Welcome to Canada. The Chinese boy named Bian, 15 years old, walked into an immigration hearing room in British Columbia -- in handcuffs.
Nine other Chinese boys, some as young as 14 were also cuffed. The children were strip-searched.
They were treated like animals.
This after spending day after day, night after night, in appalling conditions on a decrepit ship in the Pacific Ocean.
Canada boasts about having "liberal" immigration policies.
But the handcuffed and strip-searched children reveal the real face of Canadian policy -- one of hard-hearted racism.
The anti-refugee racism is promoted all down the line.
Ross Dawson, the BC government's director of child protection, wrote to the children saying it was "in their best interests" to go back to China.
If the NDP government in the province had any principles, they would have this man fired.
"The guardian is saying, 'Go back to China,' said Kevin Doyle, a Victoria-based lawyer for some of the children. "But does he know what they will be going back to?"
Janet Dench, executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees, added, "We wonder if he [Dawson] is having difficulty in knowing what is in the best interest of the child."
The racism from the state is fuelling a racist backlash in the media. "Illegal aliens should be sent back" screams Diane Francis in the National Post.
Francis goes to such lengths to make her anti-immigrant case that she defends Paul Fromm.
Fromm is a known racist, a supporter of far-right and fascist causes.
He is running an Internet site promoting hate against the refugees.
But as far as Francis is concerned he is just a leader of a group of "concerned Canadians" who are speaking for the majority.
There is a direct link between this open anti-refugee racism, coming from the state, the media and the far right, and the rise in hate crimes in the country.
The "liberal" press would like us to believe that blows like the ones that fell on the heads of Silvain Miller and Jacob Lazar -- who were attacked by anti-semites outside a Synagogue in Toronto (see page two) -- originate in disrespectable, nazi back-rooms.
The truth is, they originate in the very respectable rooms of the media and the state.
We need more actions like the one organized in Work Point, British Columbia, where a group of anti-racists staged a demonstration to welcome the Chinese refugees.
These refugees are fleeing the terrible repression and poverty of their homeland. Unemployment in rural areas is 30%, in the cities 10%.
The total is between 150 million and 200 million unemployed -- the largest unemployed army in one country in world history.
And it is set to get "more recruits" as the Chinese government proceeds on a massive privatization campaign.
It is illegal in China even to belong to a self-help religious cult, let alone an independent trade union.
We can expect more people to flee these conditions.
We can expect more racist attacks from the likes of Fromm, Francis and immigration authorities.
We need to be prepared to organize on the ground demonstrations and meetings to tell the refugees, "You are welcome here."