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Politico
6 days ago
- Business
- Politico
Countdown to chaos
Presented by Send tips | Subscribe here | Email Canada Playbook | Follow Politico Canada Happy Monday. Thanks for reading Canada Playbook. Let's get to it. Here's what's in today's edition: → The clock ticks toward Aug. 1. → The ethics disclosure to end all ethics disclosures. → TikTok asked Ottawa for an in-person meeting. Crickets so far in return. THREE THINGS WE'RE WATCHING TRADE DEADLINE — Eighteen days left until Aug. 1. That's when the clock is set to run out on Canada-U.S. negotiations on an economic and security deal spearheaded by Ambo KIRSTEN HILLMAN and cross-border trade minister DOMINIC LEBLANC. Unless, of course, the August date is a deadline in name only. — Public-private relationship: Canadian officials routinely refuse to comment on the horsetrading going on behind closed doors, insisting that negotiating in public is unhelpful to a productive negotiation. But they're contending with President DONALD TRUMP's apparent willingness to drop demands for all to see — most recently in a July 10 threat of 35 percent tariffs on Canadian imports that revived grievances about fentanyl, dairy and retaliatory tariffs. — Meanwhile in Ottawa: Conservative MPs ADAM CHAMBERS, SHELBY KRAMP-NEUMAN, JACOB MANTLE, MATT JENEROUX, JASON GROLEAU and DAVID MCKENZIE have asked Liberal MP and committee chair JUDY SGRO to call a meeting of the House international trade committee. — Kill 'em with kindness: 'Conservatives are ready to collaborate with the government, and all parties to protect Canadian jobs, industries and our economic future,' the CPC MPs wrote in a letter to Sgro. They tied the meeting directly to ongoing cross-border negotiations, writing that it means 'Canadians, trade-exposed industries, and Parliamentarians may contribute to the negotiation process and ensure transparency.' ETHICS — MARK CARNEY's critics are sinking their teeth into his sprawling ethics disclosures made public last week — late on a Friday in July. — Recusal time: The ethics commissioner's office published the mother of all disclosures. The PM attached sprawling annexes that detailed his investment portfolio (now placed in a blind trust) and an ethics screen that prevents him from participating in matters related to Brookfield Corp., Brookfield Asset Management, Stripe Inc. and a constellation of companies he formerly managed, or that are owned or controlled by Brookfield. It was a mammoth package dated July 10 that followed all the rules and was posted online a day before Carney's 120th day in office — the deadline for disclosure. — Opposition bugaboo: Still, Carney's critics wonder how he can possibly govern without coming into conflict with former dealings that touched so many corners of the economy. Conservative Leader PIERRE POILIEVRE criticized the PM for making his conflicts public months after the election — and wants him to sell off his portfolio: 'Prime Minister Carney should sell all of his holdings and hand the cash to a trustee to have it invested in a truly blind trust, so he doesn't know what he holds,' Poilievre posted on X. 'Otherwise, he will always know how political decisions can affect his personal wealth.' — Flashback: Poilievre isn't opposed to rich guys entering public life. Take NIGEL WRIGHT, who took leave from a lucrative gig at Onex for an influential gig as former Prime Minister STEPHEN HARPER's chief of staff. Here's how Poilievre characterized Wright's career move during a House committee meeting in 2010 where MPs put the incoming chief under the microscope: 'It is good to see people who have succeeded in [the] private sector making the sacrifice to come to serve the country in the public realm. We're very much pleased that you're joining the government to serve in that capacity,' Poilievre said. ECONOMICS — Statistics Canada drops a summertime dollop of data tomorrow morning on the consumer price index. — Inflation: Bank economists expect year-over-year growth in the consumer price index to come in at or just a hair short of the Bank of Canada's 2 percent target when June numbers are posted at 8:30 a.m. — a tick higher than surprisingly low price growth in May. 'We expect it is likely too early to see a significant increase in prices due to tariffs in Canadian and U.S. inflation data,' predict RBC's NATHAN JANZEN and ABBEY XU. — Don't poke the bear: CIBC's AVERY SHENFELD advised the prime minister to tread carefully in high-stakes negotiations with a U.S. president who lashes out publicly on a whim — including last week's swipe at Canada. 'You've gotta know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, and at some point, we'll have to give up on getting a fully satisfactory deal in round one,' Shenfeld wrote in his weekly lookahead note. Shenfeld counseled consumers north of the border to play their part in boosting the economy without riling DONALD TRUMP: 'Buying Canadian, and avoiding U.S. goods and travel, is a more effective countermeasure because it's based on decisions by individuals and unlikely to trigger a White House response.' — Interest rates: TIFF MACKLEM unveils the Bank of Canada's latest policy rate announcement on July 30. Scotiabank's DEREK HOLT isn't holding out for any movement on the 2.75 percent status quo. Holt points to a pair of massive unknowns: Canada-U.S. trade talks, which might not conclude before the current deadline of Aug. 1; and the government's plans for its fall budget, which won't become clear before Macklem's next move. The rhetorical question of the day: 'How