Canadian dual citizens not affected by U.S. travel ban: Ottawa
Posted January 28, 2017 4:38 pm.
Last Updated January 28, 2017 10:44 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Canadian passport holders won’t be affected by a American ban that has barred citizens of seven countries from entering the United States.
An email from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s office late Saturday said that the U.S. has given assurances that Canadians with dual citizenship will not be turned away at the border.
Earlier the U.S. State Department said that Canadians with dual citizenship from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya would be denied entry for the next three months.
But Kate Purchase, Trudeau’s director of communications, said in an email that Trump’s National Security Adviser Michael Flynn has given assurances that Canadian passports will be dealt with normally by American border officials.
The federal government has been low key in its response to the American ban, with Trudeau only offering a tweet that Canada would welcome those fleeing persecution, terror and war regardless of their faith.
He followed it up by tweeting a photo of himself greeting a young Syrian refugee.
His office said later Saturday that Trudeau was “looking forward to discussing the success of Canada’s immigration and refugee policies” with U.S. President Donald Trump when they next speak.
Trump’s executive order, which prevents citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya from entering the country in the next three months, also banned refugees from Syria indefinitely, pending a review of the application process.
According to the most recently available data from Statistics Canada, in 2011 there were about 35,000 people born in the seven affected countries who were Canadian and held at least one other citizenship. Representatives from Citizenship and Immigration did not immediately respond to requests for updated statistics.
Bijan Ahmadi, president of the Iranian Canadian Congress, said he’s outraged by the new policy.
“It’s unacceptable. It’s very unreasonable,” he said. “It’s very discriminatory to target people based on their race, their religion, the country of their origin and the country of their birth. And the community has that same outrage.”
“Everybody’s nervous, everybody of Somali origin and Muslim origin,” said Osman Ali, the Toronto-based director of the Somali Canadian Association of Etobicoke. “The community feels that it’s a way of targeting the Muslim community, the African community and the black Muslim community.”
Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall, who has been a vocal critic of Trudeau’s environmental and health care policies, offered his support to the federal government in the face of Trump’s ban.
“Sask has welcomed approx 2000 refugees this past year, Wall posted on Twitter Saturday. “We stand ready to assist fed gov’t re: anyone stranded by the US ban.”
An American law enforcement official told The Associated Press there was an exemption for foreigners whose entry is in the U.S. national interest, but it was not immediately clear how that exemption might be applied.
Air Canada and WestJet say they were waiving cancellation fees for people who hold passports from the affected countries, though a representative from Air Canada declined to say how the company is dealing with dual citizens.
Air Canada said it expected that only a small handful of its passengers would be affected.
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