Links
National Immigrant Justice Center
The National Immigrant Justice Center, a program of Heartland Alliance for Human Needs & Human Rights, provides direct legal services to and advocates for low-income and impoverished immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers. The Center's Children's Project employs a Managing Attorney, Staff Attorney and Paralegal who recruit, train and mentor pro bono attorneys who represent unaccompanied children.
www.immigrantjustice.org
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees was established on December 14, 1950 by the United Nations General Assembly. The agency is mandated to lead and coordinate international action to protect refugees and resolve refugee problems worldwide. Its primary purpose is to safeguard the rights and well-being of refugees. It strives to ensure that everyone can exercise the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another State, with the option to return home voluntarily, integrate locally or to resettle in a third country.
www.unhcr.org
National Center for Refugee and Immigrant Children
The National Center for Refugee and Immigrant Children coordinates pro bono legal services for unaccompanied children released from detention in the United States.
www.refugees.org
American Bar Association Commission on Immigration
The Commission directs American Bar Association efforts to ensure fair and unbiased treatment, and full due process rights, for immigrants and refugees within the United States.
www.abanet.org/publicserv/immigration
Harvard University Committee on Human Rights Studies
Jacqueline Bhabha has released a report on the treatment of unaccompanied and separated immigrant and refugee children titled "Seeking Asylum Alone."
www.humanrights.harvard.edu/conference/
Seeking_Asylum_Alone_US_Report.pdf
asylumlaw.org
Free website run by an international consortium of agencies that help asylum seekers in Australia, Canada, the United States, and several countries in Europe.
www.asylumlaw.org
Women’s Commission for Refugee Women and Children
The Women's Commission is an expert resource and advocacy organization that monitors the care and protection of refugee women and children. It speaks out on issues of concern to refugee and displaced women, children and adolescents, who have a critical perspective in bringing about change but often do not have access to governments and policy makers.
www.womenscommission.org
National Immigration Forum
The National Immigration Forum advocates and builds support for public policies that welcome immigrants and refugees and are fair and supportive to newcomers in the United States.
www.immigrationforum.org
Vera Institute of Justice
The Vera Institute of Justice works closely with leaders in government and civil society to improve the services people rely on for safety and justice. The Vera Institute’s Unaccompanied Children Project is working to build organizational capacity to provide pro bono legal services in eight sites around the country.
www.vera.org
Resources
ABA Standards for the Custody, Placement and Care
Legal Representation and Adjudication of Unaccompanied Alien Children in the United States
www.abanet.org/publicserv/immigration/home.html
Convention on the Rights of the Child
www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/k2crc.htm
UNHCR Guidelines on Policies and Procedures in Dealing with Unaccompanied Children Seeking Asylum
www.unhcr.org/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/publ/opendoc.pdf?tbl=PUBL&id=3d4f91cf4
www.unhcr.org
UNHCR Guidelines on Formal Determination of the Best Interests of the Child
UNHCR Guidelines on Formal Determination of the Best Interests of the Child
1951 Geneva Refugee Convention
1951 Geneva Refugee Convention
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Books/Articles
Enrique's Journey; The Story of a Boy's Dangerous Odyssey to Reunite with his Mother, by Sonia Nazario
Enrique's Journey
La Travesia de Enrique
The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: a Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures, by Anne Fadiman
The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down
The Devil's Highway: A True Story, by Luis Alberto Urrea
The Devil's Highway : A True Story
By the Lake of Sleeping Children, by Luis Alberto Urrea
By the Lake of Sleeping Children
The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver
The Dew Breaker, by Edwidge Danticat
Small Island: A Novel, by Andrea Levy
When the Emperor Was Divine, by Julie Otsuka
The Hummingbird's Daughter, by Luis Alberto Urrea
The Smugglers Due, by Alex Kotlowitz, New York Times Magazine
June 11, 2006Brother, I'm Dying, by Edwidge Danticat
The Namesake, by Jhumpa Lahiri
The Inheritance of Loss, by Kiran Desai
Interpreter of Maladies, by Jhumpa Lahiri
Movies
Born Into Brothels
Two documentary filmmakers chronicle their time in Sonagchi, Calcutta and the relationships they developed with children of prostitutes who work the city's notorious red light district.
Born into Brothels (2003)
Maria Full of Grace
A pregnant Colombian teenager becomes a drug mule to make some desperately needed money for her family.
Maria Full of Grace (2003)
Hotel Rwanda
Don Cheadle stars in the true-life story of Paul Rusesabagina, a hotel manager who housed over a thousand Tutsis refugees during their struggle against the Hutu militia in Rwanda.
Hotel Rwanda (2005)
Human Commodity
After being orphaned in Morocco, Fanny Clonch was trapped in households where she was nothing more than a commodity. The story of her grandmother, who as a child had been sold into slavery and eventually escaped, inspired Fanny to find a way out. Fanny’s own account tells the story of so many unaccompanied immigrant children who find themselves alone in the United States.
Reported and co-produced by Alex Kotlowitz and edited and co-produced by Amy Dorn. [12:46 min.]
Exodus of One, by Alex Kotlowitz for
This American Life
Just three years old, Georgia was caught by immigration officials when a Milwaukee woman brought her into the country illegally from Jamaica. She ended up at a residential shelter in Chicago. No one knew much about Georgia—where she was from in Jamaica, who her parents were, or how she ended up with this woman from Milwaukee. After six months, a local reporter found her mother in Jamaica, so she was sent back—to the same woman who gave her up. While it seemed like the obvious choice, it worried those who had taken care of her. What does it mean to send a child back to a parent who is willing to give her away? Five years later, reporter Alex Kotlowitz traveled to Jamaica to find out what happened to Georgia. [42 min.]
(Part 1)
(Part 2)
at the University of Chicago
6020 South University Avenue
Room K212
Chicago, IL 60637
773 702-0349
info@immigrantchildadvocacy.org
© 2006 Immigrant Child Advocacy Center.
All rights reserved.
Web design:
Axie Breen and Brian Robinson
Home page main photo by Tony Armour.
All others by Kathy Richland Pick.