23724: (pub) Chamberlain: US may allow refugees to stay (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By JOHN PAIN

   CORAL GABLES, Fla., Nov 5 (AP) -- The government will consider allowing
illegal immigrants from Haiti to remain here if they aren't violent
criminals, and if they come from parts of the island devastated by Tropical
Storm Jeanne, officials said Friday.
   The decisions will be made on a case-by-case basis, said Bill
Strassberger, a spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Citizenship and
Immigration Services, part of the Homeland Security Department. It was
unclear how many Haitians would be affected or how long they could stay.
   Federal officials were still considering a more sweeping request from
Haiti's interim Prime Minister Gerard Latortue -- to temporarily stop
deporting all Haitians living illegally in the United States, said Angie
Alfonso, another bureau spokeswoman.
   Such temporary protected status has been granted in the past, including
to victims of 1998's Hurricane Mitch from Honduras and Nicaragua.
   Haiti, long suffering from political unrest and poverty, was devastated
by Jeanne. It killed some 1,900 people, left 900 missing and presumed dead,
and left 200,000 others homeless in the country's third-largest city of
Gonaives.
   Latortue met Friday with Roger Noriega, U.S. assistant secretary of
state for the Western Hemisphere. "I told him right now I believe it
wouldn't be good decision to send back to Haiti criminals ... in a country
where we have so many problems," Latortue said.
   Gov. Jeb Bush, who was also at the meeting, has recommended temporary
protected status "so long as it can be done in a way that does not create a
'pull' factor toward the United States."
   Under Haiti's military dictatorship between 1991 and 1994, more than
65,000 Haitians were intercepted at sea by the Coast Guard. Many were
heading to Florida, and most were sent home.