Govt to press US for $$ to resettle deportees
Insanally
By Patrick Denny
Stabroek News
November 6, 2002
Foreign Affairs Minister Rudy Insanally says that the government will press the United States for financial assistance in resettling deportees who are being sent back here in substantial numbers by Washington.
Insanally told Stabroek News in an interview that negotiations on the Memorandum of Under-standing with the United States of America covering the return of the deportees are yet to be finalised. He explained that the negotiations are taking place regionally through the CARICOM ambassadors in Washington DC and bilaterally.
The bilateral negotiations with the US are stalled pending a response from the US State Department on the Guyana Government's comments on the proposed draft of the memorandum.
Insanally said that the government is interested in receiving assistance not only in the monitoring and surveillance of the deportees but also in their resettlement.
At the regional level, the minister said that when he and his colleagues met with US Secretary of State Colin Powell during the UN General Assembly, the US had given a reaction to the proposal for the establishment of a resettlement fund created by the seizure of the assets of those deportees convicted for drug related crimes. The fund is being seen as an initiative to help the countries in the region in their efforts to cope with absorbing the deportees.
Insanally said that the US officials had indicated that the US Immigration and Naturalization Service would have some difficulty implementing the proposals but that the discussions were still ongoing.
Meanwhile, despite the dispatch in passing the amendment to the Prevention of Crimes Act, the Government is still to take advantage of the powers given to the police under the new legislation to monitor a certain category of deportees.
Police sources told Stabroek News that the police are still familiarizing themselves with the legislation and taking legal advice on it.
The amendment was enacted together with three others as part of a menu of anti-crime measures being taken by the government to address the current crime wave.
Last month Police Commissioner Floyd McDonald said the deportees were making a significant contribution to the criminal acts committed recently.
The amendment provides for Guyanese convicted of certain offences in a foreign state to be effectively monitored by the police. In cases where the police seek to monitor the movements of a given deportee, they will make an ex parte application to the court for the appropriate order.
The amendment also provides for the police to monitor those persons who elect to return to Guyana instead of being deported. The monitoring provided for in the act includes restricting the deportee to a defined geographical area.
The Guyana Bar Association describes these provisions as a challenge to rights guaranteed by the constitution.
According to information extracted by the Stabroek News from releases issued by the police between November 15 last year and October 16 this year, 268 persons have been deported back to Guyana, 207 of them having been returned from the United States of America and 37 from Canada. Of these, 57 were returned after being convicted for the possession of narcotics and 7 from Canada for the same offence. For the offence of trafficking in narcotics, 46 were returned from the US and 10 from Canada. For robbery under arms and robbery 28 of the 31 who were deported here came from the USA.