Refugees in Canada plea for government to speed up family reunification

Refugees and their advocates are calling on the Canadian government to speed up family reunification.

"My mother has been in Turkey for over a year waiting to come to Canada. Really I miss her," saidHuda Mohammed Ahmed, 14, at a press conference in Vancouveron Monday.

Ahmed,a government-assistedrefugeefrom Iraq, came to Canada with her older brotherbut without their mother, whose paperwork has yet to be processed.

"Imiss my home and my friends," said Ahmed.

Last Saturday, Immigration Minister Chris Alexander announced a $25-million plan to allow more refugee applications to be processed.

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Immigration advocates at the announcementsaid the quickest way to speed those applications along is tohelp families who have been separated by war.

"Canada needs to putrefugeechildren first and this can happen through an expedited government-assisted program," saidChris Friesen,chair of the Canadian Immigrant Settlement Sector Alliance.

Friesen pointedout that the federal government sped up family reunification for refugees from Kosovo in 1999.

Like the other panel members at the conference, B.C.'s child advocate MaryEllen Turpel-Lafondaskedthe Canadian government to help reunite refugees with their families.

"I can't justify to you the slowness of the process, it's inexcusable," saidTurpel-Lafond. "I've found the bureaucracy far too complex and burdensome."

'I love him, he's my dad'

Other refugees separated from their families stood up to share their stories as well.

NastehoAbdhurhman'smotherbrought her and her threesistersto Canada threeyears ago from a refugee camp. Separated from their father, she and her familyare trying to bring him here.

"I love him, he's my dad," saidAbdhurhman.

Hers is not an unfamiliar story, saidDr.Mei-lingWiedmeyer, who runs a specialized primary health care facility for refugees in B.C.

"We see children who cry at night for their fathers," saidWiedmeyer.

"Imagine that you have already lost immediate family members to violence in the region, the mental weight of this is almost unbearable."