One week after US President Donald Trump allegedly referred to African nations and Haiti as "shithole countries", the US has revoked Belize's eligibility for workers visas. On Tuesday, the Federal Register published a decision of the Department of Homeland Security to remove Belize, Haiti and Samoa from the list of counties whose citizens can get an H2 or workers visa.
Now, these are not the regular visitors or tourist visas, known as B-1 and B-2 visas. The H2 visa allows US businesses to bring in workers from other countries: H-2A is for agriculture and the H-2B is for non-agricultural seasonal work in places such as resorts.
Last year, the US Embassy in Belmopan issued 299 of those H-2 visas to Belizeans.
And the reason? Well, officially, the Federal Register says, "Belize is listed on the U.S. Department of State's 2017 Trafficking in Persons Report as a Tier 3'' country. Tier 3'' means the country does not fully meet the Trafficking Victims Protection Act's minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making significant efforts to do so."
Attorney General Mike Peyreffite had a thing or two to say about that. He attended a Human Trafficking seminar in late 2017 to try and get Belize off that odious Tier 3 list. He spoke with us today and made it clear that he's disappointed by the temporary ban::
Hon. Michael Peyrefitte - Attorney General
"I was only just now made aware of the report. I noticed that they only mentioned we had human trafficking issues. My guess - it stems from the fact that we were - because of last year's, somehow - put on tier 3, when it comes to human trafficking, which is not a good place to be in terms of ranking of human trafficking. And so, I guess, on that basis, they are limiting people from Belize to go to the US. I find it kind of strange the tier 3 thing because many nations have similar arrest records and conviction rates, and detention records as Belize, but yet, they're on tier one. So, I don't know what the real issue is as to why we are on tier 3. The second thing is that I find it very perplexing that the US would take a position to restrict people coming into their country like that because I know for sure that they always pressure us. They always pressure our immigration department to accept people from any and everywhere. So, why don't they accept people the way they want Belize to accept people from Central America and other countries. So, while it is what it is, it's their country. They allow who they want in their country, but I have to say that it is cowardly and very hypocritical to say the least. The tier 3 ranking comes from results and studies done in 2016, and that's what created the tier 3 ranking. There will be another ranking assessment in the coming month or 2. And, that will be determined by what their investigations reveal as to what happened in 2017. So, the meeting I had in DC with the State Department and with the Attorney General's office had nothing to do with our activity since then, or what were trying to do up until this point. We have done several things that were required and suggested a consultant specially assigned to us. We have assigned a police unit to Human Trafficking, a special Supreme Court judge, a special magistrate, members in the Attorney General's Ministry and a specialize prosecutor. So, many of the things that were required for the powers that be to indicated to that we are complying with human trafficking efforts have been. So, it will be interesting to see, given what we have done so far, what will be done. So, it will be interesting to see, given what we have done so far, what will be the ranking for 2017, since I've taken office, and since we've been working together with the Human Development Ministry to see what will be the result of all of that. Indeed, it will be very disappointing if given all the efforts we're making, and given all the commitments we've made, that we remain at tier 3 at the next ranking session."
The ban lasts for a year, and eligibility for these H-2 visas will be reviewed again in January 2019.
Belize and Venezuela re the only countries in this hemisphere on the Tier 3 list. It also includes mainland China and Russia.
Seasoned observers of diplomatic gamesmanship say that they aren't surprised that this slight comes right after Belize voted in favour of the UN Resolution challenging the US for moving its Israeli Embassy to Jerusalem.
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