can you adjust policy when you haven't a clue what trade and fiscal policies might unfold?' THE ROOMS THAT MATTER — Environment Minister JULIE DABRUSIN will be in Burlington, Ontario, at 10 a.m. to talk about the protection of fresh water in the Great Lakes. For your radar LEFT ON READ — TikTok CEO SHOU ZI CHEW scored a prime seat at DONALD TRUMP's inauguration and dined with him in December. Ottawa isn't extending any kind of olive branch to Chew. Industry Minister MÉLANIE JOLY doesn't appear to be keen on meeting Chew anytime soon, despite his attempts to talk things out. — First in Playbook: On July 2, Chew wrote Joly a letter requesting an urgent in-person meeting to discuss the government's ordered shutdown of TikTok Canada — but his request has so far gone unanswered. Read the full letter here. Joly's office didn't respond to a request for comment. — Zooming out: About six months after JOE BIDEN signed a bill forcing TikTok to find a new owner within a year or face a ban, the Liberal government ordered TikTok Canada to wind up their Canadian offices — in Toronto and Vancouver. The app will remain available in Canada even with domestic offices closed. Ottawa agreed with Biden's take that TikTok, which is owned by China-based ByteDance, poses a national security threat. TikTok is challenging Canada's decision in court. — Times they are a-changin': Trump has extended the TikTok sale-or-ban deadline for the third time this year. The White House has imposed a new Sept. 17 deadline to sell the video-sharing app, but any TikTok sale would require Beijing's blessing. — In the letter: Chew argued the Liberal government ordered the wind up of TikTok Canada 'seemingly based on assumptions about TikTok's future in the United States which no longer hold true … Rather, by taking this action toward TikTok, Canada is making itself an outlier among Five Eyes nations and its other allies.' — Proposal: Chew is hoping to mend the relationship with the federal government now that MARK CARNEY is prime minister. In his letter, he said Canada's concerns can be addressed by TikTok imposing tighter data security around the app, and bringing in new oversight and transparency measures around online safety, elections and foreign interference. — Tick tock: Neither the government nor TikTok will say the precise date by which the company's Canadian operations need to shutter. TikTok has said the dissolution would result in over 350 job losses and hurt the Canadian cultural sector. This week the company announced it was pulling its sponsorship from several Canadian arts institutions, including the Juno Awards and the Toronto International Film Festival. — Last word: 'I believe that we both have a duty to meet face-to-face to discuss the impact on TikTok's Canadian users, creators, and employees,' Chew wrote. MORNING MUST-CLICKS — PIERRE POILIEVRE took questions on CBC's 'The House' — his first conversation with the public broadcaster since he took over as Conservative leader. — New York magazine's SIMON VAN ZUYLEN-WOOD spent several weeks in Canada, and has a long feature out this morning: 'You Have No Idea How Furious the Canadians Are.' — POLITICO's ERIC BAZAIL-EIMIL and NAHAL TOOSI report on sweeping layoffs at the U.S. State Department. Friday's 1,300 cuts hit bureaus and offices that managed foreign assistance programs and worked with energy policy, global human rights and refugees and migration issues. — Canadian Sen. PETER BOEHM, a former diplomat, offers his two cents as Ottawa stares down spending reductions: 'It is my hope that whatever cuts are enacted at Global Affairs Canada, there will be some enlightened thinking about who we are in the world and how we provide the human resource support to act as Canada on the global stage.' — The European Commission has backed down on digital taxes, GREGORIO SORGI reports from Brussels, 'a move that hands victory to Donald Trump and U.S. tech giants like Apple and Meta.' — Abacus Data's DAVID COLETTO serves up KEIR STARMER's waning popularity as a possible cautionary tale for Canada's PM, whose government enjoys broad — but soft — support on affordability and housing priorities. — Toronto Life looks at the city's potential plan to take on rats, 'breeding faster than their peers in New York, Chicago and Amsterdam.' PROZONE For Pro subscribers, our latest policy newsletter. In other news for Pro readers: — EU and Ukraine launch €50M defense tech program. — White House probe fuels speculation Trump could oust Powell. — Germany plans to buy more F-35 fighter jets from the US. — France launches criminal investigation into X over algorithm manipulation. — Megalaw complicates Trump's plans to quickly ax renewable credits. LOBBY WATCH — The Pathways Alliance logged a June 1 meeting with Prime Minister MARK CARNEY, Energy and Natural Resources Minister TIM HODGSON, Emergency Management Minister ELEANOR OLSZEWSKI and Canada-U.S. Trade Minister DOMINIC LEBLANC. 