The Decibel - What asylum seekers face now at Roxham Road

Episode Date: March 31, 2023

The change came swiftly. A few hours after being announced by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and U.S. President Joe Biden, the rules at Roxham Road had tightened.Globe reporter Frédérik-Xavier Duhamel went to the popular unofficial border crossing and spoke to migrants trying to make the trek as changes to the Safe Third Country Act now limit who can claim asylum in Canada via that passage.Questions? Comments? Ideas? Email us at [e-mail]

R-CMP says if you approach, if you enter Canada, you will be arrested for illegal entry into Canada. That's Globe reporter Frédéric Xavier Duhamel, on the border between Quebec and New York at Roxham Road. Hola. Hi, hola. ¿De dónde están? Hola. ¿De dónde están? Yo soy de Colombia.

¿De Colombia? OK. ¿Y por qué te. From Colombia? Okay. And why did you leave Colombia? This unofficial border crossing was a popular route for people coming from the U.S. to claim asylum in Canada. But now, many people can no longer claim asylum at unofficial crossings, after U.S. President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced a change to the Safe Third Country Agreement. Frederic was at Roxham Road last weekend.

Today, he'll tell us about the people he met there, why this change happened, and what this means for people seeking asylum in Canada. I'm Mena Karaman-Wilms, and this is The Decibel from The Globe and Mail. Frederic, thank you so much for joining me today. Thank you for having me. So you were at the Roxham Road unofficial border crossing just before these new rules went into effect last week. Can you just describe it for me? What was it like there? bit more confusing was that there were not many indications of the policy change at the border. The only thing that changed really was the sign. So there used to be a sign giving information

about the process of seeking asylum in Canada and a sign telling people to stop, that it was illegal to cross. And now those signs were removed. And they put another sign saying it's illegal to cross into Canada and adding that you might be returned to the United States if you cross at that point. So the sign change, was that actually the main change that happened at the border than at midnight, just a switch of signs, essentially? It's the only thing that changed. The message from the RCMP officers did not change at all before and after midnight. The sound I sent you was an RCMP officer saying, you know, stop, do not cross. It's illegal to cross into Canada here. You will be arrested if you cross. And that was the same message before

and after midnight. Could you just describe what Roxham Road actually looks like? Like the area, when you're standing there, what are you seeing? It's between Champlain, New York and Saint-Bernard-de-la-Cole, Quebec, which are both very small towns. It's a sparsely populated area. It's mostly fields and woodlands. It's a dirt road on the U.S. side. It's paved on the Canadian side. There is now this RCMP compound on the Canadian side,

which has been there for the past few years as the number of asylum seekers who crossed there grew. So you were talking to some people as they were getting off buses, out of cars to cross the border there. Can you just tell me about some of the people you met? Who were they? On Friday night, there were people at Roxham Road. Before midnight, we met people from all over the world, really, from Afghanistan, Turkey, Haiti, Chad, Botswana, the DRC, Colombia, Venezuela, and other countries. On Friday afternoon, I met people coming off the bus at the 3 p.m. bus at the Mountain Mart, which is a convenience store and a Dunkin' Donut in a deli in Plattsburgh, New York, which is the last bus stop before the border.

And so the people that went off the bus on Friday afternoon were probably among the last ones to be able to do that and not be returned to the US before the policy change. And so I spoke with people from Colombia who said they did not know of the looming policy change. And they said they were fleeing violence, armed group violence and threats that their family had received. And so I stayed there for a Friday night at Roxanne Road, and then I went back on Sunday, and I met other people who had arrived too late. I met people from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Venezuela, and Colombia,

and they all said that they would still try their luck to go through, to come into Canada, because what they told me is that they really had no other option. They had nothing to go back to. And they had made all this, they have come a long way, and we wanted to try their luck anyway. Wow. And I think someone you spoke to from Afghanistan, his name is Mortaza Rezia, I think. Can you just tell me about his story? Mortaza Rezia arrived at Roxanne Road crossing at about 11 p.m. with his three sisters. He told reporters he was in a rush. He knew of the policy change.

