CCR Resolutions Database

1. There are 3,000 Assyrian Christians who fled Iraq due to the war and persecution and are living temporarily in Jordan;
2. There are 2,000 Assyrian Christians living temporarily in Turkish refugee camps;
3. There have been many cases of further mistreatment in both Turkey and Jordan;

1. Bill C-40 contains provisions which amend the Immigration Act to deem some persons facing extradition to have received a decision of the Immigration and Refugee Board and to be found not to be a Convention Refugee even though no hearing of the Immigration and Refugee Board was actually held;
2. These amendments to the Immigration Act deny refugee claimants their right to a hearing before the IRB and to make submissions to establish their claim to refugee status;
3. International human rights have been involved in extraditions and expulsions by Canada and have been the object of views by the United Nations Human Rights Committee, for example, in the cases of Ng, Khan, and Cox;
4. In the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights Canada has accepted responsibility for measures necessary to ensure these international rights;

1. In June of 1996, in response to the U.S. INS detention of Canada-bound refugee claimants and the subsequent processing of said claimants for deportation, the CCR passed a resolution urging CIC to cease turning refugee claimants back to the U.S.;
2. INS detentions of Canada-bound refugee claimants have continued and, in fact, broadened in 1998 to include detentions in the Niagara Region, Blackpool and Minnesota;
3. INS has continued to detain certain refugee claimants, even after such claimants have received Canadian eligibility determinations, thereby denying these claimants the opportunity to pursue their refugee claims in Canada;
4. In an April 29, 1998 letter to the President of the CCR, the Acting Director General of the Enforcement Branch, CIC NHQ, stated, "...it is our policy that no person will be returned to the United States where there is reason to believe that they will be removed from the U.S. before the scheduled eligibility determination or would otherwise be unavailable because of detention. We are reviewing our procedures manual to ensure that this is clearly understood";
5. Despite the above-cited policy, CIC in the Niagara Region has continued to direct refugee claimants back to the United States to await eligibility determinations, which has resulted in the detention of a troubling number of people;
6. CIC's practice at certain border crossings of closing the border to refugee claimants on certain days of the week or at certain times of the year has also led to U.S. detentions of Canada-bound refugees awaiting Canadian processing;

1. The CCR adopted Resolution 3 in November 1997 concerning changes from AAP to RAP and has not received a satisfactory response;
2. There has been no consultation about the changes to services with the organizations that deliver the services, let alone with the refugees receiving the services;
3. CIC is committed to promoting through its services greater independence in government-assisted refugees;
4. CIC is continuing to impose a quantitative approach (defining the numbers of hours of service to be delivered, and the period within which they are to be delivered);
5. The changes appear to mean, at least in some regions, significant cutbacks in services for government-assisted refugees;
6. In some areas the role of reception centres is being called into question, but without open discussion and consultation;
7. Citizenship and Immigration Canada is developing national standards for services to arriving refugees, again without consultations;

Groups applying for Joint Assistance Sponsorships for Women at Risk can face unexpected requests for travel costs in addition to the resettlement support they promised;

1. Board members are under pressure to move quickly on cases at the expense of fairness, thus violating the fundamental right of refugee claimants to a fair and impartial hearing;
2. The Montreal IRB has started giving negative decisions with no credible basis in a systematic and abusive fashion;
3. There is a serious problem with Board members not treating fairly victims of torture and a general problem of insensitivity linked to a lack of proper training for Board members;

There is a need to share information on services for refugee claimants and to explore how the work can be improved and better communication networks established across the country;

1. Human rights violations in Guatemala have increased significantly since the April 1998 assassination of Bishop Juan Gerardi Conedera two days after he presented the report of the Interdiocesan Project to Recover the Historical Memory (REMHI) which named some of the perpetrators involved in torture, killings, massacres and disappearances;
2. The REMHI report not only documents 55,021 cases of victims, holding the Guatemalan Army and paramilitary squads responsible for 85.4% of the crimes and the insurgency responsible for 9.3% of those crimes, but also exposes the way the repressive apparatus operates allowing powerful perpetrators of human rights violations to continue to act with impunity;
3. Luis Yat, indigenous mayor of El Quiche was assassinated in front of his wife and children last May 6 and numerous members of indigenous, women's and human rights organizations continue to be threatened and intimidated;
4. The Inter-American Human Rights Commission of the Organization of American States (OAS) requested the Guatemalan State to provide protective measures for 110 members of REMHI and workers at the Human Rights Office of the Catholic Archdiocese who are at risk;

1. There are Convention Refugees, particularly Iranians, who have applied for landing and had CSIS interviews but have had their landing held up for years in the Security Reviews in case management;
2. They are unable to travel outside Canada, sponsor family or pursue post-secondary education;

1. The scourge of torture continues throughout the world;
2. There is an urgent need to raise public awareness in Canada about torture;
3. The UN General Assembly has proclaimed June 26, 1998 as the International Day in support of Victims of Torture;

1. The Canadian Council for Refugees recognizes that racism is systemic in Canadian society. It causes pain, humiliation and has far-reaching consequences. It is embedded in society and social institutions in a way that is so pervasive that it is often invisible;
2. The Anti-Racism Policy of the Canadian Council for Refugees was adopted on November 24th, 1996 by its members who have recognized that racism prevents equality in opportunity and access to asylum, immigration opportunities, education, jobs, housing, health care and social services, and limits participation in decision-making bodies;
3. The CCR acknowledges its commitment to promote anti-racism principles and practices among its member organizations;

