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[Walpurgis]

Two Somalian refugee claimants crossed the border into Canada the hard way this week -- in the Red River.

On Wednesday, Yahya Samatar, who was shivering and soaking wet, climbed out of the Red River in Emerson, and into the pickup truck of a Good Samaritan who cranked up the heat, gave him a sweater and called 911.

"I didn't know where to go," said Samatar, a 32-year-old English-speaking aid worker from Somalia. In an interview with the Free Press Thursday, he said he and a companion were dropped off just south of the Canadian border crossing after midnight Tuesday. "I saw the lights of the port" at Emerson, he said. They were both afraid U.S. border patrols would pick them up and send them back to Somalia, so they headed for the bush.

"I crossed the farms and saw the bushes. I went in the bushes and saw the river."

Disoriented and in the dark, they figured the river ran east to west rather than south to north and, if they waded across it, they'd be safe in Canada, he said.

His companion entered the river with a backpack containing Samatar's wallet and phone. He was quickly swept up by the current and carried downstream, he said.

"I wasn't seeing him," Samatar said. He thought his friend had drowned. "I didn't hear him calling my name."

By that time, Samatar had already taken three steps into the mighty Red. Realizing it wasn't a lazy river they could just wade across, he scrambled back up on the bank.

"I slept in the bush." In the morning, he took a chance. "I thought I could cross if I left my trousers and shoes behind."

He learned to swim as a kid growing up in Kismaayo, a port city south of Mogadishu on the Indian Ocean, but he was not prepared for the cold, fast-moving river.

After two or three terrifying minutes in the water, Samatar said he swam back to shore and pulled himself out of the river. Shivering and shoeless, wearing nothing but shorts and a T-shirt, he walked into Emerson. "I didn't know if I'm in Canadian territory," Samatar said.

"I met a guy parking a truck... He was shocked by me when he saw my condition... He was a very nice guy." He told Samatar he was in Canada, gave him a sweater, put him in the cab of his truck with the heater running full blast and called 911. Paramedics and RCMP arrived.

After determining he wasn't hypothermic, Samatar was arrested, handcuffed, draped in a blanket and taken to the Canada Border Services Agency office nearby.

"They gave me food and trousers and a sweatshirt -- they gave me what they had."

The refugee claimant was interviewed, photographed, fingerprinted and given an October date for an Immigration and Refugee Board hearing. Then he was released.

But with no money, no one to call to pick him up, and nowhere to go, Canada Border Services Agency officials called Welcome Place in Winnipeg to get help for Samatar. Their offices had already closed, so they called Hospitality House Refugee Ministry. It handles private sponsorships of refugees, not refugee claimants, but their settlement manager jumped in her car and drove south to Emerson to get Samatar and put him up at Hospitality House residence in Winnipeg.

On Friday, Samatar learned his friend made it out of the river, hitchhiked to Winnipeg and was on his way to Toronto to make a refugee claim there.

Samatar hopes he's at the end of what has been a year-long survival odyssey.

He fled Somalia in August of last year when he became a target because he does aid work with a non-governmental organization and had no one to protect him.

"There's no functioning government," Samatar said. "As long as your clan has not a lot of power, you're at risk." Militia groups and Al Shabaab are active and night-time attacks are common, he said.

Samatar said he and his family scraped together US$12,000 to pay smugglers to get him to Ethiopia, then Brazil, and help him make his way by land through Central America to the U.S. border at Matamoros, Mexico. "I took buses and walked in the jungle for one month," he said.

In the U.S., he was apprehended as an illegal alien and spent six months in a detention centre in Texas and another 10 weeks in a centre in Louisiana. After his refugee claim was formally rejected, he was released to await deportation back to Somalia. Desperate to set down roots in some place safe, he headed north. A contact in Minneapolis's huge Somali community rented a car and drove Samatar and his companion close to the border crossing at Pembina, N.D., he said. In Canada, the kindness of strangers has been a shock to his system, he said. He feels welcome and hopes to make this his home.

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/long-perilous-journey-to-safety-321124011.html

 

[TimeEffect]

What a journey. Hope he does well, seems Canada is doing a good job of it, right? What's going to likely happen to him?

 

[Kickz]

Amazing, thats gotta be the longest hardest border crossing. Give the man a citizenship stat

 

[Walpurgis]

What a journey. Hope he does well, seems Canada is doing a good job of it, right? What's going to likely happen to him?

