It’s been called the “Voyage of the Damned”—907 Jewish
refugees fleeing Nazi persecution set sail in 1939 from Hamburg,
Germany for Havana, Cuba on the ocean liner St. Louis. One of them was
four-year-old Lisa Avedon, who told her story in Halifax last week at a
ceremony marking the 70th anniversary of the voyage. “The fact that I
was a passenger on the ill-fated voyage of the St. Louis has certainly
been a huge influence on my life,” Avedon told about 140 people at the
Maritime Museum of the Atlantic. “I have always thought of myself as a
passenger, not a survivor.”
When the Jewish refugees reached Havana, Cuban authorities refused
to honour their entry visas, forcing them to remain on board the ship.
Avedon still vividly remembers seeing her uncle, who had flown down
from the US, alongside the St. Louis in a rowboat. “We were able
to speak with my uncle from the deck. I remember begging him to take me
with him.” Jewish organizations couldn’t find a country willing to
accept the refugees. Within three days, the St. Louis left Havana
shadowed by an American Coast Guard ship under orders to keep the liner
away from the US coast so that its passengers couldn’t try to swim
ashore.
Prominent Canadians appealed to the prime minister to accept the
refugees, but a Liberal government, implacably opposed to letting Jews
into Canada, rejected their appeal. After the St. Louis arrived at
Antwerp, Belgium, Avedon and her family made their way to England and
eventually joined her uncle in the US. But many of the refugees ended
up in countries later occupied by Germany, and 255 died in the Nazi
death camps. Their names were read out during last week’s ceremony.
“We have to admit that it was our country who sent 255 passengers of
the St. Louis, who we could have made room for, to their deaths,” says
John Hennigar-Shuh, the museum official who hosted the ceremony. On
October 6, the museum will open an exhibit featuring a replica of the
St. Louis and key documents related to Canada’s decision to reject its
Jewish passengers. “I think the museum has a role in helping our people
to remember where we’ve been and what the implications are,”
Hennigar-Shuh says, “and maybe begin to formulate how we can ensure
that we don’t go there again.” He adds that the well-documented
anti-Semitism of Canadian immigration officials doomed the Jewish
refugees. (One such official was asked by reporters during an
off-the-record briefing in 1945 how many displaced Jews would be let
into Canada after the war. “None,” he replied, “is too many.”)
“We just can’t say as people have said in the past, ‘Oh well, they
couldn’t have known,'” says Hennigar-Shuh, “Well they could have
known and they chose not to know, they chose to close their eyes and
they chose to allow their worst racist tendencies to rule their
decisions.”
It would be nice to think that when it comes to immigrants and
refugees, prejudice, bias and racism are relics of the past. But as
Hennigar-Shuh points out, Canada recently rejected a US request to
admit Chinese Muslim Uighurs held for nearly eight years in the
infamous American torture camp at Guantanamo. Last year, an American
judge ruled the Uighurs posed no terrorist threat and ordered them
released. Canada also refused for years to allow Sudanese-Canadian
citizen Abousfian Abdelrazik to return to Montreal from Sudan even
though there’s no evidence he poses a terrorist threat. The government
finally relented last week after being ordered to do so by a Federal
Court judge. And in 2004, Canada closed its borders to people from
Central America and the Caribbean who travel through the US seeking
refugee status here.
“I think there’s a message from the St. Louis that has to be
reinforced,” says Hennigar-Shuh. “That’s why we’re doing what we’re
doing.”
Feel like a refugee? Email Bruce Wark at brucew@thecoast.ca.
This article appears in Jun 25 – Jul 1, 2009.
I have met many real refugees as opposed to the phony ones arriving here by ship and via the US border. The convention on refugees rquires the claim be made in the first safe country. Which means people from Central America and the Caribbean should have made a claim in the USA.
There is a big difference between an economic migrant and a refugee.
The Algerians who recently arrived in Canada had a choice of several European countries in which to make a claim and we should deport them to Antwerp where they can make a claim or Spain or France to name just two more countries which are regarded as a safe place and which they passed through. Once back in Europe they can also begin the normal application process for landed immigrant status and wait patiently like millions of others.
Joeblow: I guess you haven’t been following news from the US about refugees and immigrants. As the Canadian Council on Refugees points out, the US is not necessarily a “safe third country” for refugee claimants. Here are the top three points from a 10-point document issued by the Council:
” ONE: The US is not safe for refugees because of the risk of detention.
The [Canada-US] agreement forces claimants to seek protection in the United States, a country that is not necessarily safe for refugees. Thousands of asylum seekers, including children, are held in detention in the US, for months and even years, often in jails alongside convicted criminals. Those who are detained have reduced chances of getting refugee protection, because it is difficult for detainees just to make a phone call, let alone get the help they need to present their refugee claim adequately. There have recently been widely publicized abuses of detainees in US immigration jails.
TWO: The US is not safe for refugees because some refugees are denied protection.
The US does not always give protection to refugees who need it. In the past, numerous claimants have been recognized as refugees in Canada after having been refused in the US, because of more restrictive rules and interpretation of the refugee definition. Eligibility rules in the US mean that claimants who apply after having been in the US for over a year are denied a hearing. Unlike Canada, the US law does not offer protection to people who face a risk to their life or of cruel and unusual treatment or punishment. If Canada turns away a refugee who is subsequently deported by the US back to persecution, Canada will bear a part of the responsibility for whatever harm comes to the refugee.
THREE: The US is not safe for refugees because of discriminatory practices.
US policies and practices discriminate against some refugees and immigrants on the basis of their nationality, ethnicity or religion. For example, the US detains Haitian claimants based on nationality. People from mainly Muslim countries are also particularly at risk of detention.
You can read the rest of the list of reasons at:
http://www.ccrweb.ca/10reasons.html