'Potential collaboration between industry and government in the area of greenhouse gas emissions' was on the agenda — including carbon capture and storage. — The Canadian Canola Growers Association posted a July 4 meeting with Carney. Top priority: international trade. — Crestview's ASHTON ARSENAULT posted a meeting on behalf of Capital Power, an Edmonton company that wants to power Alberta-based data centers that fuel 'world-changing innovation driven by AI.' The July 11 meeting included ANSON DURAN, chief of staff to AI Minister EVAN SOLOMON, and BENJAMIN EBADI, a western desk staffer in the minister's office. PLAYBOOKERS Birthdays: HBD to former Cabmin RANDY BOISSONNAULT, former Sen. JIM MUNSON, Ottawa Mayor MARK SUTCLIFFE, journalist GRAYDON CARTER, former publisher RUSSELL MILLS and former mayor and MP ED HOLDER. HBD + 1 to Counsel's ELIZABETH CAMPBELL. Spotted: Former PM JUSTIN TRUDEAU, posing with an employee at the Vancouver Aquarium wearing the same shirt he donned for that infamous Canadian Tire snap: a dark tee with the branding for 'Anxious Leaders,' a workplace mental health initiative headed by CHELSEA MADRYGA, the PMO's former workplace wellness and HR adviser. Liberal MP JAKE SAWATZKY, marking the opening of a local pool by jumping in fully suited up — MP pun included. Noted: Former Hamilton Centre MP MATTHEW GREEN and Rimouski Mayor GUY CARON have each ruled out a run for NDP leadership. Manitoba Premier WAB KINEW called out the U.S. lawmakers who complained about smoke from Canadian wildfires. Movers and shakers: Former Liberal Justice Minister DAVID LAMETTI officially starts his new job as the PM's principal secretary today … KEEAN NEMBHARD returns to the Hill as press secretary to Environment Minister JULIE DABRUSIN. Media mentions: The Star's ANA PEREIRA has won the Edward Goff Penny Memorial Prize. Got a document to share? A birthday coming up? Send it all our way. TRIVIA Friday's answer: Then-PM ROBERT BORDEN was the first to deliver a speech in the House of Commons after the original Centre Block was destroyed by a fire. Props to ROBERT MCDOUGALL, MALCOLM MCKAY, JONATHAN MOSER, DOUG SWEET, AIDEN MUSCOVITCH, ELIZABETH BURN, J. ROLLAND VAIVE and ALEXANDER LANDRY. Today's question: Who added a vegetable garden to the property of Harrington Lake, the official country residence of Canada's PM? Send your answer to canadaplaybook@ Canada Playbook would not happen without: Canada Editor Sue Allan, editor Willa Plank and POLITICO's Grace Maalouf.
CNN
30-03-2025
- Politics
- CNN
She was expelled from the United States, but still thought America would help. She was wrong
She asked to be identified only as 'Ambo,' out of fear of being recognized back in her home country. 'Life is very difficult for me,' she told CNN from a school-turned-shelter on a humidly hot day in Panama City, Panama. Over the ambient noise of blade fans attempting to cool the large room, she explained she left her native country of Cameroon due to 'political issues,' fearing that she would either be 'sentenced dead' or spend the rest of her life in prison if she stayed. She remembers arriving at the US-Mexico border on January 23 – three days after US President Trump's inauguration – after trekking through Central America and the dangerous Darién jungle. She turned herself in to United States Customs and Border Protection in hopes of making her case for asylum. By her count she spent 19 days in US custody, then finally got that chance – or so she thought. Just after midnight on February 13, by her recollection, she and other migrants were loaded onto a bus where they drove for hours. 'We were so happy thinking that they were going to transfer us to a camp where we are going to meet an immigration officer,' she recalled. She still thought that when she was loaded onto a plane, believing they were headed to another facility in the United States. But when they landed, they were in Panama. 'We're asking them why are they bringing us to Panama? 'Why are we in Panama?'' she said, 'People started crying.' Even still, she was optimistic. 'We're like thinking maybe the camp in the US is full. That is why they are bringing us here. When it will be our turn, they will come and take us to give us a listening ear,' she said. But the Panamanian government took them to a hotel in Panama City, guarded tightly by security, no phones, and limited access to the outside world, according to multiple migrants CNN spoke to. Panama's Security Minister Frank Ábrego previously told a local radio program the deportees were held at the hotel, in part, because officials needed to 'effectively verify who these people are who are arriving in our country.' Even in a new country, under a new government authority, she held out hope someone from the United States government would step in and fix the situation. 'We were somehow happy that maybe the immigration from the US would come to Panama to listen to our stories,' she told CNN, now fighting back tears. 'It wasn't the case.' Her voice cracked, recalling the moment her optimism shattered. This is the downstream reality of an increased immigration crackdown in the United States, which the Trump administration has pressured Latin American countries like Panama, Costa Rica, and El Salvador to help with. Just days before she arrived at the border, Trump had signed an executive order effectively shutting down the US-Mexico border to migrants seeking asylum in the United States. Weeks later, the Panamanian government agreed to receive some of those migrants, at least temporarily, and took in nearly 300. Many are asylum-seekers from places like Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, China, Sri Lanka. They are now are caught in limbo – expelled from the United States, but unable to go back to their home countries out of fear of being persecuted or killed. 'They shouldn't just like abandon us like that without telling us what we have done wrong. It become very, very difficult and confusing to us. I've left my children back home,' Ambo said through tears. Another woman from Ethiopia, was on a similar flight. She too requested not to use her name for fear of retaliation in her home country. 