Posts tagged : "Immigration"

Kourosh Ziabari - Asia Times: As the world is engrossed in the news around the Covid-19 crisis and the epoch-making US presidential contest, the tragic deaths of four Kurdish Iranian migrants in the English Channel off the north coast of France has filled many with sorrow, throwing the plight of Iranian refugees and asylum-seekers into the spotlight. Rasoul Iran-Nejad and Shiva Mohammad Panahi, both 35, and their children Anita and Armin, aged nine and six, were crossing from France to the UK on October 27 when their boat capsized. They died, and the couple’s 15-month-old son Artin is missing. British media reported that the family had paid migrant smugglers a huge sum to take them to the UK shores by boat. They sold all of...

Kourosh Ziabari - ODVV: The United States is a diverse and multicultural society, accommodating people coming from a range of racial, cultural, religious and national backgrounds. In fact, multiculturalism is believed to be a historical tradition in the United States, and the blending of cultures and ethnic groups in America since it was discovered by the Europeans in the 17th and 18th centuries, has led to the country to become known as a “melting pot.” Americans see advantages in their country’s growing demographic diversity. According to a Pew Research Center study carried out in 2019, a majority of Americans, namely 57% of them, believe the fact that there’s a diverse composition of people from different ethnic and...

Kourosh Ziabari - Fair Observer: The coming to power of Donald Trump has reignited the debate on immigration and multiculturalism in the United States. His stringent policies and the efforts to slash both legal and illegal immigration to the US have been at the forefront of controversy since he took office in January 2017, leading some to assert that Trump is heading “the most immigration-restrictive administration since the 1920s.” Immigration and race relations are expected to be major areas of focus in the 2020 election, once again highlighting a longstanding challenge the United States has been grappling with. In September 2019, the State Department announced that the US will only admit up to 18,000 refugees in the next...

Kourosh Ziabari - Fair Observer: Bordered by China to the north and India to the west, Southeast Asia is home to some of the world’s most promising economies, some of the biggest shipping trade routes and a young, digitally-connected population. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries are said to represent the greatest opportunity for fintech development. The region is urbanizing at a remarkable pace, with cities growing five times faster than in other parts of the world. Geopolitically and economically, Southeast Asia is of high importance to the European Union and the United States as an investment hotbed and trading partner that cannot be ignored. A recent report by the Global Impact Investing Network found...

Kourosh Ziabari - Fair Observer: Since coming to office, President Donald Trump has tightened US immigration policies, both legal and illegal. His policies follow economic nationalism and are part of his “America First” slogan, aimed at protecting American workers and industries. In 2017, Trump banned immigration from several Muslim-majority countries and ordered the building of a separation wall along the US border with Mexico, from which a large number of illegal immigrants flock to the United States. The Trump administration also enacted a policy that permitted the government to take thousands of illegal migrant children from their parents at US ports of entry and place them in cage-like detention centers. On several...

Kourosh Ziabari - Fair Observer: A landlocked country, Hungary is the 11th most popular tourist destination in Europe, according to the UN World Tourism Organization. Aside from being a well-liked tourism hub, Hungary is one of the main arrival points of migrants and refugees fleeing conflicts. Although Hungary functions as a transit, source and destination country of global migration, the government has made it clear to asylum-seekers: they are not welcome. The migration policies of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s far-right government have been so hard-hitting that they are widely criticized even by Hungary’s close allies in the European Union. Orbán’s Fidesz party currently maintains a two-thirds majority in parliament...

Kourosh Ziabari - CFJ: Steve Adler is the Mayor of Austin, Texas. He is Jewish but his advocacy for the rights of Muslims and immigrants and his vocal resistance against the exclusion of minorities from important social and political decision-makings have made him a popular politician and lawyer nationally and internationally. He has been a practicing attorney in Austin in the areas of eminent domain and civil rights for some 35 years. A noted member of Democratic Party, Mayor Adler was named by the Foreign Policy magazine as one of the top 100 global thinkers in 2017. I did a brief interview with Steve Adler to ask him questions about President Donald Trump's Muslim ban and how immigrants and minorities are doing these days in...