Free Republic

Building on pro-gay policies put in place by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, President Obama today ordered overseas federal agencies to fight local anti-gay violence and provide asylum to homosexuals seeking protection. Obama said, "I am deeply concerned by the violence and discrimination targeting LGBT persons around the world -- whether it is passing laws that criminalize LGBT status, beating citizens simply for joining peaceful LGBT pride celebrations, or killing men, women, and children for their perceived sexual orientation." >>SNIP<< "There is no question that the administration's record of advancing equality for LGBT people has been enhanced by the leadership...

What does it take to be a crime reporter in the murder capital of the world? Everything, says Irma Londono. For 17 years, Irma Londono did her part to uncover the truth about drug trafficking in Colombia. As a journalist, Londono disregarded comments that women did not belong in her field, endured challenges to her credibility from corrupt officials and even survived a kidnapping from guerilla rebels. But when threats against her life escalated, the award-winning journalist heeded her mother’s advice and fled to the United States as a political refugee, leaving her family, friends and career behind. “I am...

Diplomatic safe sex: No US asylum to Saudi gay By Julio Severo A homosexual from Saudi Arabia had his asylum request denied by the Obama administration. The Jerusalem Post reported that Ali Ahmad Asseri “argued that if he returned to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia he would face execution because the country’s radically fundamental form of Islam mandates the death penalty for same-sex relations.” Reportedly, the Obama administration denied the asylum to “avoid disrupting US-Saudi relations”. Annoying wasps is less dangerous than annoying a Muslim nation! Is not the Obama administration the most radically pro-sodomy government in the US and...

LABOR may have finally bounced off rock bottom but Australia's oldest political party and its leader are still facing a historic loss of public confidence and electoral failure. A three-point rise in the Newspoll primary vote for the ALP has avoided the unthinkable for the Gillard government of going to 25 per cent or below to have less support than the combined vote for the Greens and various odds and sods, but the broader view of this survey of public opinion about Labor - as well as the personal standing of Julia Gillard - is devastating. The electorate has not...

<p>The daughter-in-law of a slain Mexican activist and her son have been granted asylum in the United States, her attorney said.</p> <p>The El Paso (Texas) Times reported Monica Arias Hernandez, 33, and her 6-year-old son, Eduardo Alejandro Frayre Arias, had requested asylum in March and received it in late August. (SNIP) Arias Hernandez's attorney, Carlos Spector, called the decision to grant her asylum "a great victory that shows the entire world that there are hopes in this country, that they will not continue closing the doors on the victims of the Mexican government. There are bases for political asylum."</p>

GOP Rep. Steve King (R-IA) - a stalwart opponent of illegal alien amnesty, came out with a strong response to Barack Obama's "Uncle Omar" - the 20-year fugitive from justice busted for DUI in Massachussetts 2 weeks ago, who was then summarily released by ICE a few days ago. This follows the outrage of Obama's Aunt Zeituni mooching off welfare and public housing for years in Boston, before being outed - and then getting asylum in an unprecedented closed immigration hearing. As Judiciary Chariman Lamar Smith said Friday, "It appears there is a double standard — one for President Obama’s...

Prosecutors are reportedly set to ask a judge to abandon the case against Dominique Strauss Kahn. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance is preparing to ask that all charges against the former head of the IMF accused of attempting to rape hotel maid Nafissatou Diallo are dropped Tuesday. Such requests from the DA 'are never denied', an expert told the New York Post meaning Strauss-Kahn could finally return to his home country after being forced to remian in the U.S for months.

By Sunday afternoon, the infiltrators began to make their way back to Syria following negotiations between the IDF, police and Druze elders. The forces tried not to intervene as the Syrian youngsters marched back to their country while calling out "we'll be back," encouraged by applause from the Druze villagers who looked on. By 5 pm Sunday, the IDF said that all infiltrators left Israeli territory. 'We come in peace' "I'm tired of living in Syria, we'd rather die than see more bloodshed," one of the Syrian infiltrators into Majdal Shams told Ynet earlier. He called on Israel to grant...