'I am so shocked. I'm saying this is Texas or Panama?' she recalled. She told CNN she too had trekked through Central America, injuring her leg in the Darién jungle, to reach the US-Mexico border. She said she too had left Ethiopia due to political issues and feared returning. 'I don't have family. They died already,' she told CNN. And a fellow asylum-seeker migrant Afghanistan, who did not want to share his identity, told CNN en Español's Elizabeth Gonzalez that if he were to return to Afghanistan, he would be killed by the Taliban. They all now live in a humble shelter, one of multiple places in Panama where these migrants are trying to navigate life, in a country where they don't speak the language. 'Almost all of us are from different countries, but here we are like family, you know?' said the woman from Ethiopia. As she sat with CNN, mattresses on the floor lining the edges of the room, she said, 'We are together. Everyone is in distress. Everyone is in a bad situation.' Days after they were initially brought to a Panamanian hotel, the migrants were loaded onto buses again. They expected to be moved to another hotel, Ambo says. But the drive stretched on for hours, until they arrived at a facility over a hundred miles outside of Panama City on the outskirts of the Darién jungle near the border with Colombia. 'Are you going to kill us? Why are you bringing us here?' she recalled asking in fear, 'Bringing us in this place, a forest. What is going to happen to us?' Artemis Ghasemzadeh, an English teacher from Iran, remembers crying after being expelled from the United States on her February birthday. 'I changed my religion in Iran and the punishment of that is may be a long prison or at the end is death,' she told CNN. 'They took two of my friends from the underground church, so I understand it's time to go. The next is me,' she added. In February she was seen in a window of the migrant hotel with the words 'Help Us' written across the window. Days later she was at this Panamanian jungle camp, known as the San Vicente shelter, with over 100 other migrants who were in the same situation as hers. 'The food was really disgusting,' said Ghasemzadeh. 'The bathroom was really dirty, no privacy, no door,' she added. Salam said the water for bathing was not clean, causing hives to break out on her skin. She pulled up a pant leg to show the marks on her skin. 'All my body is like this,' she said. Panama's President José Raúl Mulino has repeatedly denied that authorities have violated the deportees' rights. Reached for comment about conditions at the camp, a spokesperson from the Panamanian Security Minister's office deferred to the International Office for Migration (IOM), which assists migrants. A spokesperson at IOM stressed, however, that handling the deportees is a 'government-led operation,' telling CNN 'we did not have direct involvement in the detention or restriction of movement of individuals.' Through every step of the way, attorneys for these migrants argue their rights were violated. 'Our claim is that America violated the right to seek asylum and by extension, by receiving them, the Panamanian government did the same thing,' said Silvia Serna Román, regional litigator for Mexico and Central America for the Global Strategic Litigation Council. 'Even though they all claim to be to be asylum seekers, they have never had their right to be heard,' she added. Serna Román is part of a group of international lawyers that filed a lawsuit against Panama on these alleged violations in the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Ian Kysel, who is also part of that group, has previously said they are exploring a range of further legal actions, including against US-specific entities and other countries that might be taking in deported or expelled US migrants. Panama has denied any wrongdoing in this saga. In early March, the Panamanian government released the over 100 migrants from the remote jungle camp, but gave them 30-day 'humanitarian' permits, extendable up to 90 days, to find another place to go or risk deportation from Panama. 'We're also trying to navigate the terms of those permits,' Serna Román explained. 'If they're only given 90 days and the 90 days come up then they might be forcibly removed and they might be like involuntarily be taken back to their countries and that's our concern,' she added. All the migrants CNN and CNN en Español spoke to said going back to their countries simply was not an option. 'Asylum means I'm not safe in my country, I need help. Just that. I'm not criminal. I'm educated person and just need help,' Ghasemzadeh explained. 'If I come back to my country, my government will kill me, so in Panama they are free to kill me,' she added. Aurelio Martinez, a spokesperson in Panama's security ministry, told CNN that after the 90-day period it would be studied whether to grant another extension or if their status would become illegal. When CNN pressed on whether that could trigger forcible repatriation, Martinez simply said they will review each case individually, that Panama always supports migrants and human rights, and that they intend to maintain that support and commitment. Ambo, her life now in a demoralizing standstill, still dreams about the United States, even though she has no idea when this nightmare will end. 'America has always been a country that received people from all over the whole world. I believe that is why many people are going towards the USA for to seek for asylum,' she said. 'They should listen to us and see if they can permit us to stay or not because when you don't listen to somebody, it means that human rights does not exist again in America.'
