Certification of compliance with the Hague Adoption Convention and the Intercountry Adoption Act of
2000 is required under the procedures for Hague Convention adoptee cases. Since prospective adoptive parents cannot complete the immigration process for an adopted child from Cambodia at this time, they are strongly urged not to file Form I-800A, Application for Determination of Suitability to Adopt a Child from a Convention Country, identifying Cambodia as the country from which they seek to adopt.

The Hague Adoption Convention entered into force for the United States on April 1, 2008. The Hague
Adoption Convention provides important safeguards to protect the welfare of children, birth parent(s) and adoptive parent(s) engaged in intercountry adoptions. Effective April 1, 2008, new intercountry
adoptions between the United States and other Hague Convention countries must comply with the Hague Adoption Convention standards. Cambodia also ratified the Hague Adoption Convention in 2007.

Before the United States and Cambodia ratified the Hague Adoption Convention, Cambodian intercountry adoption cases were processed on USCIS Forms I-600A, Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition, and I-600, Petition to Classify Orphan as an Immediate Relative. However, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, USCIS’ legacy agency, suspended U.S. orphan visa petition processing in Cambodia on Dec. 21, 2001 due to fraud, irregularities, and allegations of child-buying in the Cambodian adoption process. Because these concerns persist, DOS has determined it is not able to issue Hague Adoption Certificates or Hague Custody Declarations in Cambodia. It is important to note that this Cambodian suspension remains in effect for all Form I-600 (orphan) petitions filed before April 1, 2008.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested 11 individuals in six states Wednesday as part of an investigation into suspected visa and mail fraud.  The alledged H-1B fraud scheme was carried out in Iowa, California, Massachusetts, Texas,Pennsylvania, Kentucky and New Jersey.

ESTA is a web-based system that determines the preliminary eligibility of visotrs to travel under the VWP prior to boarding a flight or ship to the United States.  Visitors may apply for travel authorization on the ESTA website.  DHS has stated it will take a reasonable approach to travellers who have not obtainied an approved travel authorization through ESTA, but warns these travelers will be subject to delays or may be denied boarding or admission at a U.S. port of entry.

The VWP allows eligible citizens or nationals of designated countries to enter the United States for tourism or business for stays of 90 days or less without obtainig a visa.  Nationals or citizens of the following countries are currently eligible to travel to the United States under the VWP:

Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brunei, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany,Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.

The approved documents include: passport; passport card; a NEXUS, SENTRI or FAST trusted traveler program card; or a state- or province-issued enhanced driver’s license. Travelers under age 16 need only to present a birth certificate or alternate proof of citizens. A list of acceptable documents and how to apply for them is available at GetYouHome.gov.

NEXUS is a CBP-Canada Border Services Agency program that both governments implemented to attempt to simplfiy the entry process for pre-approved, low-risk travellers.

SENTRI is a land-border crossing program that provides expedited Customs and Border Patrol processing for low-risk, pre-approved travelers along the U.S./Mexico border.

FAST (Free and Secure Trade) program is available to commercial drivers crossing the northern and southern borders.

Travelers without the proper travel docuemnts may face long delays.

In May, the show’s producer, Arnold Shapiro told the Hollywood Reporter, “I love investigative journalism, but that’s not what we’re doing” and further unabasedly admitted the show was meant to portray DHS in a positive light.   “It doesn’t have a political point of view,” Shapiro said. “It’s not meant to show the (department) higher-ups …. just the average men and women on the front lines protecting our country from various things illegal and dangerous,”  as if the mere peon agents and officers were not entitled to have a policital view.

Althought the show does not uncover any terrorist plots, a young Swedish woman is exposed as having the intention to enter the United States without a work visa to find a job as a belly dancer and is sent home.  The series also shows agents drawing guns on a man trying to drive across the U.S.-Mexico border with his family, terrifying his wife and young children, until agents discover it’s a case of mistaken identity.

Although the show does feature agents stopping individuals from entering the United States with drugs, is this propoganda television really the media forum this country needs as we embark on a chance for the United States to change how we are perceived by the world with a new President-elect?

This series airs the same week that a U.S. resident was awarded $240,000 in compensatory damages after being order by Jet Blue to cover up his T-shirt with Aarabic words before boarding the flight.  The young man was apprehended as he waited to board a JetBlue flight from New York to Oakland, California, and told to remove his shirt, which had written on it in Arabic: “We will not be silent.”  He was told other passengers felt uncomfortable because an Arabic-inscribed T-shirt in an airport was like “wearing a T-shirt at a bank stating, I am a robber.” http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090106/ts_alt_afp/ustransportairsecuritymuslimsrights_090106002219

An applicant may attempt to walk into an Application Support Center and have biometrics taken by explaining the urgent need to depart (i.e., a letter from the employer) Ii the applicant receives a biometrics appointment notice and must depart before that date. The applicant may depart and return to the U.S. later to attend the appointment. If the ASC does not comply with a walk-in request, or if the applicant does not receive the biometrics notice until after he or she has departed, then he or she must attempt to reschedule the biometrics appointment by notifying the ASC, which will in turn notify the NSC. The request for reschedule should clearly indicate the dates requested to have the biometrics taken, however the NSC’s scheduling system does not allow the appointment to be made more than 30 days prior to the requested appointment date.

by Bob Braun/Star-Ledger Columnist

Wednesday December 24, 2008, 6:18 PM

It was barely light a few weeks ago when the man and his wife came to Newark, anticipating a gift this Christmas.