Unfortunately not because of new rules imposed by our ignorant Conservative government.

After emerging from the Red River, Somali man seeking asylum now mired in red tape

New immigration rules imposed three years ago mean anyone with a legitimate refugee claim is up against a system that’s designed to make them fail, said Bashir Khan. He summarized what happens with refugee claimants such as Samatar:

A refugee claimant is dropped off in the middle of the night and walks until they’ve crossed the border into Canada.

"They’ve been outside for nine or 10 hours and are hungry and thirsty when dawn breaks. They’ll go to a farmer or approach a Canadian for help," he said.

"The farmer in Morden or Winkler is no stranger to this," Khan said. "They call the RCMP in the area, who books them, and they’re taken to the border crossing right away."

There, a Canada Border Services Agency [CBSA] officer decides whether or not they can be released based on three grounds: are they a flight risk? Is their identity unclear? Are they a danger to the public? If they’re detained, they’re transferred to the Winnipeg Remand Centre.

If the CBSA releases them, it has no duty to take them anywhere, said Khan.

In Samatar’s case, the CBSA officials were "nice" to call Winnipeg immigration organizations to come and help him, Khan said.

"Most of the claimants released fend for themselves," Khan said. "They get from there to Winnipeg.

"More often, they’re left to their own devices."

There is just one worker in Winnipeg at Welcome Place helping refugee claimants fill out all the forms. His position is no longer funded by the federal government, whose elected officials have often referred to refugee claimants as "bogus." Welcome Place, which is run by the Manitoba Interfaith Immigration Council, says it relies on donations to fund the position because it’s a vital and just service, and refugee claimants deserve the right to a fair hearing.

They’ll often need documents, paperwork and evidence from abroad that are difficult to obtain, he said. Under the old system, they had a year-and-a-half to prepare for a hearing, he said. With drastically shortened timelines, they’re not getting a fair opportunity to present their case, said Khan.

If they can’t convince the adjudicator at their hearing their refugee claim is legitimate, they’re going to be removed from Canada.

In my experience, people typically pay someone several hundred dollars to fill the papers out for them because they are so ridiculous. I've read them and they are absolutely not written for immigrants. It's a very time consuming process and after reading this article, much worse than I thought.

 

[DopeyFish]

Reading the comments of the articles makes me sad

 

[Walpurgis]

Reading the comments of the articles makes me sad

Some of them are unfortunate but I've seen a lot worse.

 

[benjipwns]

In fairness to the lack of staff, I would imagine Winnipeg isn't exactly a hot bed of immigration. Though that might actually be interesting to find out. Maybe I should do that instead of snarking.

I wonder what Calgary's numbers are.

 

[Walpurgis]

Wow, what an incredible journey. I'm so glad he made it of the US. I can't imagine how hard it would be to be deported after coming so far.

The article doesn't do it justice. I just talked with my dad who met with him. The guy was travelling with a very large group of refugees from all over the world in Brazil. When they were travelling through Panama, they got lost in the jungle for several days and three people from Bangladesh were killed by "lions". By the time he made it to the U.S., they were only 3 (not sure what happened to the rest). They two Somali men were travelling with a Bangladeshi woman who was pregnant. When the group was detained by American officials, the Bangladeshi woman disappeared in an ambulance.

As for the guy trying to cross the Red River, he described it as "very easy" since there were no crocodiles like he was used to back home.

 

[MMarston]

That's gonna be tricky given they just ended up at what could possibly be the most racist city in all of Canada.

 

[Log4Girlz]

Canada is the home of the free to be honest.

 

[benjipwns]

As for the guy trying to cross the Red River, he described it as "very easy" since there were no crocodiles like he was used to back home.

Border patrol needs to get on this asap.

Bonus points if they attach laser beams to their heads.

 

[Walpurgis]

In fairness to the lack of staff, I would imagine Winnipeg isn't exactly a hot bed of immigration. Though that might actually be interesting to find out. Maybe I should do that instead of snarking.

It actually is. Tons of East Asian immigrants at the University of Manitoba specifically and lots of African and East Asian/South Asian immigrants throughout the city. Things were much easier before the policy change by the Conservatives that was instated in 2012.

 

[ponpo]

Now Trump has a second wall to build.

 

[Vitten]

I wonder if Canadians would continue to act so friendly towards refugees if they were confronted with the same numbers as Texas.

 

[Walpurgis]

Border patrol needs to get on this asap.