Colonel Gaddafi, having foolishly agreed not to arm himself with chemical, biological or nuclear weapons*, a lesson other dictators may heed, has set upon a more surreal but perhaps more effective weapon against the West – refugees. According to this newspaper: Libya is unleashing a wave of migrants against Europe as retaliation for the coalition’s military strikes against the country.…Col. Muammar Gaddafi’s regime is alleged to have been actively encouraging boatloads of migrants to leave the country’s shores since March 22, when the first vessel sailed from Tajoura, a suburb of Tripoli.Libyan armed forces and militias are reportedly turning...

The Church of Sweden has advised pastors to avoid christening asylum seekers that have converted to Christianity due to the risk of reprisals in the case of repatriation, reported news agency TT. One of the reasons for the recommendation is because it can cause danger and increase risks if a person who has converted to Christianity is later sent back to their home country. Another reason is that the motive for the christening can be questioned by some who suggest that asylum seekers convert to Christianity to increase their chances of staying in Sweden. The issue is being addressed in...

Immigration attorneys and immigrant-rights groups in the Texas border city of El Paso said they have formed a coalition aimed at providing greater support for asylum seekers facing a hurdle-ridden application process. The director of the Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center in El Paso, Louie Gilot, said cases of Mexicans fleeing drug-related violence have risen significantly over the past two years and that the asylum seekers include former police officers, rights activists, journalists, business leaders and even government officials. Just across the Rio Grande from El Paso is Ciudad Juarez, Mexico's murder capital and the largest city in Chihuahua state,...

A 20-year-old college student hired as police chief of a Mexican border town has left the job and fled to the United States after threats, an official said Friday. Marisol Valles Garcia left the town of Praxedis G. Guerrero with her family, the El Diario newspaper cited Jorge Gonzalez Nicolas, an official investigating the threats, as saying. Earlier a relative of hers had told AFP news service that she had "received death threats from a criminal group that wanted to force her to work for them." She "went to the United States along with two relatives and will seek asylum,"...

According to Arabic language broadcasts, “The Muslim world is saying that President Obama wants amnesty for the current Hispanic 12 million illegal immigrants in the US in order to pave the way for the next wave of tens of millions of illegals from the Middle East to the United States, leading to 50 to 100 million Muslims living in the US. before the end of Obama’s second term.

Two Libyan air force jets have arrived in Malta and military officials say their pilots have asked for political asylum amid a bloody crackdown on anti-government protesters in Libya. The two Mirage jets arrived Monday shortly after two civilian helicopters landed at the airport carrying seven people who said they were French.

The little girl is captured in a photo taken after her mother's murder, dressed in a frilly pink dress and clutching a grape lollipop, her face nestled in her grandmother's chest. The grandmother, Marisela Escobedo, looks determined in the snapshot, taken at one of many protests she staged to demand justice for her 16-year-old daughter, Rubi Frayre, whose presumed killer walked free despite confessing to her murder. It was at one of those protests that a gunman hunted down Escobedo, 52, and shot and killed her just steps from the state capitol building in Chihuahua City on Dec. 16. And...

Here's one advantage to being a caretaker mayor: You can make tough decisions without worrying about their repercussions at the ballot box. That's exactly what Mayor Ed Lee has in his quiver as he prepares to make the difficult calls to balance the budget for 2011-12, which now has a $380 million deficit because of a recent $20 million increase in projected pension costs. "I have an opportunity to actually make some long-term reforms, reforms that will last," Lee told The Chronicle's editorial board on Tuesday. "I'm not speaking about any particular politician, but what I generally have felt is...

New York state Sen. Carl Kruger wants to make his state’s streets safer. To do that, he's not proposing a tough new gun law or advocating for broader police search powers. No, Sen. Kruger sees a greater danger out there. Distracting gadgets. He hopes to ban the use of mobile phones, iPods and other gadgets by pedestrians in major cities while crossing the street.

