"No free ticket" for asylum seekers crossing into Canada, ministers say

Canada is not in any formal negotiations to amend an agreement with the US in a way that would to allow it to automatically turn back asylum seekers crossing into the country between official points of entry, cabinet ministers reiterated on Monday.

They also reassured Canadians that the border is under control, saying that crossing between official points of entry doesn’t give claimants a “free ticket.”

"All Canadian laws are and will continue to be enforced, and all our international obligations are and will continue to be honoured," Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale, told reporters on Monday, in a joint press conference with Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen and Transport Minister Marc Garneau.

Asked if Canada was hardening its tone on refugees, Goodale said, “It’s not a question of hardening our tone. It’s about properly explaining… that we have rules in place.”

“We want to make sure not just anybody comes to Canada, thinking it’s a free ticket,” he said.

SAFE THIRD COUNTRY AGREEMENT

The comments come after 2,500 asylum seekers crossed into Canada through the Quebec border in April, on top of approximately 5,000 others who have made the journey since the beginning of this year. Every day, about 70 to 80 people cross the border at Lacolle, Quebec, the site of most irregular crossings and where the government plans to build temporary housing for 520 people.

The ministers’ comments contradict a news report from last week that quoted officials saying the Canadian government is working to have the Safe Third Country Agreement rewritten so that it applies to the entire US-Canada border.

Under the agreement, asylum seekers are required to seek protection in their first country of arrival — since the US is a designated ‘safe country,’ claimants who come to Canada from the US are automatically turned back, with few exceptions.

However, a loophole in the agreement allows people who make it onto Canadian soil by walking across the border between official points of entry to have their asylum claims heard. Over 26,000 people have made the trek over the past 15 months, crossing in places like Lacolle, Quebec.

Canadian officials have been asking the US to change the agreement with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security since September, according to Reuters.

“We’d like to be able to get them to agree that we can, if somebody comes across, we just send them back,” one official told Reuters, adding Canada had raised the issue “at least a dozen” times since.

“I wouldn’t say they’ve been objecting or saying: ‘No, we won’t do it,’ but it’s been not responding rapidly.”

BORDER DIPLOMACY

The Department of Homeland Security told VICE News that they are “reviewing the proposal made by Canada to amend the Safe Third Agreement, but we have no decision to announce at this time.”

They did not respond to a request for clarification on what the nature of the proposal was.

Meanwhile, Citizenship and Immigration Canada says while they’ve been “closely engaged” with the US on issues related to irregular migration, and have raised challenges related to the STCA, but that they haven’t been in any formal negotiations.

“The agreement has allowed Canada and the United states to coordinate the management of asylum seekers between the two countries,” said Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen, adding that the agreement has been “good” for Canada and that “the United States has a fair and judicious domestic asylum system.”

Experts say amending the agreement to apply to the entire border could force people underground even more than they already have been. The agreement is already being challenged in court on the basis that it’s discriminatory. The Conservatives, meanwhile, have been urging the Liberal government to close the loophole.

Canada has also repeatedly raised the issue of asylum seekers getting tourist visas to the US as a way of getting into Canada. Three Canadian officials have been dispatched to Nigeria, the country of origin of many asylum seekers who have entered Canada in recent weeks. Hussen himself plans to go there in the near future to discuss the issue with Nigerian officials.