But he told reporters that he fled Afghanistan because life was made impossible under the Taliban rule. He worked a bit in the US for a time, crossed many countries. Initially, I spoke to him in Spanish because I thought it was from Latin America, but he told me, and he answered in Spanish, but he told me, oh, I'm not an African-American from Afghanistan. I picked up a bit of Spanish on the way because I needed to, because he crossed several Latin American countries before arriving in the U.S. And then he learned on Thursday night, I think, that there would be this policy change at Roxanne Road. And he said he bought a ticket. I'm not sure exactly what mean of transportation, probably a bus ticket. And then with his three sisters, they came to Roxanne Road

just about in time to make it through. So let's get into some of the details here about these new rules, because these are changes to the Safe Third Country Agreement. So, Fradjik, what specifically about the Safe Third Country Agreement has changed? So the Safe Third Country Agreement is used to apply only at official border crossings, what are called ports of entry. And we should maybe just remind people, so the Safe Third Country Agreement is essentially, you have to claim asylum in the first safe country that you land in, either the US or Canada.

That's an agreement between those two countries. And just to be clear here, Fajriq, this is not just for Roxham Road, right? This is any unofficial border crossing now along the Canadian-US land border? Exactly. The thing is, Roxham Road was by far the most popular, for lack of a better word, place to cross between ports of entries. So the RCMP publishes data, monthly data on people who are intercepted between ports of entry. And in 2022, it's over 39,000 of people who were intercepted between ports of entry in Quebec compared to less than 400 in the rest of the country. And so the vast majority of people crossing into Quebec would have been at Roxham Row. And yeah, now it applies not only to ports of entry, but also between ports of entry, which means Roxham Row, among other places, all along the border.

So what actually happens, like we talked about the change of the signs, but what is actually the difference that happens at those unofficial border crossings now? So the RCMP arrest them, then they are taken to a Canadian Border Service agency port of entry, and then your situation is assessed. So there are a few exceptions under the safe third country agreement, which means some people would still be eligible to make an asylum claim at the land border between the US and Canada. But if you are deemed eligible, you can go ahead and make your claim. But if you're deemed ineligible, what changes now is that you'll be returned to the US. And the CBSA has started to return people to the U.S. But yes, so you said, so sometimes people

can still make an asylum claim in Canada. So what are the exemptions that would actually allow them to do that? Yeah, so there are four categories of exemptions from the Safe To Eat Country Agreement. The exemptions are for those who have family members who are, for example, citizens or permanent residents of Canada. Also, there's an exception for unaccompanied minors and for document holders, so people who already have a work permit, for example, or a study permit to come into Canada.

There's also a public interest exception for people who have been charged or convicted of an offense that could subject them to the death penalty in the US or a third country. But also those refugee claimants are ineligible if they have been found inadmissible in Canada on the grounds of security or for violating human or international rights or for serious criminality, for example, or if the minister finds a person to be a danger to the public. And so if someone is turned away, they cross illegally, they're sent back to the U.S., can they try to claim asylum again in Canada?

So I asked this question to Stéphanie Valois, who is the president of the Quebec Association of Immigration Lawyers, and she told me that this person will be ineligible to claim asylum forever in Canada. We'll be back in a moment. Okay, so let's turn our attention now to why this change is actually being made here. So previously, people could claim asylum at unofficial land border crossings. They couldn't at official land border crossings because of the Safe Third Country Agreement. But now with this change, people won't be able to claim asylum at these unofficial crossings like Roxham Road.

What does the Canadian government say about why it made this decision? So the stated objective from the Canadian government for this change in policy was to address irregular migration. This will ensure fairness and more orderly migration between our two countries. That's a government statement then? Yeah, exactly. That's the press release from the prime minister's office. The conservatives and other opposition parties have called for Roxanne Road to be shut down, for the passage to be closed. It was not always clear what this meant in practice.

Politicians in Quebec have also asked for a change in policy there. So the federal government was facing this political pressure from Quebec, especially because they were, as we said, a huge number of asylum seekers are coming through that province. We should just say this, a lot of changes in the States with the election of President Donald Trump, changes to their immigration policies and things was actually part of the fuel here that was causing more people to try to enter Canada through the US land border there. Yeah, this is one of the causes that people have pointed to to explain the rise in asylum seekers crossing at unofficial points of entry such as Roxham Road.

