Senate to Rescue Hmong From Terrorist Label
WASHINGTON — Hmong who fought for the United States in the Vietnam War are now finding they are defined as terrorists under a Homeland Security measure, the Real ID Act of 2004.
The Act broadened the definition of terrorist to inadvertently include Hmong, some of whom had taken up arms against the Communist Lao government, making them “terrorists.”
Under the Act, Hmong refugees have been denied entry into the United States and an opportunity to become U.S. citizens.
The Senate has passed an amendment to resolve the issue. The Bush administration opposed a similar amendment last year, but as of January, has backed efforts to remedy the problem. The House and Senate versions of the bill now must be combined and passed.
— Asian American Press
Millionaires Charged for Indonesian ‘Slaves’
CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y. — A millionaire couple accused of forcing Indonesian housekeepers to serve as their slaves in their Long Island mansion pleaded not guilty to conspiracy and other charges.
Varsha Mahender Sabhnani, 35, and her husband, Mahender Murlidhar Sabhnani, 51, appeared in federal court to face a superceding indictment. They remain free on $4.5 million bail while awaiting their Oct. 22 trial.
Varsha Sabhnani is originally from Indonesia, and her husband is from India; both are U.S. citizens.
Prosecutors have said the couple held two Indonesian housekeepers from 2002 to 2007 as virtual slaves, subjecting them to serious physical abuse and paying them no wages except for $100 a month sent to relatives abroad.
Through lawyers, the Sabhnanis have denied the charges.
Japanese Ams. Seek to Preserve WWII Camps
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — Japanese Americans who were imprisoned at Heart Mountain Relocation Center, and dozens of similar camps during World War II, do not want their forced relocation to be forgotten. And now they have an opportunity to share their thoughts on preserving the sites during a series of public hearings on a new $38 million federal grant program.
“The purpose of the grant program is to find the resources for local community groups to determine how they want their story told, what kind of legacy they want to leave, and then come in and seek federal funding,” said Gerald Yamada, national coordinator for the Japanese American National Heritage Coalition.
Last year, Yamada’s group lobbied the U.S. Congress to pass the grant program for the 10 major internment camps and 40 other sites related to Japanese relocation in 17 U.S. states.
President George W. Bush signed the bill in December, and Yamada expects lawmakers to approve funding next year.
Illegal Immigrants From India on the Rise
HOUSTON — The fastest-growing group of illegal immigrants in the United States doesn’t speak Spanish.
They typically aren’t found at day labor sites or streaming across the Southwest border into the U.S.
Instead, they’re here in America working in tech companies, small businesses, as engineers or other highly skilled jobs, and they’re coming from India.
The profile of the illegal immigrant may need to take on a slightly more South Asian persona, since a recent federal report revealed that India had the greatest percentage increase in unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. since 2000.
Illegal immigrants from India grew to 270,000 in 2006 from 120,000 in 2000, a 125% increase, according to a report late last month from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
Undocumented Indians, however, remain a small segment of the total estimated population of 11.6 million illegal immigrants in the U.S.
— Houston Chronicle
First Inhabitants: Japanese Fishermen?
The first inhabitants of North and South America could have been fishermen from Japan who traveled there in small boats, according to research in a recent edition of New Scientist magazine.
The work casts doubt on the traditional theory that the “first Americans” were hunters from Asia who traveled to the continent on foot, via the Bering ice bridge in Alaska some 13,500 years ago. Coastal researchers believe the seafarers could have arrived in the New World some time after 16,000 years ago, when the massive glaciers started to retreat from the outer northwest American coast.
The conventional theory is that hunters came into North America, much of which was covered in ice, from Siberia and made their way down the continent through a relatively narrow passage in the ice.
However, since the 1950s, there has been growing evidence that America might have been discovered by ancient ice age seafarers.
— Kyodo News
Asian Americans Shun Mental Health Care
Cultural barriers make Asian Americans less likely to seek help for emotional problems than whites, says a panel of experts at Alliant International University.
“The small amount of research that has been done on Asian and Pacific Islander Americans shows that they don’t use mental health services, and when they do, they often stop treatment before solving their problems,” said Dr. Tai Chang of the California School of Professional Psychology.
The U.S Surgeon General states that AAPIs have “extremely low utilization of mental health services relative to other U.S populations,” with 1 out of 2 having difficulty accessing mental health treatment because of language needs.
— Alliant International University
Among Asians, Filipino Criminals Top Alien Removals
LOS ANGELES — In the U.S., more criminal aliens are deported to the Philippines than to any other Asian country.
Among Asian countries, the Philippines was followed by China, 46; India, 41; Korea, 29; and Laos, 11.
Among other countries, Mexico has the largest number with 8,495 deportees, followed by El Salvador at 1,043.
On its Web site, the Office of Detention and Removal is tasked with removing all fugitive aliens in the United States as mandated by the landmark USA Patriot Act, passed after the terrorist attacks of 9/11.
— Balita News Service
Umpires Likely to Favor Pitchers of Same Ethnicity
Umpires for Major League Baseball are more likely to call strikes in favor of pitchers who are of the same race or ethnicity, according to new research conducted by the University of Texas at Austin.
In baseball, the umpire’s evaluation heavily influences the pitcher’s productivity and performance. During a regular game, the umpire calls about 75 pitches for each team. Throughout the season, they call about 400,000 pitches.
The researchers found if a pitcher shares the home plate umpire’s race or ethnicity, more strikes are called, and he improves his team’s chance of winning.
— Science Daily
OCA Welcomes New Arkansas Chapter
WASHINGTON — The Organization of Chinese Americans recently announced the formation of a new OCA chapter in Bentonville, Arkansas.
Bentonville, the home of Wal-Mart, boasts a fast-growing APA community.
From 2000 to 2005, the APA population in northwest Arkansas (where Bentonville is located) grew 12% annually.
The APA community also represents 7% of total growth in the region. There are also large APA communities in Little Rock and Fort Smith, Ark.
“We wanted to start an OCA chapter to serve the rapidly growing APA population in metropolitan areas in Arkansas,” said Ken Yeung, OCA–Arkansas chapter president, “Before we formed OCA–Arkansas, there was no broad-based secular APA organization in the area; there was no place for the APA community to gather.”
Marital Violence Among Asian American Couples
DAVIS, Calif. — Researchers have found that violence is more common among Asian American couples who report marital distress.
UC Davis psychology professor Nolan Zane and graduate student Manveen Dhindsa found that three other factors also stood out as significant risks for marital violence.
Independent of marital distress, violence was more likely to occur if a family lacked closeness or if a spouse suffered from an anxiety disorder or stress related to acculturation into American society.
The findings stem from an analysis of the largest nationally representative survey to explore mental health problems in Asian Americans.
“These results are quite important as they highlight that factors beyond marital distress can strongly increase chances for abuse,” Zane said. “Such information can be used to enhance therapy for batterers, as clinicians can go beyond remedying marital distress and focus on other psychological problems found to significantly impact marital abuse.”
— Medical News Today