Yahoo
30-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
She was expelled from the United States, but still thought America would help. She was wrong
She asked to be identified only as 'Ambo,' out of fear of being recognized back in her home country. 'Life is very difficult for me,' she told CNN from a school-turned-shelter on a humidly hot day in Panama City, Panama. Over the ambient noise of blade fans attempting to cool the large room, she explained she left her native country of Cameroon due to 'political issues,' fearing that she would either be 'sentenced dead' or spend the rest of her life in prison if she stayed. She remembers arriving at the US-Mexico border on January 23 – three days after US President Trump's inauguration – after trekking through Central America and the dangerous Darién jungle. She turned herself in to United States Customs and Border Protection in hopes of making her case for asylum. By her count she spent 19 days in US custody, then finally got that chance – or so she thought. Just after midnight on February 13, by her recollection, she and other migrants were loaded onto a bus where they drove for hours. 'We were so happy thinking that they were going to transfer us to a camp where we are going to meet an immigration officer,' she recalled. She still thought that when she was loaded onto a plane, believing they were headed to another facility in the United States. But when they landed, they were in Panama. 'We're asking them why are they bringing us to Panama? 'Why are we in Panama?'' she said, 'People started crying.' Even still, she was optimistic. 'We're like thinking maybe the camp in the US is full. That is why they are bringing us here. When it will be our turn, they will come and take us to give us a listening ear,' she said. But the Panamanian government took them to a hotel in Panama City, guarded tightly by security, no phones, and limited access to the outside world, according to multiple migrants CNN spoke to. Panama's Security Minister Frank Ábrego previously told a local radio program the deportees were held at the hotel, in part, because officials needed to 'effectively verify who these people are who are arriving in our country.' Even in a new country, under a new government authority, she held out hope someone from the United States government would step in and fix the situation. 'We were somehow happy that maybe the immigration from the US would come to Panama to listen to our stories,' she told CNN, now fighting back tears. 'It wasn't the case.' Her voice cracked, recalling the moment her optimism shattered. This is the downstream reality of an increased immigration crackdown in the United States, which the Trump administration has pressured Latin American countries like Panama, Costa Rica, and El Salvador to help with. Just days before she arrived at the border, Trump had signed an executive order effectively shutting down the US-Mexico border to migrants seeking asylum in the United States. Weeks later, the Panamanian government agreed to receive some of those migrants, at least temporarily, and took in nearly 300. Many are asylum-seekers from places like Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, China, Sri Lanka. They are now are caught in limbo – expelled from the United States, but unable to go back to their home countries out of fear of being persecuted or killed. 'They shouldn't just like abandon us like that without telling us what we have done wrong. It become very, very difficult and confusing to us. I've left my children back home,' Ambo said through tears. Another woman from Ethiopia, was on a similar flight. She too requested not to use her name for fear of retaliation in her home country. 'I am so shocked. I'm saying this is Texas or Panama?' she recalled. She told CNN she too had trekked through Central America, injuring her leg in the Darién jungle, to reach the US-Mexico border. She said she too had left Ethiopia due to political issues and feared returning. 'I don't have family. They died already,' she told CNN. And a fellow asylum-seeker migrant Afghanistan, who did not want to share his identity, told CNN en Español's Elizabeth Gonzalez that if he were to return to Afghanistan, he would be killed by the Taliban. They all now live in a humble shelter, one of multiple places in Panama where these migrants are trying to navigate life, in a country where they don't speak the language. 'Almost all of us are from different countries, but here we are like family, you know?' said the woman from Ethiopia. As she sat with CNN, mattresses on the floor lining the edges of the room, she said, 'We are together. Everyone is in distress. Everyone is in a bad situation.' Days after they were initially brought to a Panamanian hotel, the migrants were loaded onto buses again. They expected to be moved to another hotel, Ambo says. But the drive stretched on for hours, until they arrived at a facility over a hundred miles outside of Panama City on the outskirts of the Darién jungle near the border with Colombia. 'Are you going to kill us? Why are you bringing us here?' she recalled asking in fear, 'Bringing us in this place, a forest. What is going to happen to us?' Artemis Ghasemzadeh, an English teacher from Iran, remembers crying after being expelled from the United States on her February birthday. 'I changed my religion in Iran and the punishment of that is may be a long prison or at the end is death,' she told CNN. 'They took two of my friends from the underground church, so I understand it's time to go. The next is me,' she added. In February she was seen in a window of the migrant hotel with the words 'Help Us' written across the window. Days later she was at this Panamanian jungle camp, known as the San Vicente shelter, with over 100 other migrants who were in the same situation as hers. 'The food was really disgusting,' said Ghasemzadeh. 'The bathroom was really dirty, no privacy, no door,' she added. Salam said the water for bathing was not clean, causing hives to break out on her skin. She pulled up a pant leg to show the marks on her skin. 'All my body is like this,' she said. Panama's President José Raúl Mulino has repeatedly denied that authorities have violated the deportees' rights. Reached for comment about conditions at the camp, a spokesperson from the Panamanian Security Minister's office deferred to the International Office for Migration (IOM), which assists migrants. A spokesperson at IOM stressed, however, that handling the deportees is a 'government-led operation,' telling CNN 'we did not have direct involvement in the detention or restriction of movement of individuals.' Through every step of the way, attorneys for these migrants argue their rights were violated. 'Our claim is that America violated the right to seek asylum and by extension, by receiving them, the Panamanian government did the same thing,' said Silvia Serna Román, regional litigator for Mexico and Central America for the Global Strategic Litigation Council. 'Even though they all claim to be to be asylum seekers, they have never had their right to be heard,' she added. Serna Román is part of a group of international lawyers that filed a lawsuit against Panama on these alleged violations in the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Ian Kysel, who is also part of that group, has previously said they are exploring a range of further legal actions, including against US-specific entities and other countries that might be taking in deported or expelled US migrants. Panama has denied any wrongdoing in this saga. In early March, the Panamanian government released the over 100 migrants from the remote jungle camp, but gave them 30-day 'humanitarian' permits, extendable up to 90 days, to find another place to go or risk deportation from Panama. 'We're also trying to navigate the terms of those permits,' Serna Román explained. 'If they're only given 90 days and the 90 days come up then they might be forcibly removed and they might be like involuntarily be taken back to their countries and that's our concern,' she added. All the migrants CNN and CNN en Español spoke to said going back to their countries simply was not an option. 'Asylum means I'm not safe in my country, I need help. Just that. I'm not criminal. I'm educated person and just need help,' Ghasemzadeh explained. 'If I come back to my country, my government will kill me, so in Panama they are free to kill me,' she added. Aurelio Martinez, a spokesperson in Panama's security ministry, told CNN that after the 90-day period it would be studied whether to grant another extension or if their status would become illegal. When CNN pressed on whether that could trigger forcible repatriation, Martinez simply said they will review each case individually, that Panama always supports migrants and human rights, and that they intend to maintain that support and commitment. Ambo, her life now in a demoralizing standstill, still dreams about the United States, even though she has no idea when this nightmare will end. 'America has always been a country that received people from all over the whole world. I believe that is why many people are going towards the USA for to seek for asylum,' she said. 'They should listen to us and see if they can permit us to stay or not because when you don't listen to somebody, it means that human rights does not exist again in America.'
