's Project Safehouse, an effort to get a better sense of the phenomenon and make recommendations to deal with it. [. . . . ]

The study says smugglers promote Canada as a destination by highlighting perceptions of a generous immigration regime and a chance to obtain citizenship following a successful refugee claim.

In the summer of 1999, a series of rusty ships brought more than 600 Chinese, mostly from Fujian province, to the British Columbia coast. It is believed each newcomer paid tens of thousands of dollars for passage. [. . . . ]

Worth reading.




Canadians are suckers -- "refugees"

Study released on human-smuggling market

[. . . . ] It examined data from 1997 through 2002 to try to pin down how much illicit migration to Canada results from smuggling activity.

During the period, 14,792 people who reached Canada or were intercepted attempting to do so had associations with an escort or facilitator - someone who provided services including a travel document, air ticket, safe house or referral to people smuggling contacts.

The figure represents 11.9 per cent of the total number travelling by air, land or ship. [. . . . ]

"There is growing evidence in the literature of a connection between human smuggling and transnational organized crime groups, terrorist organizations and the movement of individuals who pose direct threats to the security of Canada and the safety of Canadians." [. . . . ]

The study says smugglers promote Canada as a destination by highlighting perceptions of a generous immigration regime and a chance to obtain citizenship following a successful refugee claim. [. . . . ]

Search: 600 Chinese , lacking a comprehensive national strategy , Canada Border Services Agency




GANGS IN AMERICA...AND BEYOND: FBI Exec Outlines Anti-Gang Strategy to Congress 04/20/05

Turns out, even gangs have gone global. On Wednesday, the House Committee on International Relations' Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere held a hearing on rising gang violence across Latin America—and how it's not only destabilizing the region but also fueling crime and violence here in the U.S.

Testifying for the FBI was our top criminal investigative executive—Chris Swecker. He provided plenty of detail on the growing menace of gangs and our growing efforts to defeat them, including a task force specifically focused on disrupting and dismantling Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13. A few highlights:

The threat:

"Today, gangs are more violent, more organized, and more widespread than ever before."

"There are approximately 30,000 gangs, with 800,000 members, impacting 2,500 communities across the U.S."

Latino gangs are sowing violence and crime in big cities like Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York, but are also spreading to rural and suburban areas.

The violent gang MS-13—composed mainly of Central American immigrants from El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala—"has a significant presence in Northern Virginia, New York, California, Texas, as well as places as disparate and widespread as Oregon City, Oregon, and Omaha, Nebraska." MS-13 is estimated to have some 8,000 to 10,000 hardcore members—and is growing increasingly sophisticated, widespread, and violent.

Our response:

A new National Gang Strategy: it identifies the gangs posing the greatest danger to American communities and targets them with the coordinated resources of law enforcement and the same federal racketeering statutes, intelligence, and investigative techniques used to defeat organized crime. See the full testimony for a complete list of the gangs with connections to Central America and Mexico that we are targeting.

More Safe Streets Violent Gang Task Forces (SSVGTF): from 78 to 108 and 20 more planned. Since 1996, the work of the SSVGTFs have led to nearly 20,000 convictions and the dismantling of more than 250 gangs.

A National Gang Intelligence Center: it will coordinate the national collection of gang intelligence and help us share it with our partners around the globe.
The new MS-13 National Gang Task Force (NGTF): it's helping to speed the flow of information and intelligence on MS-13 nationally and internationally and to coordinate investigations.

In the words of Subcommittee Chairman Dan Burton, "It is clearly in everyone's best interest that we address this problem now, and end the threat of transnational gang violence in the Western Hemisphere."

Links: Read the full testimony | House Press Release

This activity does not stop at the border, I would surmise. We could ask what Canada is doing to forestall this activity.

Airport syndicate was sending illegals to Canada Nov 18, 2004, via Prime Time Crime

Indian police have busted a racket operating out of the New Delhi airport that was sending natives of Punjab to Canada on fake visas and passports.

Among those arrested were the chief security officer of an international airline and other staff posted at the international airport, including a private travel agent.

They were charging 18 lakh Rupees (about C$48,000) for each illegal migrant and working with travel agents in Punjab and New Delhi.

The man who was instrumental in ex-Minister Judy Sgro's demise as Minister of Immigration was holding several illegal passports and/or visas, I think. No wonder he was deported from Canada back to India before he revealed more information on illegal documents and "refugees".




Happy Days Are Here Again -- America stands astride the world, stronger and more self-confident than ever. Claudia Rosett, May 4, 2005

It's always risky to celebrate security and good times, especially in an age when there is no way to rule out that along with the usual perils of life, we will suffer another terrorist attack. But this spring, more than 3 1/2 years after Sept. 11, it does seem that since that day America has weathered a rough passage awfully well. That, and with the cherry trees just done blooming in Washington and New York's Central Park full of flowers (and, in the grand old tradition, amateur baseball teams), it feels worth a moment to stand back and observe that for all the usual ructions of politics and the more prominent idiocies of such institutions as Hollywood, academia and the imploding United Nations in our midst, rarely in recent decades has there been more sanity and self-respect abroad in this land. [. . . . ]

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