There were also other things, you know, global issues like the Syrian crisis causing record numbers of displaced people throughout the world. And some people have also pointed out the Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's tweet in 2017 saying that refugees, asylum seekers were welcome to Canada. And just to get to the heart of this, I guess, what was the, when we talk about Premier François Legault saying he wanted the Rochambeau closed, the arguments from the Quebec side, what was the argument in Quebec, I guess, to the federal government about why they were worried about this? Yeah, so Premier François Legault was worried about Quebec's capacity to welcome asylum seekers with dignity. So to provide them with services such as healthcare, schooling for their kids, and temporary housing. Resources, essentially. Exactly, resources, but also, you know, not only financial, but in terms of people who could take care of the incoming people. And he also mentioned in a letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau concerns about French language.

It's a big issue for Prévier Legault and his government, the preservation of French. And he saw the arrival of many asylum seekers who did not speak French as a threat to French language in Quebec, in Montreal in particular. Okay, so that's kind of the side of why the Trudeau government, the Canadian government may have some reasons to change this agreement. What about the U.S., though, Frederic? They've got a different situation down there. What's their motivation for wanting these changes?

So many observers in the past few months have said that the U.S. probably did not have much of an incentive to renegotiate the Safe Third Country Agreement because, in effect, it was kind of like a pressure valve allowing people to go from the US to Canada. Of course, the US is facing significant challenges at its southern border with many more people coming in there than we've ever seen in Canada. Like we're talking like hundreds of thousands kind of each or 100 to 200,000 each year basically coming through the southern border. Exactly. Yes. But our colleague Marika Walsh has reported before the Doreen

negotiated agreement was announced, she reported on the settlement whereas apparently the White House asked Canada to help ease the much more significant pressure it faces with irregular migration on the southern border

and the U.S. southern border by accepting 15,000 more migrants in Canada. This number, 15,000 more migrants, was part of the official announcement, but it is not yet clear what will be those pathways to welcome those 15,000 more migrants. This announcement was made last Friday afternoon during US President Joe Biden's visit to Canada, when him and Trudeau were meeting. And just a few hours later, after they made that announcement, the crossing was closed. It was something like eight hours that day. So, Frederic, why did it happen so suddenly? So, again, our colleague, Mariko Walsh, reported that there has been an agreement in the works for a year, about a year. But it was kept secret just to avoid a sudden rush at our southern border. Because, of course, people who would have known early on that a looming policy change would prevent them from claiming asylum at Roxham Road would have been incentivized to make their way there earlier. Which is kind of what we saw on Friday night, but of course probably to a lesser extent than what it would have been otherwise. Now, the other side of this means that many people who were already on the bus to Roxanne Road

arrived either early on Saturday morning. For example, there was a 3 a.m. bus on Saturday morning. Both people who were hoping to make an asylum trip to Ghana had to reassess their plan, which must have been difficult for many of them. And I guess I want to, we've been talking about the dangers of crossing in a place that's not regulated. But I guess I also wonder too,

if you're not claiming, if you do get into the country and you don't claim asylum, you're essentially undocumented then. Doesn't that pose additional dangers and difficulties? Well, for sure. Undocumented people are extremely vulnerable. Of course, it makes it much more difficult to receive support, social services, or of course, to get any kind of work. So that's probably another concern that we're looking at right now.

What's the argument against this, Frederic? Yes, advocates and experts have said that trying to apply the safe third country agreement to all of the border, which is, I think, the world's largest land border, would be extremely challenging. And as well that it would put people at risk because it incentivizes them to try a riskier approach, such as crossing in the woods or in the fields. And we have seen people dying trying to do the same from Canada to the U.S. where there is not the equivalent of Roxham Road to process them. Just lastly, Hifajik, from everything you've heard and the people that you've been talking to, what do you think is going to happen in the coming months? Do you think people will still try to cross the border at Roxham Road? I think from what we've heard by migration experts and advocates is that, yes, people are still.

Of course, this now disincentivizes people to cross through Roxham Road because they're not at risk of being returned to the US, but in a way it incentivizes them to try more risky approaches, such as trying to cross anywhere else and in a covert manner and try to avoid being intercepted by the RCMP. So this is probably what we will see in the coming months. Fajrik, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today. Thank you. That's it for today. I'm Mainika Raman-Wilms.

Our producers are Madeline White, Cheryl Sutherland, and Rachel Levy-McLaughlin. David Crosby edits the show. Adrian Chung is our senior producer and Angela Pachenza is our executive editor. Thanks so much for listening and I'll talk to you next week.