Yahoo
30-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
She was expelled from the United States, but still thought America would help. She was wrong
She asked to be identified only as 'Ambo,' out of fear of being recognized back in her home country. 'Life is very difficult for me,' she told CNN from a school-turned-shelter on a humidly hot day in Panama City, Panama. Over the ambient noise of blade fans attempting to cool the large room, she explained she left her native country of Cameroon due to 'political issues,' fearing that she would either be 'sentenced dead' or spend the rest of her life in prison if she stayed. She remembers arriving at the US-Mexico border on January 23 – three days after US President Trump's inauguration – after trekking through Central America and the dangerous Darién jungle. She turned herself in to United States Customs and Border Protection in hopes of making her case for asylum. By her count she spent 19 days in US custody, then finally got that chance – or so she thought. Just after midnight on February 13, by her recollection, she and other migrants were loaded onto a bus where they drove for hours. 'We were so happy thinking that they were going to transfer us to a camp where we are going to meet an immigration officer,' she recalled. She still thought that when she was loaded onto a plane, believing they were headed to another facility in the United States. But when they landed, they were in Panama. 'We're asking them why are they bringing us to Panama? 'Why are we in Panama?'' she said, 'People started crying.' Even still, she was optimistic. 'We're like thinking maybe the camp in the US is full. That is why they are bringing us here. When it will be our turn, they will come and take us to give us a listening ear,' she said. But the Panamanian government took them to a hotel in Panama City, guarded tightly by security, no phones, and limited access to the outside world, according to multiple migrants CNN spoke to. Panama's Security Minister Frank Ábrego previously told a local radio program the deportees were held at the hotel, in part, because officials needed to 'effectively verify who these people are who are arriving in our country.' Even in a new country, under a new government authority, she held out hope someone from the United States government would step in and fix the situation. 'We were somehow happy that maybe the immigration from the US would come to Panama to listen to our stories,' she told CNN, now fighting back tears. 'It wasn't the case.' Her voice cracked, recalling the moment her optimism shattered. This is the downstream reality of an increased immigration crackdown in the United States, which the Trump administration has pressured Latin American countries like Panama, Costa Rica, and El Salvador to help with. Just days before she arrived at the border, Trump had signed an executive order effectively shutting down the US-Mexico border to migrants seeking asylum in the United States. Weeks later, the Panamanian government agreed to receive some of those migrants, at least temporarily, and took in nearly 300. Many are asylum-seekers from places like Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, China, Sri Lanka. They are now are caught in limbo – expelled from the United States, but unable to go back to their home countries out of fear of being persecuted or killed. 'They shouldn't just like abandon us like that without telling us what we have done wrong. It become very, very difficult and confusing to us. I've left my children back home,' Ambo said through tears. Another woman from Ethiopia, was on a similar flight. She too requested not to use her name for fear of retaliation in her home country. 'I am so shocked. I'm saying this is Texas or Panama?' she recalled. She told CNN she too had trekked through Central America, injuring her leg in the Darién jungle, to reach the US-Mexico border. She said she too had left Ethiopia due to political issues and feared returning. 'I don't have family. They died already,' she told CNN. And a fellow asylum-seeker migrant Afghanistan, who did not want to share his identity, told CNN en Español's Elizabeth Gonzalez that if he were to return to Afghanistan, he would be killed by the Taliban. They all now live in a humble shelter, one of multiple places in Panama where these migrants are trying to navigate life, in a country where they don't speak the language. 'Almost all of us are from different countries, but here we are like family, you know?' said the woman from Ethiopia. As she sat with CNN, mattresses on the floor lining the edges of the room, she said, 'We are together. Everyone is in distress. Everyone is in a bad situation.' Days after they were initially brought to a Panamanian hotel, the migrants were loaded onto buses again. They expected to be moved to another hotel, Ambo says. But the drive stretched on for hours, until they arrived at a facility over a hundred miles outside of Panama City on the outskirts of the Darién jungle near the border with Colombia. 'Are you going to kill us? Why are you bringing us here?' she recalled asking in fear, 'Bringing us in this place, a forest. What is going to happen to us?' Artemis Ghasemzadeh, an English teacher from Iran, remembers crying after being expelled from the United States on her February birthday. 'I changed my religion in Iran and the punishment of that is may be a long prison or at the end is death,' she told CNN. 'They took two of my friends from the underground church, so I understand it's time to go. The next is me,' she added. In February she was seen in a window of the migrant hotel with the words 'Help Us' written across the window. Days later she was at this Panamanian jungle camp, known as the San Vicente shelter, with over 100 other migrants who were in the same situation as hers. 'The food was really disgusting,' said Ghasemzadeh. 'The bathroom was really dirty, no privacy, no door,' she added. Salam said the water for bathing was not clean, causing hives to break out on her skin. She pulled up a pant leg to show the marks on her skin. 