A woman who lied about being gang raped in Somalia to claim more than £250,000 in benefits had moved to Britain after boasting it was the ‘land of easy money’. Ayan Abdulle was jailed this week after investigators discovered that the story she used to win asylum – and later UK citizenship – was a pack of lies. Now the Daily Mail can reveal the full scale of her fraud and how easily she was able to milk the benefits system for years. Abdulle, who also used the fake name Amina Muse and is from Somalia, was living in Gothenburg...

A woman who lied about being gang raped in Somalia to claim more than £250,000 in benefits had moved to Britain after boasting it was the ‘land of easy money’. Ayan Abdulle was jailed this week after investigators discovered that the story she used to win asylum – and later UK citizenship – was a pack of lies... Abdulle, who also used the fake name Amina Muse and is from Somalia, was living in Gothenburg when the authorities insisted immigrants learn Swedish if they wanted to continue to claim handouts... She told a friend she couldn’t be bothered and moved...

If WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange needs a home, Ecuador's deputy foreign minister says this Andean nation is happy to provide one. The 39-year-old Australian, who has incensed and embarrassed Washington with the release by his online whistle-blowing organization of hundreds of sensitive diplomatic cables, had sought residency and a work permit in Sweden. But after the release by WikiLeaks beginning in late July of thousands of sensitive documents from the Iraq and Afghan wars, a Swedish court ordered him detained for questioning on sexual assault allegations - claims Assange denies and calls part of a smear campaign. Assange, who keeps...

The Alarcón case is believed to be the first on the crowded court dockets here – and one of the few nationally – involving a Mexican law enforcement officer Alarcón and his attorney must prove that as a municipal officer, he belonged to a social group that was persecuted and that the government was unable to protect him In fiscal 2010, asylum applications from Mexicans before immigration judges jumped to nearly 3,800, up about 35 percent from the year earlier and the highest level in five years. But less than 2 percent of those who in 2010 applied ultimately were...

When Alexandra Reyes' father caught her wearing her sister's shoes and clothes, he tied her up and beat her with spiked pieces of a tree. "It was so horrible, I would scream," Reyes said. "He told me he had a son, not a daughter, and he did not accept me." Reyes, 32, was born a boy named Carlos but began living life as a girl at age 8, infuriating her traditional Mayan family in Cenotillo, Mexico. One night, an aunt walked into Reyes' bedroom and tried to kill her with a machete because she didn't want Reyes in the family....

Granted asylum and still living off taxpayers thanks to her nephew's powerful position... meanwhile President Obama -who wrote fondly of her in his book- treats dear Aunt Zietuni like a leper he's never even met Any residual pity or sympathy you may have harbored for the plight of long-time illegal alien and 2x-deportation-order-defying Zeituni Onyango vanishes the minute she opens that dopey mouth... if you can even understand her. Interestingly, this Judge Shapiro that granted her asylum earlier in the year is the very same one who's previous deportation order she just completely ignored... that's some change of heart there,...

I've previously argued that the benefits of so-called "civil Gideon" are overstated, and another example hit the news recently. In FY 1986, 89% of asylum claims were denied, and 52% of asylum seekers had counsel. In FY 2010, 50% of asylum claims were denied, and 91% of asylum seekers had counsel; the approval rates for without and with counsel were 11% and 54% respectively. Therefore, Syracuse's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse announces, legal representation helps asylum seekers in court, and more legal representation is needed?a claim repeated uncritically by an article by Marcia Coyle in the National Law Journal without any...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico – Some 230,000 people have left Ciudad Juarez, a border city that has become Mexico’s murder capital, in the past three years as the death toll from a gang war topped 7,000, a non-governmental organization said in a new report. About 124,000 people, or 53.9 percent of the total, have sought safe haven in El Paso, Texas, which is just across the border, the Ciudad Juarez Citizens Security and Coexistence Observatory said. The rest have returned to their hometowns, mainly in Durango, Coahuila and Veracruz states, to get away from the drug-related violence. “Action should be taken...

