After ostensibly ten years of negotiations with Vietnam, the US signed an agreement on Tuesday, January 22, 2008 with Vietnam for the US to return all Vietnamese nationals who entered the US after July 12, 2995 and who have been ordered removed. This agreement goes into effect in sixty days and lasts for five years, although a three year extension is readily available.
This is big news even though the US has stated that only 1500 Vienamese nationals living in the US will be affected. The US stopped accepting refugees from Vietnam in the 1990s, drastically limiting the number of vietnamese entering the US (the San Jose Mercury News has indicated over 8000 Vietnamese will be affected http://www.mercurynews.com/valley/ci_8043621?nclick_check=1)
This process of returning nationals to their home countries after being ordered removed by the US government is deemed ‘repatriation’. Until last Tuesday, the US had no repatriation agreements with four countries. Now the list is down to three countries: Laos, Cambodia and Cuba. The US cannot return nationals from these countries who have been ordered deported.
There are other countries to which deportation is also nearly impossible although they may have an existing repatriation agreement, including Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Afghanistan, China. And then there are the stateless people such as the Palestinians. The US’ position is that it can remove people to these countries although in practice it is nearly impossible because there is no functioning government or the foreign government will not accept the returned national or assist in preparing travel documents for the national to be returned.
As it may not be clear to the lawperson, the US can order someone removed from the US but ICE needs another country willing to accept the person. The US government doesn’t just bring the person ordered removed to the border and say “goodbye.” If the US followed this simple practice, our only two neigboring countries would not accept the deported person into their countries, effectively trapping the deported person between the US and either Canada or Mexico. Clearly that would be absurd since the person would have no way of leaving that space, at least legally leaving it. Remember the Tom Hanks movie The Terminal? In this film, based on a true but changed story, an eastern immigrant arrived at JFK only to learn his home country had been overthrown while he had been en route to the US, thereby rendering his passport and visa void and rendering him stateless. So the US government could not allow him to enter the US by leaving the airport – or allow him to return to his country.
But I digress.
Good luck to the people who will be returning home to Vietnam. May you be treated well.
Peace,
Elizabeth
