RHON­DOR DOWLAT

Se­nior Re­porter

rhon­dor.dowlat@guardian.co.tt

The im­mi­grant pop­u­la­tion will fight back even if it means go­ing all the way to the Privy Coun­cil to en­sure that asy­lum seek­ers and refugees are not de­port­ed from T&T.

Ac­tivist Yese­nia Gon­za­lez was re­spond­ing to a state­ment by High Court Judge Frank Seep­er­sad yes­ter­day that asy­lum seek­ers and refugees can be de­port­ed from this coun­try de­spite T&T be­ing a sig­na­to­ry to a Unit­ed Na­tions Con­ven­tion that ad­vis­es against such ac­tion.

Jus­tice Seep­er­sad made the state­ment as he dis­missed a hy­brid ju­di­cial re­view and con­sti­tu­tion­al mo­tion law­suit brought by a Venezue­lan refugee, who was or­dered to be de­port­ed by Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Fitzger­ald Hinds in March.

In his judg­ment, Jus­tice Seep­er­sad not­ed that the 1951 Refugee Con­ven­tion could not ap­ply as its terms were not in­cor­po­rat­ed in­to lo­cal laws. This means all im­mi­grants are sub­ject to the pro­vi­sions of the Im­mi­gra­tion Act and can be de­port­ed even if they have reg­is­tered with the Unit­ed Na­tions High Com­mis­sion­er of Refugees (UN­HCR).

Ac­cord­ing to Gon­za­lez, the judge’s de­ci­sion will not de­ter them or cause fear or pan­ic among im­mi­grants cur­rent­ly in the coun­try.

“We be­lieve in the courts and most­ly the Privy Coun­cil. It will take a long time and it will be a fight, but we will fight back,” she said.

When con­tact­ed, di­rec­tor of the Liv­ing Wa­ter Com­mu­ni­ty Rhon­da Main­got said Seep­er­sad was cor­rect, but ex­plained that al­though in 2000 T&T signed the in­ter­na­tion­al treaty, this coun­try has no laws to back it up.

Main­got said that she was look­ing for­ward to hav­ing a le­gal frame­work to deal with asy­lum seek­ers and refugees. “Mi­grants and refugees do not have le­gal per­mis­sion to en­ter the coun­try if they do not come through one of the le­gal ports and are seen by im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cers. So peo­ple, refugees or asy­lum seek­ers, will en­ter the coun­try in dif­fer­ent ways and they would be il­le­gal in Trinidad and To­ba­go and, yes, the Gov­ern­ment can send them back.”

An­oth­er ac­tivist Sofia Leon said as far as she un­der­stands it, “When a coun­try signs an in­ter­na­tion­al treaty or con­ven­tion, that coun­try that signed is bound by those rules or reg­u­la­tions or laws that are in the treaty or con­ven­tion. As a sig­na­to­ry to ANY treaty or con­ven­tion, we have oblig­a­tions.

“Are we go­ing to with­draw from the 1951 UN Con­ven­tion for Refugees? T&T be­came the 140th coun­try to sign the 1951 Con­ven­tion Re­lat­ing to the Sta­tus of Refugees and its 1967 Pro­to­col–the foun­da­tions of in­ter­na­tion­al refugee law.”

She said since then T&T had not in­sti­tut­ed le­gal pro­vi­sions for refugees to seek pro­tec­tion from per­se­cu­tion but han­dled re­quests for asy­lum on a case-by-case ba­sis.

“Ac­ces­sion to the con­ven­tion will as­sist the Gov­ern­ment in de­ter­min­ing refugee sta­tus and will help en­sure that refugees in need of pro­tec­tion are treat­ed ac­cord­ing to in­ter­na­tion­al stan­dards,” she added.

Leon said there was a le­git­i­mate ex­pec­ta­tion. “That is why hav­ing a prop­er frame­work on how to deal with refugees or asy­lum seek­ers is so im­por­tant for us as a coun­try.”

UN­HCR to re­spond in due course

When con­tact­ed, a se­nior re­port­ing as­so­ciate at the UN­HCR, Kali­fa Clyne said, “UN­HCR, the Unit­ed Na­tions Refugee Agency is re­view­ing the judg­ment de­liv­ered” in the High Court and “will pro­vide com­ments in due course”.

26,663 refugees and asy­lum seek­ers in T&T

Ac­cord­ing to the UN­HCR T&T Fact Sheet dat­ed March-April 2023,

26,663 refugees and asy­lum seek­ers from 41 coun­tries live in T&T, and 25 per cent are chil­dren. Near­ly 87 per cent of those reg­is­tered with UN­HCR are from Venezuela.