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Thousands Across the Nation Protest INS Special Registration

Top to bottom: Rev. Cecil Williams (top) and Jeff Adachi (middle) address the crowd; Hundreds of protestors convened on the INS offices in San Francisco, calling for an end to the “disappearances.” Photos by Brian Kluepfel.

Fewer men detained this time around

By Brian Kluepfel | Special to AsianWeek

“INS director David Stills, how many cells will you fill?” A crowd that numbered in the hundreds filled the four corners near the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Services’ regional office in downtown San Francisco on Jan. 10. Fears of massive arrests did not materialize during the second phase of a post-Sept. 11 crackdown that required thousands of men from mostly Arab or Muslim countries to register with U.S. immigration authorities.

Chants in English and Spanish filled the air as well-known progressive speakers from the Bay Area addressed the crowd. Although many different political groups distributed literature, a sense of common purpose prevailed: to remind America that the Bush administration’s foreign and domestic policy is creating more fear and terror than that which it purports to halt.

There was also a current of historical continuity to the rally: a Muslim speaker reminded the crowd that Queen Isabella banned people of the Islamic faith from settling Spain’s new colonies as early as 1531. There were reminders of more recent state-sponsored scapegoating, as well.

Protestors in the Bay Area joined thousands in major metropolitan areas across the nation who held peaceful protests to call attention to the same issues.

Few problems were reported Jan. 10, a marked change from last month, when some 400 people were arrested or detained after the first registration deadline. Lawyers and immigrant advocates said those arrests — mostly in Southern California — may have caused many to stay away and not comply with the deadline.

“They are alienating the people who can help them the most in this war on terrorism,” said Salam Al-Marayati, national director of the Muslim Public Affairs Council.

Preliminary numbers showed more than 124 foreigners with suspected visa violations were arrested across the country during the Jan. 10 period, said Jorge Martinez, a Justice Department spokesman.

Immigration officials had said earlier that about 7,200 men and boys aged 16 and older from 13 countries were expected to be photographed, fingerprinted and interviewed by the end of the day at Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) offices nationwide.

Rakya Ahmed arrived at the San Francisco INS office with an 18-year-old friend who came from Yemen on a tourist visa that expired five months ago.

“We don’t know what they are going to do with him,” Ahmed said. “I expect anything after what happened after Sept. 11. Nobody feels safe here.”

The majority of those arrested in California have been released on bail but activists said the names and whereabouts of dozens more remained unclear.

In all, some 24,200 men and boys aged 16 and older from a total of 20 countries are required to visit local INS offices by next month.

Around 3,000 visitors from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Sudan and Syria were required to register by Dec. 16. Another 7,200 men from Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Eritrea, Lebanon, Morocco, North Korea, Oman, Qatar, Somalia, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen had to register by Friday. An estimated 14,000 visitors from Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have until Feb. 21.

In San Francisco, the Blue Triangle Network, a Dearborn, Mich.-based organization, distributed blue paper triangles imprinted with the names of Arab Americans who have been detained without trial since Sept. 11, 2001 — a visual reminder of the pink, red and green triangles, as well as the yellow stars, that identified various enemies of the state in Nazi Germany. The triangles identified the detainees as “disappeared”; invoking the nomenclature of Pinochet and South America’s right wing.

“We’re saying that we know who these people are, that they are human beings and they are our brothers,” said one member of the Blue Triangle Network. “We’re not going to let them disappear silently — we’re going to continue to ask questions.”

Of course, California has a recent history of political and ethnic scapegoating, and several persons of Japanese descent whose relatives were sent to American internment camps during World War II were present. Reverend Cecil Williams of Glide Memorial Church was among the speakers, accompanied by his wife Janice Mirikitani, who remembers a childhood behind barbed wire.

“We stand with our Muslim brothers and sisters,” said Williams, “as we will always stand with people who are excluded.” He mentioned the Japanese Americans who were stripped of their property and imprisoned during World War II, and said that any American with “any sense of decency” should be indignant with the recent actions of the INS. “We must always have a cadre of people who will stand up and say ‘no, no, no!’” said Williams, and the crowd joined his chant.

San Francisco public defender Jeff Adachi also spoke to the internment camp legacy. “I’m proud to be here to protest the basic rollback in civil and human rights since 9/11,” he said. “I never understood how my parents and grandparents could be interned [until now]. Our greatest enemy is our own inaction,” he concluded.

The crowd was energized by the fact that Cecil Williams and several other delegates from the rally, including representatives of the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Lawyers Guild and the Council on American Islamic Relations, actually secured a meeting with INS regional director David Stills. At the same time, attendees were angered to learn that perhaps as many as a dozen registrants at the Washington Street offices had been detained that very day.

Rula Khalafawi of ADC/Global Exchange addressed a basic reason for gathering outside the INS office. “Lawyers are here tracking the people going in, and seeing who gets out,” she said.

A speaker for Filipinos for Global Justice, could barely contain her anger at the proceedings. She had a friend detained earlier in the INS registration process, which began in mid-December. “We [immigrants] come here to help build the empire, and they send us home in chains!” she said. “We come here for a better life, and this is how they treat us?”

As the crowd thinned out, protesters continued to chant “Stop the war at home, stop the war abroad!” Flyers and posters reminded rally attendees that the biggest antiwar protest yet will be held on Jan. 18, the Saturday closest to Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday. As troops arrive in the Persian Gulf and the drums of war sound louder, the movement against the Bush administration is gathering force.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.