He had just returned 12 hours earlier from his second tour of duty in Iraq and carried with him orders to return before New Year’s Day. That gave him less than a month to spend with his wife and son — but this trip to the federal building was the first thing he wanted to do.

The gift really had nothing to do with Christmas. The gift was U.S. citizenship.

Matt Rainey/The Star-LedgerAhmed Weisi, pictured here in Whitehouse Station, is an Iraqi whose application for citizenship was denied because he was out of the country for more than 6 months. He was out of the country for that time–6 months and one day–working for the US Army in Iraq as a translator helping to interrogate terrorists.

“I was so excited that, finally, I would get it,” recalled Ahmed Weisi. What he was expecting Dec. 2 was approval of his application for citizenship.

The couple, who live in Whitehouse Station, waited until it was their turn to present his paperwork, including his latest orders.

The woman behind the window tapped the keys on her computer, then looked back at Joan and Ahmed.

“But your application was denied,” she said.

“What do you mean?” asked Ahmed Weisi.

“You should have received a letter,” she said.

“I received no letter,” he said, looking at Joan. She shook her head.

Two hours later, angry and dejected, they left the federal building with the letter. It read his application had been denied because he had overstayed a six-month trip outside the U.S. and had been presumed to have abandoned his application.

Overstayed — by one day.

“I am convinced it was because of my name,” said Weisi. “It’s an Arab name, a Muslim name.”

Ahmed, who was born in Iraq, is neither Arab nor Muslim. He is a Kurd and a citizen of Austria. While his family ancestry includes virtually every major religion, he doesn’t want to describe his religious lineage too closely for fear relatives in Iraq will be persecuted.

When he and Joan arrived at their 11-acre farm that day, she already had decorated the house for Christmas — a tree, hundreds of Santa Claus figures, throw pillows embroidered with “Joyeux Noel” and “Merry Christmas.”

“I love Christmas,” said Ahmed. “It’s what we celebrate — but Joan overdoes it with Santa Claus statues. It takes a day to put them up and another to take them down.”

His lawyer, Audrey Allen of Conshohocken, Pa., said her client’s application was denied because of what she says was an incorrect reading of rules that invalidate requests for citizenship if the applicant spends more than six months out of the country.

“It was one day,” said Allen, “and he was out of the country helping to protect the lives of Americans. That regulation is never enforced like that.”

Weisi is not a soldier, although he tried to enlist after 9/11. At 51, he was too old. He then tried to join Kurdish and anti-Saddam Iraqi forces after the American invasion in 2003. Again he was rebuffed because of his age.

“I know what terrorism is,” said Weisi. “It’s what happened to my family for years. It wasn’t new to me.”

Finally, in 2005, Weisi, who owned a small trucking business as well as a sheep farm, was hired as an interpreter for the Defense Department. Educated at the University of Vienna, he can speak Kurdish, Arabic, Farsi, Turkmen, German and English.

He trained with soldiers at Fort Benning, Ga., and works two six-month stints a year as a translator for interrogators at detention camps. As an interpreter, Weisi has security clearance and access to sensitive information. That’s nothing new — because he needed security clearance from Homeland Security so his trucking company could haul hazardous-waste materials on interstate highways.

Weisi said problems getting military flights out of Iraq caused a delay getting home from one tour last May — a delay that got him back to the United States one day after the six-month period cited in federal regulations.

Weisi said he left Iraq 40 years ago to study in Vienna. He came to the U.S. in 1986, received permanent resident status eight years ago and applied for citizenship. He should have become a citizen in 120 days; instead, his application was inexplicably delayed for two years.

“This is my country,” he said. “I want to be a citizen.”

His wife, Joan Pierson Weisi, is a supervisor with the state Division of Youth and Family Services. Their son, Marc, is a junior at the Stevens Institute of Technology.

On Tuesday morning, someone who heard his story called the Department of Homeland Security, and while that person got no direct response, Weisi was called by immigration officials later in the day and asked to come in.

By the time he got there it was nearly dark, federal offices were closed, but the Citizenship and Immigration Services office was kept open just for him.

He and his wife were brought into the great hall where crowds of new citizens are sworn in.

“The problem has been corrected,” someone told him. And swore him in. The only new citizen in the big room.

David Santos, a spokesman for Homeland Security, said there had been a problem in communication and Weisi’s application should never have been denied.

“But it’s all good now,” Santos said. “He’s a citizen.”

Weisi said he was angered by what he termed the “incompetence” of the agency and vowed, now that he is a citizen, to campaign for changes.

“But I am happy and proud finally to be an American. It’s a great gift for Christmas.”

As published in The Star Ledger on December 25, 2008.