Relocating up to 20,000 Kosovar refugees from Macedonia to the
continental United States would cost American taxpayers between 40 and
45 million dollars, according to State Department
estimates.
Costs would include screening ethnic Albanians who are seeking
refugee status, transporting them, providing for their physical needs in
the process, and settling them in temporary homes in the United States.
If they are assimilated into American society, costs would be even
greater.
It has not yet been decided how refugees would be transported to the
American mainland. Options include chartering flights from private
airlines, or using military aircraft.
The new policy,
announced by Vice
President Al Gore on Wednesday at Ellis Island,
may be implemented as early as next week.
However, most details of the plan have not been worked out yet.
Officials from the State Department and Immigration and
Naturalization Service will travel to
Macedonia to make sure the displaced ethnic Albanians meet required
standards for refugees. Screening will likely be done in conjunction
with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Representatives will determine needs for protection and assistance
based on criteria in the State Department Refugee Resettlement Program.
According to the program’s guidelines, “the U.S. considers for refugee
admission persons of special humanitarian concern who can establish
persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a
particular social group, or political opinion.” The legal basis of the
admissions program is the Refugee Act of 1980.
Because of the urgency of the problem in Macedonia, State Department
officials expect they will have to move the screening process along
quickly. Shortages of personnel in Europe may require some of the
interviewing to be conducted in the United States. Relocation of
displaced Kosovars will add to the Clinton administration’s estimated
78,000 refugees from other countries who will be resettled on American
soil this year.
According to statistics from the Bureau of Population, Refugees and
Migration, an average of 93,000 refugees have been relocated annually to
America during the last 24 years.
“In a typical refugee situation, a family comes in (to the U.S.), and
we provide money to humanitarian organizations to help them about $740
per person,” said a Bureau official.
Standard procedure for relocating refugees begins with the
Immigration and Naturalization Service, who interviews individuals
overseas, then the State Department transports them to America. Once
here, the Department of Health and Human Services works with them,
helping to arrange for housing, employment, and government benefits.
Government policy is to promote economic self-sufficiency “as quickly as
possible.”
A State Department official said some of the standard refugee
admission procedures would likely be waived for the Kosovars, because
their status is expected to be temporary.
Refugees do not have to return to their homelands if they do not
wish, because they have already cleared the screening process. Emigrants
are free to apply for American citizenship. This differs from foreigners
who seek political asylum, who can be denied.
Clinton administration officials have made it clear the relocation of
refugees is “temporary,” with Vice President Gore saying, “we anticipate
their return to Kosovo.”
Some foreign policy experts have doubts about such a prediction.
“There’s little possibility that even one of these people will
return,”
said Mark Krikorian, Executive Director of the Center for
Immigration Studies.
“It’s mendacity on the part of this administration,” he added. “It
provides cover for them against those who might object to resettlement.
However, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be doing it.”
“Most refugees hope they will go home someday,” agreed Ted Galen
Carpenter, Vice President for Defense and Foreign Policy Studies at the
Cato Institute . “But a good many of them won’t
be in any position to return.”
Both experts interviewed for this story believed that the United
States should be helping more than 20,000, but had different ideas about
doing so.
“I don’t think it should be a fixed number,” said Carpenter. “We have
the capacity to absorb many more than 20,000. Promoting the fiction of
returning to Kosovo retards the assimilation process.”
“We would get more bang for our buck if we built camps in Albania,
where they’re from,” countered Krikorian. “We’d be able to shelter a lot
more refugees effectively over there, than to bring 20,000 over here.”
However, both said admitting more refugees would look bad for the
Clinton administration. Doing so would demonstrate that Slobodan
Milosevic is achieving his goals of removing ethnic Albanians from
Kosovo, and that NATO airstrikes have been unsuccessful.
“If we admit more refugees, it’s a corollary to our admission of
defeat,” said Krikorian.
The end of Obama – thankfully
Jack Cashill