Kenyan officials are displeased about the judge’s decision, claiming that “The allegations made against the country are not only untrue but unrealistic to any person who understands our country.” Onyango had argued during her hearing in February that she would be “persecuted” if deported back to her “home country” of Kenya. She also reportedly said that she “could be targeted by members of Kenya’s government” if returned there.

SAN DIEGO—The son of a Hamas founder who became a Christian and an Israeli spy will be granted U.S. asylum after he passes a routine background check, an immigration judge ruled Wednesday. Mosab Hassan Yousef got the news during a 15-minute deportation hearing after a U.S. Department of Homeland Security attorney said the government was dropping its objections. The agency denied Yousef's asylum request in February 2009, arguing that he had been involved in terrorism and was a threat to the United States.

Congressman Steve King, an Iowa Republican, today requested that President Obama's aunt, Zeituni Onyango, testify before the House Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security and International Law in order to address "the public perception that favoritism played a role in the grant of asylum to Ms. Onyango." In a letter to the chair of the subcommittee, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, King writes that "[i]n order to better determine whether favoritism played a role - especially because Ms. Onyango had been earlier turned down for asylum and ordered deported in 2004 before her nephew became president - the Subcommittee needs to...

BOSTON — An immigration judge has granted asylum to President Obama’s aunt and will allow her to stay in the United States, her lawyers said Monday. She could become a citizen in about six years. Zeituni Onyango, 57, who lives in public housing in Boston, is the half-sister of Mr. Obama’s late father and is from Kenya. She moved to the United States in 2000 on a valid visa and has been seeking asylum since 2002. Judge Leonard Shapiro, an immigration judge in Boston, reached his decision in the long-running case on Friday. Her lawyers announced the decision Monday at...

<p>President Barack Obama's Kenyan aunt can stay in the United States, a U.S. immigration judge has ruled, ending a more than six-year legal battle over her status.</p> <p>Judge Leonard Shapiro made the decision Friday, court officials told CNN. Two government sources confirmed Monday that the ruling will give legal status to Zeituni Onyango, allowing her to remain in the country.</p>

Sweden's Migration Board (Migrationsverket) has increased its forecast to 31,000 for the number of people expected to seek asylum this year. It has also requested an additional 60 million kronor ($7.86 million) in 2010 to cope with the increased pressure. "There has been a sharp upward revision. This is the second time this year we have increased the projection," said Dan Eliasson, the director general of the Migration Board. Previously, the Migration Board estimated that there would be 25,000 asylum seekers in 2010, but in February, it increased its forecast to 28,000 and asked for an additional 50 million kronor...

Speaking at a cultural event in Ramat Gan on Saturday, Deputy Negev and Galilee Development Minister Ayoub Kara (Likud) said that an Iranian nuclear scientist had broken ranks with the Islamic regime and requested political asylum in Israel. While Kara refused to reveal the identity of the scientist, he did say that the Iranian national was currently awaiting a decision on the matter in a “friendly country.”

The lie that got asylum Brazilian homosexual is granted asylum in the US by putting Brazil in the stranger category of one of the world champions in violence and murders against homosexuals By Julio Severo Since 2003, the Lula administration has been promoting and imposing the gay agenda, not only in Brazil, but also in the world. Under Lula, Brazil was the first country to introduce, in 2003, a resolution in the UN classifying homosexuality as an inalienable human right. The same kind of resolution was introduced by the Brazilian government in the Organization of the American States. Under the...

