Canada treated fleeing Ukrainians better than Afghans, new lawsuit alleges – National | 24CA News
Canadians who served the army in Afghanistan are suing the federal authorities for failing to rescue their members of the family from the Taliban, and alleging the federal government has been discriminatory in the best way it treats Afghans in comparison with Ukrainians.
The federal authorities not too long ago created a program to make sure the households of Canadians who served as language and cultural advisers in Afghanistan are delivered to security.
But the standards are so restrictive that this system doesn’t apply to some members of the family who have been threatened due to their connection to Canada’s army efforts earlier than the Taliban takeover in August 2021.
The authorities has additionally capped the variety of principal candidates at 380.
Two of the advisers filed a Federal Court utility alleging the federal government supplied “superior immigration benefits” to Ukrainians fleeing the Russian invasion of their nation starting in 2022, in comparison with these supplied to Afghans hoping to flee the Taliban takeover in 2021.
“We’re looking for the Ukrainian policy to be extended to anyone who needs it. Not just the Ukrainians, but anyone in a similar circumstance of persecution by war or severe human-rights abuses,” mentioned Nicholas Pope, one of many attorneys representing the advisers.
The advisers and their attorneys additionally need the federal government to confess that the vastly completely different approaches to the 2 crises violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Canada launched a particular program that made a limiteless variety of Ukrainian nationals and their households eligible to work or research in Canada whereas they search refuge for as much as three years.
The households of the advisers, nevertheless, are nonetheless trapped in Afghanistan and neighbouring nations.
The sister of one of many advisers, who is barely recognized within the lawsuit as John Doe 1 due to the chance to this household, isn’t eligible to return to Canada as a result of she left Afghanistan for Turkey previous to July 22, 2021.
The lawsuit says she has no authorized standing in Turkey and can’t work, her kids can not go to highschool they usually danger deportation again to Afghanistan.
The identical adviser’s stepbrother in Afghanistan doesn’t qualify as a result of stepbrothers aren’t thought-about household underneath the coverage.
“The Taliban doesn’t care. They don’t say, ‘Oh, you’re a stepbrother, not a brother, so we’ll leave you alone,’” Pope mentioned.
The household of one other adviser, recognized within the courtroom submitting as John Doe 2, faces comparable boundaries. In the case of his sister in Afghanistan, the lawsuit says, she must depart three of their daughters behind as a result of they’re too outdated to be thought-about dependants.
The federal authorities hasn’t but responded to the courtroom submitting,and the immigration minister didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
In a press release earlier this month, the immigration division mentioned it has tailor-made its approaches because the troublesome scenario has developed in Afghanistan.
The Canadian authorities recruited some 45 Canadian residents with Afghan heritage to function language and cultural advisers in the course of the mission in Afghanistan. They have been granted top-secret safety clearance and risked their lives to serve alongside troopers.
Some of their members of the family have been threatened by the Taliban due to their connections to the Canadian army.
“That’s the part of it that disgusts me, that the 45 (language and cultural advisors) took enormous risks,” mentioned Amir Attaran, a University of Ottawa professor and lawyer.
“What’s the Trudeau government done? Kicked them to the curb.”
Attaran represented 4 different language and cultural advisers who served in Afghanistan in human-rights complaints in opposition to the federal government final 12 months on comparable grounds.
“This is obviously discrimination,” he mentioned in an interview Tuesday.
“You cannot single out a single nationality for special treatment. That clearly violates the Canadian Human Rights Act and, I believe, also the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”
All 4 advisers have now settled their complaints, he mentioned.
Though he mentioned he can’t reveal the main points of these settlements, he characterised the negotiations with the immigration division as “extremely slow-moving and, until quite recently, in outright bad faith.”
Attaran mentioned he’s not totally proud of that consequence, as a result of the households of lots of the different advisers are nonetheless in peril.
© 2023 The Canadian Press
