Voies vers la prospérité: Canada

The Halifax Pride Festival is, perhaps, best known for its celebratory parade. However, despite the festive feel to the event, the LGBTQ community still faces many hurdles in gaining acceptance. Halifax Pride Festival put the spotlight on LGBTQ asylum seekers with a film screening at Pier 21 Tuesday evening. In the film ‘Last Chance’, Paul Emile d’Entremont profiles five LGBTQ people who are fleeing their home countries and seeking asylum in Canada. “I wanted to go where homophobia was the worst,” says d’Entremont. “There are, you know, thousands and thousands, probably hundreds of thousands of gays and lesbians who are suffering.” The film was shown at Pier 21 as part of Halifax Pride. Marie Chapman is the CEO of the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 and says the location is fitting. […] Canada has long been known as a safe haven for LGBTQ people from around the world. Today, there are 82 countries where being gay is a criminal offence, and in 8 of those nations it is punishable by death.

http://atlantic.ctvnews.ca/halifax-pride-shines-spotlight-on-lgbtq-asylum-seekers-1.2480383

The Hungarian government says it expects up to 300,000 migrants to reach the country this year, around twice its earlier estimate. Nearly 90,000 migrants have come to Hungary so far in 2015. Most continue on to other parts of the European Union. Janos Lazar, head of the Prime Minister’s Office, said Tuesday “Hungary has become one of the countries most exposed to illegal migration.” He said the fence the country is creating on the southern border with Serbia to stem the flow of migrants “needs to be built in the shortest term possible.” Lazar said most of Hungary’s 175-kilometre (109-mile) border with Serbia would be protected by a chain-link fence dug 1.5 metres (5 feet) into the ground and rising 3 metres (10 feet) above ground, topped with razor wire.

http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/hungary-builds-fence-as-300-000-migrants-expected-in-2015-1.2479867

It’s taking twice as long for foreign caregivers to get permanent resident status in Canada as it did a year ago despite Ottawa’s promise to expedite the process. According to an immigration department internal memo titled “advice to minister,” the processing time for caregivers’ permanent residency reached a record 50 months in January, up from 26 months a year ago. That’s on top of having to work two years alone in Canada — separated from family — in order to meet the residency requirement. Immigration officials are still wrestling with a huge backlog. As of February, more than 17,600 caregivers who had met the work requirement — down from a peak of 24,600 last year — were still waiting in the queue to be reunited with their spouses and children living abroad. Delays in granting permanent status and reuniting families often lead to family breakups and cause other adjustment problems for caregivers’ children, including high school dropout rates, said immigration lawyer Richard Kurland, who obtained the government memo. “Caregivers waiting for PR (permanent residency) are unfortunately subject to longer processing,” said Kurland. “In the long term, it’s going to have expensive consequences.”

http://www.thestar.com/news/immigration/2015/07/21/foreign-caregivers-face-lengthy-wait-for-permanent-status.html

Le Groupe Jean Coutu a réaffirmé hier que les travailleurs de la compagnie autrichienne Knapp, qui sont venus installer de nouveaux équipements à son entrepôt de Varennes, n’avaient absolument pas besoin de permis de travail. L’entreprise soutient qu’elle avait tout à fait le droit de les utiliser en vertu d’une disposition fédérale. «Ces travailleurs ne sont pas à l’emploi du Groupe Jean Coutu, mais plutôt à l’emploi de Knapp. Ils ont été admis au Canada à titre de visiteurs d’affaires par l’Agence des services frontaliers du Canada et n’ont donc pas à obtenir de permis de travail», a tenu à préciser hier Hélène Bisson, vice-président communications du Groupe Jean Coutu. «L’installation de l’ensemble des équipements de production pour tout le centre de distribution est effectuée par environ 80 personnes. De ce nombre, 11 travailleurs sont étrangers», a-t-elle ajouté

http://www.journaldemontreal.com/2015/07/21/groupe-jean-coutu-affirme-que-ses-travailleurs-navaient-pas-besoin-de-permis

It’s been 40 years since a 12-year-old Marianne Nguyen arrived in Canada without her parents and began adjusting to a completely different life. Now, she wants to help a refugee family from Syria do the same. Ms. Nguyen is heading up one of 11 teams from Ryerson University that are part of Lifeline Syria, a movement that aims to secure private sponsorship for 1,000 Syrian refugees to resettle in the GTA over the next two years. Ms. Nguyen, who trained as an architect and now works as a designer, was among the first wave of people who left South Vietnam as it came under communist control in 1975, followed by more than 50,000 Vietnamese refugees who came to Canada between 1979 and 1981. She travelled across the ocean to Montreal, living with nine of her siblings between the ages of 10 and 25, until her parents came and reunited the family – 15 children in total – in 1979. Helping a Syrian family through the challenges of settling in Canada, Ms. Nguyen said, is a way of reaching out after all the opportunities she was given.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/ryerson-university-joins-program-to-bring-syrian-refugees-to-toronto/article25588746/

Dans l’avion d’Air Algérie qui les amène d’Alger à Montréal, on peut reconnaître quelques-uns à leurs nombreux bagages, un peu plus que les autres passagers, à leur excitation et à leur angoisse parfois qui trahissent la peur de l’inconnu après avoir quitté les leurs pour une nouvelle vie. […] La bureaucratie canadienne a le mérite d’être efficace. Ses lourdeurs ou ses problèmes avec la corruption sont ailleurs et le risque de la croiser à l’aéroport est faible. Au premier trimestre 2015, pas moins de 414 immigrants d’origine algérienne ont été admis au Québec sur un total de 9200. Ils sont classés cinquièmes après les Chinois, les Français, les Iraniens et les Marocains, selon les statistiques du ministère de l’Immigration. Ces chiffres peuvent paraître faibles, mais il ne faut pas oublier que ce sont ceux d’un seul trimestre. Pour l’année 2014, le Québec a reçu 50 275 immigrants dont 7% venaient d’Algérie, soit 3519. Ils étaient classés 3es après les Iraniens et les Français, suivis des Chinois et des Haitiens. «C’est une communauté d’installation récente au Québec et au Canada en général», explique le Dr Brahim Benyoucef, expert en urbanisme et fondateur de l’Observatoire Espace et Société au Québec.

http://www.elwatan.com/actualite/immigration-au-canada-le-quebec-attire-toujours-les-algeriens-19-07-2015-299897_109.php