Bonus points if they attach laser beams to their heads.

I honestly don't know what border patrol does. I guess they just patrol the roads? The escaped murderers from New York City were found just beside the Canadian border and the only thing preventing them from crossing was some signs that basically said "welcome to Canada".

 

[Walpurgis]

That's gonna be tricky given they just ended up at what could possibly be the most racist city in all of Canada.

He's not Aboriginal so that doesn't apply to him. It's a very unique problem.

 

[benjipwns]

I honestly don't know what border patrol does. I guess they just patrol the roads? The escaped murderers from New York City were found just beside the Canadian border and the only thing preventing them from crossing was some signs that basically said "welcome to Canada".

I believe the U.S.-Canadian border is the world's longest and most lax guarded. Though it obviously increased after 9/11.

There's no border zone which is extremely rare iirc. A lot of U.S. checkpoints are like a hundred miles past the border.

Though this is all to make it easier to invoke the secret pact Mulroney put in NAFTA that allows the U.S. to annex all of Canada at any time.

 

[C4Lukins]

Great story. I would love it if the other 20 million illegals could make the journey through the US to Canada. And how happy Canada would be to have them. I am sure we could build a mass transit system to get them there more quickly. No need for all the drama of experiencing the midwest. We will shoot them right up there for you.

 

[benjipwns]

The infamous Derby Line border:

The border goes through houses and stuff, so you could go to the bathroom in the U.S. and sleep in Canada lol

 

[railGUN]

Fuck it, buddy swam harder than a beaver in the mighty maple river, I say throw him a bag of milk and a hockey stick and give him a home here in the greatest nation on earth. He earned it!

 

[Walpurgis]

I wonder if Canadians would continue to act so friendly towards refugees if they were confronted with the same numbers as Texas.

Great story. I would love it if the other 20 million illegals could make the journey through the US to Canada. And how happy Canada would be to have them. I am sure we could build a mass transit system to get them there more quickly. No need for all the drama of experiencing the midwest. We will shoot them right up there for you.

Why so salty? I didn't even say anything about America.

 

[Azih]

Reading the comments of the articles makes me sad

Don't read the comments. Read the article about the nice guy in a truck who gave him a sweater and the people in the system who treated him nicely and the settlement manager who drove to get him and get him a place to sleep and the people who hopefully offered him a job as a translator.

The worst of the worst of us dwell in poorly moderated comment sections.

 

[Lambtron]

I honestly don't know what border patrol does. I guess they just patrol the roads? The escaped murderers from New York City were found just beside the Canadian border and the only thing preventing them from crossing was some signs that basically said "welcome to Canada".

I cross through the Emerson port of entry probably 35 times a year. I think it's pretty easy to not understand just how fucking little is up there if you're not from around here. Once you get north of Grand Forks, ND, there's just fucking fields to the horizon in every direction. The Interstate runs right up to the border station and it's the only way to cross there. There's some other entry points many miles west and east, but I think there's been stories about people crossing in the places that are unmanned pretty often.

Mind you 7 months out of the year it's a frozen fucking wasteland that looks straight out of Lost Planet, so if you can avoid being killed by the Akrid you probably deserve to cross.

Anyway as to what they do at the border? They fuck with you. That's what they do.

 

[Angry Grimace]

Someone else has to have said out loud, "wow I didn't know Somalia shared a border with Canada" when they saw the thread, right?

 

[Frog-fu]

What a journey. I hope the Canadian government allows him to stay.

 

[Littlefang]

Great story. I would love it if the other 20 million illegals could make the journey through the US to Canada. And how happy Canada would be to have them. I am sure we could build a mass transit system to get them there more quickly. No need for all the drama of experiencing the midwest. We will shoot them right up there for you.

Nah they got to make it through the river first. It's like the ultimate test of how badly do you want to be Canadian.

 

[JeanGrey]

Fuck it, buddy swam harder than a beaver in the mighty maple river, I say throw him a bag of milk and a hockey stick and give him a home here. He earned it!

Sorry had to edit a bit.

Inspirational story though alot of people die trying to get to freedom he luckily survived.

 

[GameAddict411]

Unfortunately since he was detained in the US and his asylum case was rejected, it's highly likely that he will get rejected in Canada too.

 

[Walpurgis]

Someone else has to have said out loud, "wow I didn't know Somalia shared a border with Canada" when they saw the thread, right?

I guess I should have had "from U.S." in the title.