New Human Rights Watch report on arbitrary jailing of refugees in the United States
From Bill Frelick of Human Rights Watch:
Dear friends,
I wanted to send you the link to a new Human Rights Watch report called “Jailing Refugees: Arbitrary Detention of Refugees in the U.S. Who Fail to Adjust to Permanent Resident Status.”
The report examines the detention of refugees in the United States for failure to file for lawful permanent resident status, even though US immigration officials already put them through a thorough vetting process at the time they were recognized as refugees. Although only a small number of refugees are jailed for this purpose, and the number appears to have decreased under the Obama administration, the detentions continue to be selective and arbitrary, and therefore a violation of international human rights law. The report recommends changing US law to close the legal loophole that allows for detaining these refugees and to give them lawful permanent residence when the US grants them asylum or admits them to the country under its overseas refugee resettlement program.
The Philadelphia Inquirer pubished an op-ed piece today that discusses the issue.
We are greatly indebted to many NGO partners who helped to make this research possible and who helped frame our recommendations (though all my not agree with each of them). Rather than thank them all in this message, I refer you to the acknowledgements in the report itself.
We look forward to working with colleagues to change this law.
Bill Frelick
