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US-AGO’s help sought for NMI’s stateless kids
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Posted on Apr 27 2001
The possibility that about 350 stateless children in the Commonwealth will be granted citizenship runs high as matters were elevated to the United States Department of Justice.
After the recently concluded meeting with Intergovernmental Affairs Office representative Timothy Quinn, House Speaker Benigno R. Fitial sought the assistance of US Attorney General John D. Ashcroft on the said matter.
The House speaker urged the justice official to take the immigration and citizenship issue of more than 350 Northern Marianas residents into serious consideration.
“We need your assistance to resolve the important immigration and citizenship issue affecting roughly 300 residents in the CNMI,” said Mr. Fitial in a letter to the attorney general.
The speaker explained that despite covenant agreement reached between the CNMI and the US in 1978 and the conferment of Presidential Proclamation No. 5564 in 1986 by then US Pres. Ronald Reagan, the 350 children born in Northern Marianas were not accorded citizenship.
These children were born overseas by parents who are legal aliens working in the CNMI between 1978 and 1986. Even today, these children are not citizens of any country, said the House speaker.
“A small finite group of young adults has grown up without citizenship and the consequence of this oversight are only now being fully realized,” the letter reads.
Further, these young adults are having difficulty to travel off-island on school-sponsored trips and facing problems in the immigration when entering the CNMI.
“These children could become citizens of the country in which their parents are citizens, but they would like to become US citizens and do not want to take any actions that would jeopardize their ability to do so,” Mr. Fitial further averred.
Because of these consequences, the legislator urged the Justice department to act on the said case and correct the oversight taken for granted for a long time.
The speaker is upbeat that the issue will be seriously looked into by the AG office now that the case has been elevated to higher agency. He added that all avenues are being looked into to resolve the case through the assistance of other national leaders in US mainland. (EGA)