'All my body is like this,' she said. Panama's President José Raúl Mulino has repeatedly denied that authorities have violated the deportees' rights. Reached for comment about conditions at the camp, a spokesperson from the Panamanian Security Minister's office deferred to the International Office for Migration (IOM), which assists migrants. A spokesperson at IOM stressed, however, that handling the deportees is a 'government-led operation,' telling CNN 'we did not have direct involvement in the detention or restriction of movement of individuals.' Through every step of the way, attorneys for these migrants argue their rights were violated. 'Our claim is that America violated the right to seek asylum and by extension, by receiving them, the Panamanian government did the same thing,' said Silvia Serna Román, regional litigator for Mexico and Central America for the Global Strategic Litigation Council. 'Even though they all claim to be to be asylum seekers, they have never had their right to be heard,' she added. Serna Román is part of a group of international lawyers that filed a lawsuit against Panama on these alleged violations in the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Ian Kysel, who is also part of that group, has previously said they are exploring a range of further legal actions, including against US-specific entities and other countries that might be taking in deported or expelled US migrants. Panama has denied any wrongdoing in this saga. In early March, the Panamanian government released the over 100 migrants from the remote jungle camp, but gave them 30-day 'humanitarian' permits, extendable up to 90 days, to find another place to go or risk deportation from Panama. 'We're also trying to navigate the terms of those permits,' Serna Román explained. 'If they're only given 90 days and the 90 days come up then they might be forcibly removed and they might be like involuntarily be taken back to their countries and that's our concern,' she added. All the migrants CNN and CNN en Español spoke to said going back to their countries simply was not an option. 'Asylum means I'm not safe in my country, I need help. Just that. I'm not criminal. I'm educated person and just need help,' Ghasemzadeh explained. 'If I come back to my country, my government will kill me, so in Panama they are free to kill me,' she added. Aurelio Martinez, a spokesperson in Panama's security ministry, told CNN that after the 90-day period it would be studied whether to grant another extension or if their status would become illegal. When CNN pressed on whether that could trigger forcible repatriation, Martinez simply said they will review each case individually, that Panama always supports migrants and human rights, and that they intend to maintain that support and commitment. Ambo, her life now in a demoralizing standstill, still dreams about the United States, even though she has no idea when this nightmare will end. 'America has always been a country that received people from all over the whole world. I believe that is why many people are going towards the USA for to seek for asylum,' she said. 'They should listen to us and see if they can permit us to stay or not because when you don't listen to somebody, it means that human rights does not exist again in America.'
CNN
30-03-2025
- Politics
- CNN
She was expelled from the United States, but still thought America would help. She was wrong
She asked to be identified only as 'Ambo,' out of fear of being recognized back in her home country. 'Life is very difficult for me,' she told CNN from a school-turned-shelter on a humidly hot day in Panama City, Panama. Over the ambient noise of blade fans attempting to cool the large room, she explained she left her native country of Cameroon due to 'political issues,' fearing that she would either be 'sentenced dead' or spend the rest of her life in prison if she stayed. She remembers arriving at the US-Mexico border on January 23 – three days after US President Trump's inauguration – after trekking through Central America and the dangerous Darién jungle. She turned herself in to United States Customs and Border Protection in hopes of making her case for asylum. By her count she spent 19 days in US custody, then finally got that chance – or so she thought. Just after midnight on February 13, by her recollection, she and other migrants were loaded onto a bus where they drove for hours. 'We were so happy thinking that they were going to transfer us to a camp where we are going to meet an immigration officer,' she recalled. She still thought that when she was loaded onto a plane, believing they were headed to another facility in the United States. But when they landed, they were in Panama. 'We're asking them why are they bringing us to Panama? 'Why are we in Panama?'' she said, 'People started crying.' Even still, she was optimistic. 'We're like thinking maybe the camp in the US is full. That is why they are bringing us here. When it will be our turn, they will come and take us to give us a listening ear,' she said. But the Panamanian government took them to a hotel in Panama City, guarded tightly by security, no phones, and limited access to the outside world, according to multiple migrants CNN spoke to. Panama's Security Minister Frank Ábrego previously told a local radio program the deportees were held at the hotel, in part, because officials needed to 'effectively verify who these people are who are arriving in our country.' Even in a new country, under a new government authority, she held out hope someone from the United States government would step in and fix the situation. 'We were somehow happy that maybe the immigration from the US would come to Panama to listen to our stories,' she told CNN, now fighting back tears. 'It wasn't the case.' Her voice cracked, recalling the moment her optimism shattered. This is the downstream reality of an increased immigration crackdown in the United States, which the Trump administration has pressured Latin American countries like Panama, Costa Rica, and El Salvador to help with. Just days before she arrived at the border, Trump had signed an executive order effectively shutting down the US-Mexico border to migrants seeking asylum in the United States. Weeks later, the Panamanian government agreed to receive some of those migrants, at least temporarily, and took in nearly 300. Many are asylum-seekers from places like Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, China, Sri Lanka. They are now are caught in limbo – expelled from the United States, but unable to go back to their home countries out of fear of being persecuted or killed. 