Trump’s immigration order leads to chaos, protests

Washington, Jan 30 (IANS) US President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily prohibiting entry into the country for migrants from seven Muslim-majority countries and refugees from around the world led to confusion, angst and a wave of protests across the country.

World leaders and prominent figures blasted Trump's travel ban as divisive, illegal, insulting and discriminatory.

Trump signed an executive order Friday barring citizens from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Libya, Somalia and Sudan from entering the country for 90 days and also suspended the admission of all refugees for 120 days.

The order bans entry of those fleeing from war-torn Syria indefinitely.

While many countries lambasted the ban, Muslim-majority nations not on the blacklist have remained largely silent. Australia, which has implemented hardline policies against refugees, was one of the few nations to voice support for the ban.

The ban is "not justified" and "supports the terrorists and sows divisions among people," Yemen's Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Affairs Minister Abdel-Malak al-Mekhlafi posted on Twitter.

The Sudanese Foreign Affairs Ministry in a statement called on Washington to remove Sudan from the US list of states that sponsor terrorism.

Iran called Trump's immigration order "insulting" and a "gift to extremists" and said it will also take "reciprocal measures in order to safeguard the rights of its citizens.

British Prime Minister Theresa May also put out a statement saying her government did "not agree" with it, but said immigration was "a matter for the government of the US."

A petition on the UK Government and Parliament website to prevent Trump from making a state visit to the UK passed the one million mark on Monday morning.

Closer to home, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that refugees fleeing persecution, terror and war were welcome in Canada.

Germany, France, Turkey, the Netherlands and New Zealand also condemned the ban. The United Nations' High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein denounced the move as illegal and mean-spirited.

Pakistan, whose visa seekers have been put on "extreme vetting" under US President Donald Trump's new administration, on Monday said the new policy will affect international unity against terrorism.

However, Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull became one of the few leaders to openly show support for the ban. "It is vital that every nation is able to control who comes across its borders," he said.

Raucous protests erupted at US airport terminals from coast to coast. Tens of thousands of people protested outside the gates of the White House, in Boston's Copley Square and in New York's Battery Park, with its view over the Statue of Liberty, the Washington Post reported.

Demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports.

The protesters outside the White House pushed on, wielding poster boards with messages such as "Islamophobia is un-American" and "Dissent is patriotic," chanting "No justice! No peace!" and singing renditions of "This Land is Your Land."

And in airports from Baltimore to Bangor, from Dallas to Denver, shouts of "Let them go!" and "Let them in!" reverberated Sunday. In many cities, demonstrators invoked the same chant: "No hate, no fear. Refugees are welcome here."

Scenes of relief, anxiety and sorrow played out around the globe.

Trump issued a statement late Sunday that offered little clarity, even as he defended his executive order as necessary to protect the United States from terrorism.

"To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," Trump said in the statement. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe."

Still, barely 48 hours after Trump issued his order, confusion reigned over its reach and its implementation, said the report.

Even as the President and other top advisers defended the ban, some Trump officials appeared on Sunday to walk back one of the most controversial elements of the action: its impact on green card holders, who are permanent legal residents of the United States.

"As far as green card holders going forward, it doesn't affect them," Trump's chief of staff, Reince Priebus, said on NBC News' "Meet the Press," contradicting what government officials had said only a day earlier.

In a separate statement, Homeland Security Secretary John F. Kelly was less definitive, suggesting that green card holders' status would help them gain entry to the country but that they nonetheless would be subject to a "case-by-case" review.

As of Sunday evening, officials said no one was being held at American airports, although lawyers said they believed that dozens were still being detained, the New York Times reported.

Democrats planned to assemble on Monday on the steps of the Supreme Court in a show of solidarity with legal attempts to block Trump's travel ban.

Some Republicans grew increasingly alarmed by the backlash to the order. "This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country," Senators John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said. "That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security."

Meanwhile, a federal judge in New York temporarily blocked deportations nationwide. Her ruling was followed by similar decisions by federal judges in California, Virginia, Seattle and Boston.