U.S. Immigration Opposes Asylum Decision In a deeply disturbing notice, the United States Government Agency for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has lodged an appeal of Judge Lawrence Burman’s grant of asylum to the Romeike family. The appeal was sent to the Board of Immigration Appeals in Fairfax, Virginia on February 25. In it, the ICE called homeschoolers too “amorphous� to be a “particular social group� and that “United States law has recognized the broad power of the state to compel school attendance and regulate curriculum and teacher certification� as well as the “authority to prohibit or regulate homeschooling.� On...

She’s right. Tomorrow, I’m gonna stop being unfair to bananas and call them soda. And apples, well . . . it’s not nice to exclude them from the meat group. Gonna call ‘em steak. She also said that specific assignments often call exclusively for gender-neutral language. Wow, someone’s parents are blowin’ a whole lot of money. Keith Reisinger, graduate student instructor for the Women’s Studies Department, said the issue reaches far beyond any departmental policy or the confines of the University. “I think we as a whole need to change how we talk about gender and people,” he said. Me,...

BOSTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama's African aunt showed up in a wheelchair Thursday, a cane across her lap, for a hearing in U.S. Immigration Court to make another bid for asylum because of what her lawyer said included medical reasons. Kenya native Zeituni Onyango, 57, and two doctors are expected to testify at the hearing, which is closed to the public, lawyer Margaret Wong said. She is applying for asylum for medical and "other" reasons, Wong said.

How German Homeschoolers Won Asylum in the U.S. But here's the problem: in Germany it's compulsory for children to attend school, and the Romeikes soon found themselves on the wrong side of the law. Local authorities slapped the couple with a $10,000 fine, and police even took their children to school when the Romeikes refused to send them. Fearing that they could lose custody of their kids or even be put in jail, the Romeikes fled to the U.S. in 2008, looking for a community where they could educate their kids as they saw fit.

US citizen 'seeks asylum in N Korea' AAP January 30, 2010, 10:01 am A second US citizen who was detained by North Korea for crossing the border has sought political asylum in the communist state, a South Korean newspaper says. Saturday's report by the conservative Dong-A Ilbo daily could not be confirmed independently. Dong-A Ilbo, quoting an unidentified source, said the American was a 28-year-old man. He crossed the border near the city of Tumen in northeast China into North Korea's Onsong County on Monday, the daily said. "I came here because I did not want to serve as a...

The Obama administration announced Friday evening that it will allow an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 Haitians living in the United States illegally to stay and work in the country for 18 months as part of its response to Tuesday's earthquake. But officials warned Haitians that leaving their country now "will only bring more hardship to the Haitian people and nation."

It's being tweeted that the Iranian Amb to Norway has resigned and is seeking asylum in Oslo. So far I have not seen it in the MSM. It's beeing tweeted that it is been published in a Norwegian paper. Anyone read the language? Things must be gettin real bad if Ambassadors are cutting and running, as one person posted.

LANCASTER, Calif. – The asylum seeker from Somalia hung his head as an immigration judge grilled him about his treacherous journey from the Horn of Africa. By air, sea and land he finally made it to Mexico, and then a taxi delivered him into the arms of U.S. border agents at San Diego. Islamic militants had killed his brother, Mohamed Ahmed Kheire testified, and majority clan members had beaten his sister. He had to flee Mogadishu to live.

Envoy decries illegal migration to Holland From Laolu Akande (New York) and Abiodun Fagbemi (Ilorin) POUNDED at home and desperate to keep hope alive, Nigerians are among the top nationalities fleeing their own country and seeking asylum in industrialized nations, according to the United Nations (UN). Meanwhile, the Ambassador Plenipotentiary of Nigeria to The Netherlands, Dr. Nimota Akanbi, has deplored illegal movement of many Nigerians into The Netherlands. Although Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia were three most affected countries, Nigeria was still grouped among the other "main countries of origin of asylum seekers" in mostly western nations as at the second...

