US eases law on ‘limited’ terror tie refugees
Print Edition
The Obama administration has eased the rules for would-be asylum seekers, refugees and others who hope to live in the United States and who gave “limited” support to terrorists or terrorist groups.
The change is one of President Barack Obama’s first actions on immigration since he pledged during his State of the Union address last month to use more executive directives that don’t need the approval of Congress.
The Department of Homeland Security and the State Department now say that people considered to have provided “limited material support” to terrorists or terrorist groups are no longer automatically barred from the United States.
A post-September 11, 2001 terror attack provision in immigrant law, known as terrorism related inadmissibility grounds, had affected anyone considered to have given support. With little exception, the provision has been applied rigidly to those trying to enter the US and those already there but wanting to change their immigration status.
For Morteza Assadi, a 49-year-old real estate agent in Virginia, the law has left him in a sort of immigration purgatory while his green card application has been on hold for more than a decade.
As a teenager in Tehran, Iran, in the early 1980s, Assadi distributed fliers for a mujahedeen group that opposed the government of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and was at one time considered a terrorist organization by the US government.
“When we are teenagers, we have different mindsets,” Assadi said. “I thought, ‘I’m doing my country a favor.’”
Assadi said he only briefly associated with the group, which was removed from Washington’s list of terrorist organizations in 2012, and that he was never an active member. Now he’s hopeful that the US government will look at his teenage activities as “limited.”
“Not every act is a terrorist act and you can’t just lump everyone together,” said Assadi’s lawyer, Parastoo Zahedi.
The Homeland Security Department said the rule change, announced last week, allows more discretion, but won’t open the country to terrorists or their sympathizers.
In the past, the provision allowed few exemptions beyond providing medical care or acting under duress. The change now allows officials to consider if support was not only limited but potentially part of “routine commercial transactions or routine social transactions.”
“Refugee applicants are subject to more security checks than any other category of traveler to the United States,” Homeland Security spokesman Peter Boogaard said. “Nothing in these exemptions changes the rigorous ... screening.”
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