1. The violation of human rights in Colombia has reached unprecedented and outrageous levels;
2. The targets of this violence are key institutions of civil society (human rights groups; church, justice and peace groups; workers and trade union leaders; peasant and indigenous organizations);
3. The Colombian government has proven, once again, to be unwilling and incapable of curbing the atrocities committed by the military and especially the paramilitary formations;
4. An estimated one million Colombians are internally displaced within the country;
5. Colombia was added to the Source Country list this year;

1. Agencies experienced in providing AAP services are the most knowledgeable as to how to meet client needs;
2. Inclusive, integrated, and related services should not be arbitrarily limited or required (e.g. number of hours, weeks or service) but should be discretionary and based on client need;
3. Services must include, but not be limited to, finding of permanent accommodation and sufficient funding to provide initial temporary accommodation and counselling;

1. The CCR is aware of numerous cases in which CIC's information-gathering practices have jeopardized the security of refugee claimants and their families;
2. The CCR is not aware of the existence of any adequate CIC guidelines on information-gathering practices;

1. Many claimants from the former Zaire, now the DRC, are being refused by the IRB;
2. Many of the decisions appear to be based on inadequate country information;

1. Canada is a signatory to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child which guarantees education for children;
2. Education is fundamental to child development;

1. The IRB (CRDD) currently allows documents from its Documentation Centres to be entered into evidence at hearings despite the absence of the name of the source of the document;
2. This practice contravenes the principles of fairness;

1. CIC has a list of countries to which it does not at present deport nationals from those countries, but has not made this list available in writing;
2. The recommendations made to the Minister by the Advisory Committee on Country Conditions for Removal are not made public;
3. Neither the Minister's decisions to suspend nor to resume deportations are communicated to the public;

1. The Department of Citizenship and Immigration Canada has undertaken a consultative process with relevant stakeholders with a view to developing sponsorship programs that will include partnerships and blended roles and responsibilities;
2. In some regions, as of April 1st 1998, the AAP/RAP allocations will be limited to the major urban centres in each region thus excluding the possibility of blended programs in smaller urban centres and rural communities where AAP/RAP will no longer be administered;
3. A significant portion of current and past blended programs such as the Joint Assistance Sponsorship Program, the Women at Risk Program and the Special 3/9 Program for refugees from the former Yugoslavia have been undertaken successfully in smaller urban centres and rural communities;

1. The Ports of Entry at the US border have not in the past allowed unaccompanied minors to enter Canada to make refugee claims without a guardian to receive them;
2. Due to the work of VIVE Buffalo and CIC P.O.E. at Niagara, an agreement has been reached to allow unaccompanied minors to enter Canada rather than be returned to the US;

1. Arbitrary arrests and gross violations of human rights have been the most significant characteristic of the Islamic Republic of Iran policy;
2. Tyranny and religious intolerance by the authorities have claimed thousands of lives in Iran;
3. Detention of ex-political prisoners has become a nightmare for prisoners and their families;
4. Women in Iran are treated as second class citizens and face persecution and stoning to death as Amnesty International has reported;
5. Iranian refugees do not wish to face again their torturers who appear as government agents at embassies;
6. In order to process an application for travel documents the Iranian embassy demands personal information of refugees including the way they escaped Iran;
7. Due to the prevailing situation in Iran, deporting rejected refugee claimants and refugees accused of criminal offenses to that country would certainly jeopardize their lives, putting them at risk of torture or death;

1. The federal government has allocated additional dollars for settlement in various provinces over a three year period;
2. This money has not been spent on settlement services in some provinces;
3. The need to spend significant amounts of settlement funds in a short time period will not facilitate the most effective use of such dollars;

1. The Sponsorship Agreement notes as Principle #3 the ability of the Sponsorship Agreement Holder (SAH) to submit undertakings for refugees referred by the sponsor and further to this, Appendix 3 describes the roles and responsibility of this undertaking in Joint Assistance Sponsorships;
2. The ability to refer refugees for resettlement to Canada has been of longstanding importance to sponsors and to the CCR and it has been the practice of some sponsors to refer refugees for consideration under the Joint Assistance Program;
3. The new regulations require a sponsor to sign a CR3 undertaking at the front-end of a referral of a refugee for consideration as a CR5, thus negating the need for the visa post to give due consideration to the eligibility for the CR5 programs and obliging the sponsor to fulfil their undertaking for full support as a CR3;
4. Citizenship and Immigration Canada commits in the Sponsorship Agreement (page 6 - j) to make "best efforts to give notice of any change in policy, regulations or legislation that is likely to affect this Sponsorship Agreement": and this notice was not made;
5. There is no mechanism available to sponsors to make referrals under the Joint Assistance Program other than by signing the undertaking as a CR3;
6. NGOs overseas have the ability to refer refugees to the visa post for consideration as CR5s;
7. CIC has indicated that it is difficult to identify enough refugees for resettlement in order to meet its annual targets;
8. Joint Assistance Sponsorship cases may have community links in the destination community who will enhance the potential for successful establishment of otherwise difficult cases;

1. CIC has responsibility for enforcement of the Immigration Act including, among other things, interdiction, the assessment of eligibility of refugee claimants, the opposing of refugee claims in certain instances and the removal of unsuccessful refugee claimants from Canada;
2. The employment by the IRB (CRDD) of RCO's previously or presently employees of Canada Immigration gives rise to an appearance of bias and is inconsistent with the non-adversarial model of refugee determination;