Failed Asylum Seeker Who Killed 12-Year-Old Girl Wins Court Bid To Stay In Britain Daily Mail Reporter 23rd December 2009 Aso Mohammed Ibrahim has been allowed to stay in the country despite knocking down and killing a 12-year-old girl while disqualified. A failed asylum seeker who fled after knocking down and killing a 12-year-old girl has won his appeal to stay in Britain. The family of Amy Houston, who was left dying under the wheels of Aso Mohammed Ibrahim's Rover car as she walked to the shops, have spoken of their disgust at the decision. The Kurdish Iraqi was on...

Law Firm's Scam Reopens Hundreds Of Asylum Cases Stephen Magagnini Nov. 16, 2009 For years, Sacramento's Sekhon & Sekhon law firm was renowned as a beacon of hope. The firm, boasting a 95 percent success rate, helped more than 1,000 immigrants from a half-dozen nations get political asylum in the United States based on a fear of persecution. Many of those new Americans now stand to be deported, because as many as 700 – coached by the firm's lawyers and interpreters – told phony stories of torture and rape to immigration judges and asylum officers. In June, following a three-month...

After years on the run, Gilda Ghanipour stumbled upon a retired immigration judge and his Pepperdine law students, who championed her quest for asylum. She won her case. But she doesn't know it. Director Bruce Einhorn, second from right, and students of Pepperdine Law School's Asylum Clinic. They championed Gilda Ghanipour's quest for asylum. (Ann Johansson / For The Times / October 22, 2009) Gilda Ghanipour has spent the last nine years on the run. Abandoned by her Muslim family for converting to Christianity, she has shuttled from one address to the next, terrified of being deported to her native...

Nuremberg - The daughter of a close associate of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has requested asylum in Germany, after attending a human rights film festival in Nuremberg, a festival spokesman said on Tuesday. Filmmaker Nargef Kalhor, 25, had refused to return to her native Iran after the festival and applied for asylum instead. She is currently in a refugee centre near Nuremberg, the spokesman added. Kalhor's father Mehdi Kalhor is said to be one of Ahmadinejad's closest confidants. The former documentary film producer has advised the Iranian president on cultural issues since August 2005. Nargef Kalhor attended the Nuremberg festival...

<p>SAN FRANCISCO -- A Northern California family whose daughter underwent forced circumcision in Indonesia is entitled to seek political asylum in the United States, a federal appeals court said Monday.</p> <p>The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco criticized immigration officials who, in ordering the family deported, decided that the girl had suffered no serious harm when her genitals were mutilated as a newborn.</p>

A Swedish gay rights organisation has called on the government not to deport any homosexual Iraqi asylum seekers in the light of a shocking new report categorising an extermination campaign against gay men in the Middle Eastern country. The Swedish Federation for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Rights (RFSL) has now called on the Swedish government to halt all deportations to Iraq of people who have sought asylum on the basis of sexual orientation or gender. "We urge Sweden to investigate the possibility of evacuating homosexuals, bisexuals and transgender people who are at risk of being subjected to 'sexual cleansing',"...

July 15, 2009 California is the biggest destination for those granted asylum Every year the federal government grants refugee and asylum status to "persons who have been persecuted or who have a well-founded fear of persecution" in their native countries. The legal difference between a "refugee" and an "asylee" is the former requests refuge outside the United States, while the latter requests it after entering this country. The U.S. Office of Immigration Statistics compiles data on these two groups. Its latest report indicates that 60,108 persons were admitted to the United States as refugees in 2008. The leading countries of...

Speaking for the European Union presidency, Swedish migration minister Tobias Billström said on Wednesday that the EU supported requiring visas for Canadians travelling to the EU in response to Canada’s decision to impose visa restrictions on Czech nationals. "As the presidency of the EU, we are in favour of this reciprocity," Swedish Migration and Asylum Policy Minister Tobias Billström told AFP. "But it's up to the Commission to handle the proposal, because the Commission is responsible for the reciprocity mechanism," he added. Canada imposed visas on Czechs to stave off what it said was a steady influx of Roma asylum...