If this is the way they treat tourists, it's hardly surprising that some of them treat real prisoners even worse:
US claps British tourists in irons
The Foreign Office is investigating a surge in complaints about the heavy-handed treatment of British visitors to America by US immigration officers.
Tourists and business travellers have been detained for hours — sometimes in handcuffs or leg chains — and then denied entry into the country for minor transgressions, some of which have turned out to be unfounded.
Some have been deported after being falsely accused of having terrorist links. Dozens of other visitors have complained about aggressive behaviour from airport officials.
A security crackdown in the wake of the September 11 atrocities in 2001 has led to a general rise in the number of complaints about US immigration, but last week the Foreign Office said it had been contacted by about 100 concerned Britons in the past 12 months.
A number of British travellers who claim to have been mistreated have raised their concerns with The Sunday Times.
Savinder Bual, 28, from Merton, south London, flew to America at the end of March to make an educational film. On arriving at New York’s JFK airport, she was separated from her colleagues and quizzed by an immigration officer about a trip to San Francisco she had made in 1996.
“He asked me how long I had been in San Francisco that time and I explained that I had stayed three months in my university holidays,” said Bual.
“Then he said, ‘You do know how many days are in a month? A waiver is only for 90 days and you stayed three months.’ He seemed very smug that he had actually found something to pin on me.”
The officer claimed Bual had overstayed by four days and ignored the fact that she had visited America again in 1998 without the issue being raised. Her feet were shackled and she was held in a detention room overnight.
The humiliating experience reduced Bual to tears and she was deported 12 hours after her arrival in New York. But she has since discovered from an old diary that she had not overstayed in 1996. “I was shocked to think this goes on and I hope that the Americans realise they cannot treat people like this,” she said.
Another victim is Neil Forrester, 33, chief technical officer of an IT firm in Brighton. He was held by immigration officers at Los Angeles airport in February 2003.
Forrester, who was travelling with his daughter and pregnant wife, had his passport stolen during a visit to America in 1996 which meant that the immigration services had no record of him leaving the country on that occasion.
Accused of overstaying, Forrester was handcuffed in front of his family and led to a detention room where he was photographed, fingerprinted and body-searched. He was not allowed to call his wife or a lawyer and was deported after 24 hours. He is now banned from entering America for 10 years.
“This is a real problem as my wife and daughter are both US citizens and I can’t visit our family over there,” he said.
British citizens of Asian origin, particularly Muslims, appear to have been affected the most by the security clampdown. Adam Riaz Khan, 24, from Enfield, north London, was detained in February at Atlanta airport while in transit from Mexico to Britain.
“They asked whether I had been to Iraq, Iran, Somalia or Afghanistan, and when they found the Koran in my bag I could see they thought they were on to something,” he said. “They insisted that Bin Laden was my uncle and asked me if I thought America should be an Islamic state.”
Riaz Khan, who had been on holiday in Mexico for a month, was also asked if he knew how to make bombs. He was deported to London after being questioned for seven hours.
The Foreign Office says it is seeking an explanation from the US authorities about each complaint. British officials and their counterparts from other European Union countries have also jointly raised concerns “at various levels” in America.
“We take seriously complaints from British nationals about treatment they have received from American immigration,” a spokesman said. “But the Americans decide their policy.” Some 4m Britons visit the US each year.
The US Department of Homeland Security, which is responsible for immigration, said its officers were fair and professional and would correct any errors they had made.
(From today's Sunday Times)
Land of the what......?
Last edited by BEagle; 16th May 2004 at 12:37.