Since the beginning of the year, the arrivals of asylum seekers via Roxham Road have made headlines every week. In four questions this week, The duty attempts to provide nuanced answers to this complex phenomenon. Today: are the asylum requests of these newcomers justified?
One of the lingering concerns about asylum seekers arriving in Quebec via Roxham Road is whether or not their reasons for seeking protection are justified. Do these people have valid reasons for seeking asylum? The law and public opinion do not always agree.
The majority of Roxham applicants were accepted as “protected persons” by Canada, 52% of them.
Their refusal rate, all countries of origin combined, has been around 35% since 2017, when arrivals accelerated. This rate is slightly higher than that including all asylum applications: refusals vary between 29% and 32% depending on the year, according to the statistics available for 2016 to 2021.
This comparison has its limits, but it makes Adele Garnier, professor of geography at Laval University, say that “the reasons of the Roxham applicants are as relevant as the other applicants”. The difference between the acceptance rates “is not considerable”, she qualifies.
These people come mainly from Nigeria, Haiti, Colombia, Turkey, Pakistan, the Republic of Congo, Angola, Sudan, Yemen or Venezuela.
Mme Garnier recalls that they often passed through several countries before crossing the Canadian border, and that despite “complicated migratory trajectories […]that does not mean that they are not fleeing persecution,” she says.
Each case is assessed individually, although decision makers are encouraged to consult information on the countries of origin of asylum seekers in the exercise of their functions.
Process
The law currently allows migrants arriving through Roxham to claim asylum, even if they do not pass through a border post.
Whether they arrive on foot, by plane or by boat, asylum seekers go through the same process as refugees. Unlike refugees who obtained status before arriving in Canada, those who seek asylum are already in the country while their application is being assessed.
Their reasons are assessed on a case-by-case basis, based on the evidence presented and the answers given, during a hearing before the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB).
All of these people are assessed according to the definition of the term “refugee” in Canadian law, which is the one enshrined in the 1951 Refugee Convention. A refugee is first and foremost someone who is outside their country of nationality or of residence.
Then, this person must fear “with good reason to be persecuted because of his race, his religion, his nationality, his membership in a social group or his public opinions”.
Distinction between “founded” and “legitimate”
In a recent survey conducted by the firm Environics, 36% of Canadian respondents felt that “too many refugees are not real refugees”. Conversely, 46% disagreed with this statement.
In public opinion, the valid reasons for fleeing are not entirely in line with the legal statutes, notes Mr.me Garnier on this question of “false refugees”. Those seen as refugees do not always meet specific legal requirements.
“Legally, even Ukrainians would not all have refugee status if they had to apply for it,” argues Ms.me Garnier.
The approximately 178,000 Ukrainians who have already arrived in Canada have in fact not needed to obtain refugee status within the meaning of the immigration law; instead, they received a temporary residence permit through a special program.
First, many Ukrainians received were still inside their own country, which often complicates obtaining the status. In this case, the IRB can also ask the person if they were unable to find refuge elsewhere in their country of origin.
Moreover, granting refugee status is also a matter of interpreting “generalized risk”: will the asylum seeker be personally exposed to a threat to their life to which other people in the country are generally not exhibited?
Venezuela is another interesting example, also cited lawyer Stéphanie Valois in a previous interview. The country is completely destabilized by a “catastrophic situation”, nationals who pass through Roxham are accepted at 84%, but some applicants are still rejected.
Applicants whose request has been refused sometimes find themselves at the center of incongruities. Those from Haiti, Venezuela or 11 other countries cannot be sent back to their country of origin. Canada deemed their country too dangerous and issued a reprieve or suspension of removals.
Finally, for Adèle Garnier, it is also a question of “migration justice”. “In the imagination, people who pass through Roxham have not taken the right road. Even if they have a legitimate request, many simply have no other option,” she explains.