BORDER NEWS

A group of students from Laos have arrived in the US as refugees after leading pro-democracy efforts.  The six students arrived in Seattle, Washington, last week.  During October 1999 the students attempted to stage a demonstration, which would have been the first public demonstration since the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party took over the country in 1975.  The government stopped the protest by arresting most of the participants.  The six who are now in the US initially fled to Thailand where they sought refugee status.

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Court depositions have revealed that Operation Keep and Seek, hailed as one of the most successful anti-smuggling efforts ever conducted by the INS in 1998, my have been successful because INS agents engaged in racial profiling.  According to the depositions, which were obtained by the Dallas Morning News, INS supervisors involved in the investigation photocopied listings of Indian restaurants and Dunkin’ Donuts franchises and told agents to search them for Indian and Pakistani nationals.  The depositions were filed in a case brought by three agents who were not allowed to participate in the operation.  According to the depositions, there was no evidence that would indicate the people targeted were involved in the smuggling, or were in the US without authorization.  However, an INS spokesperson has said that there were investigative leads into restaurants hiring undocumented workers.  Operation Seek and Keep disrupted a $220 million ring responsible for smuggling more than 12,000 people into the US.

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Border Patrol agents in the El Paso, Texas area are seeing a growing number of Polish nationals being smuggled into the US.  During fiscal year 2000, which ended on September 30, 2000, the El Paso Border Patrol arrested 231 Polish nationals, up from 30 the year before.  Some suspect the reason for the popularity of trying to cross in this area is because agents are searching for Hispanics, not Europeans.

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