'They shouldn't just like abandon us like that without telling us what we have done wrong. It become very, very difficult and confusing to us. I've left my children back home,' Ambo said through tears. Another woman from Ethiopia, was on a similar flight. She too requested not to use her name for fear of retaliation in her home country. 'I am so shocked. I'm saying this is Texas or Panama?' she recalled. She told CNN she too had trekked through Central America, injuring her leg in the Darién jungle, to reach the US-Mexico border. She said she too had left Ethiopia due to political issues and feared returning. 'I don't have family. They died already,' she told CNN. And a fellow asylum-seeker migrant Afghanistan, who did not want to share his identity, told CNN en Español's Elizabeth Gonzalez that if he were to return to Afghanistan, he would be killed by the Taliban. They all now live in a humble shelter, one of multiple places in Panama where these migrants are trying to navigate life, in a country where they don't speak the language. 'Almost all of us are from different countries, but here we are like family, you know?' said the woman from Ethiopia. As she sat with CNN, mattresses on the floor lining the edges of the room, she said, 'We are together. Everyone is in distress. Everyone is in a bad situation.' Days after they were initially brought to a Panamanian hotel, the migrants were loaded onto buses again. They expected to be moved to another hotel, Ambo says. But the drive stretched on for hours, until they arrived at a facility over a hundred miles outside of Panama City on the outskirts of the Darién jungle near the border with Colombia. 'Are you going to kill us? Why are you bringing us here?' she recalled asking in fear, 'Bringing us in this place, a forest. What is going to happen to us?' Artemis Ghasemzadeh, an English teacher from Iran, remembers crying after being expelled from the United States on her February birthday. 'I changed my religion in Iran and the punishment of that is may be a long prison or at the end is death,' she told CNN. 'They took two of my friends from the underground church, so I understand it's time to go. The next is me,' she added. In February she was seen in a window of the migrant hotel with the words 'Help Us' written across the window. Days later she was at this Panamanian jungle camp, known as the San Vicente shelter, with over 100 other migrants who were in the same situation as hers. 'The food was really disgusting,' said Ghasemzadeh. 'The bathroom was really dirty, no privacy, no door,' she added. Salam said the water for bathing was not clean, causing hives to break out on her skin. She pulled up a pant leg to show the marks on her skin. 'All my body is like this,' she said. Panama's President José Raúl Mulino has repeatedly denied that authorities have violated the deportees' rights. Reached for comment about conditions at the camp, a spokesperson from the Panamanian Security Minister's office deferred to the International Office for Migration (IOM), which assists migrants. A spokesperson at IOM stressed, however, that handling the deportees is a 'government-led operation,' telling CNN 'we did not have direct involvement in the detention or restriction of movement of individuals.' Through every step of the way, attorneys for these migrants argue their rights were violated. 'Our claim is that America violated the right to seek asylum and by extension, by receiving them, the Panamanian government did the same thing,' said Silvia Serna Román, regional litigator for Mexico and Central America for the Global Strategic Litigation Council. 'Even though they all claim to be to be asylum seekers, they have never had their right to be heard,' she added. Serna Román is part of a group of international lawyers that filed a lawsuit against Panama on these alleged violations in the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Ian Kysel, who is also part of that group, has previously said they are exploring a range of further legal actions, including against US-specific entities and other countries that might be taking in deported or expelled US migrants. Panama has denied any wrongdoing in this saga. In early March, the Panamanian government released the over 100 migrants from the remote jungle camp, but gave them 30-day 'humanitarian' permits, extendable up to 90 days, to find another place to go or risk deportation from Panama. 'We're also trying to navigate the terms of those permits,' Serna Román explained. 'If they're only given 90 days and the 90 days come up then they might be forcibly removed and they might be like involuntarily be taken back to their countries and that's our concern,' she added. All the migrants CNN and CNN en Español spoke to said going back to their countries simply was not an option. 'Asylum means I'm not safe in my country, I need help. Just that. I'm not criminal. I'm educated person and just need help,' Ghasemzadeh explained. 'If I come back to my country, my government will kill me, so in Panama they are free to kill me,' she added. Aurelio Martinez, a spokesperson in Panama's security ministry, told CNN that after the 90-day period it would be studied whether to grant another extension or if their status would become illegal. When CNN pressed on whether that could trigger forcible repatriation, Martinez simply said they will review each case individually, that Panama always supports migrants and human rights, and that they intend to maintain that support and commitment. Ambo, her life now in a demoralizing standstill, still dreams about the United States, even though she has no idea when this nightmare will end. 'America has always been a country that received people from all over the whole world. I believe that is why many people are going towards the USA for to seek for asylum,' she said. 'They should listen to us and see if they can permit us to stay or not because when you don't listen to somebody, it means that human rights does not exist again in America.'
