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Canada grants asylum to Saudi Teen


Jazzy Jan

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:clap:  To Justin Trudeau and Canada.  Wish Australia had been as quick to step in after she was trying desperately to come here but as per usual, our politicians were not.  What women have to go through in Saudi Arabia is dreadful.  With the shocking torture and murder of honour killings being so well known, this deserves to become a talked about issue on a big scale.  Hopefully this girl can bring much more attention to this shocking abuse of human rights. 

Rahaf al-Qunun: Saudi teen granted asylum in Canada

Canada will grant asylum to an 18-year-old Saudi woman who fled to Thailand to escape her allegedly abusive family, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday.

Rahaf Al-Qunun will head to Toronto, with a stopover in Seoul, said Thailand's Immigration Police Chief Surachate Hakparn. She boarded a Korean Airlines plane in Bangkok.
 
Trudeau told reporters in Saskatchewan that his nation accepted the request made by United Nations officials.
    The news followed confusion earlier in the day over where the teenager would be resettled.
     
    Hakparn initially told CNN that Qunun had been offered asylum by both Australia and Canada. But he later requested that the statement be retracted.
     
    Adding to the sense of uncertainty surrounding the case, the Twitter account used by Qunun throughout her appeal for asylum was deactivated.
    ABC reporter Sophie McNeill tweeted Friday that Qunun was "safe and fine" but had been "receiving a lot of death threats. She will be back on Twitter but for now she's apparently having a short break."
     
    Qunun had flown to Thailand from Kuwait to escape her family, saying she feared they would kill her because she renounced Islam. She had intended to fly on to Australia, but barricaded herself in a hotel room in Bangkok's main airport on Sunday after Thai immigration officials attempted to deport her back to the Middle East.
     
    Qunun and her supporters drew global attention to her case through a social media campaign launched mostly on Twitter. She documented her arrival and subsequent detention in Bangkok on her smartphone, creating new Twitter and Periscope accounts where she received a deluge of supportive messages.
     
    Her story has also put Saudi Arabia's guardianship laws, which restrict many aspects of women's lives, back under international scrutiny.
     
    In response to the media campaign, Thai authorities allowed Qunun access to the UNHCR and did not deport her to Kuwait. Her online campaign was so successful that Saudi chargé d'affaires Abdalelah Mohammed A. al-Shuaibi told Thai officials through a translator: "We wish they had confiscated her phone instead of her passport."
     
    Qunun later tweeted the video of that meeting and wrote that her "Twitter account has changed the game against what he wished for me."
    On Wednesday, Australia's Department of Home Affairs had told CNN it would consider Qunun's "referral in the usual way, as it does with all UNHCR referrals." Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton also said there would be no "special treatment" in the case, according to CNN affiliate Nine News.
    "Nobody wants to see a young girl in distress and she has obviously now found a safe haven in Thailand," Dutton told reporters in Brisbane.
      On Wednesday, Global Affairs Canada spokesman Stefano Maron told CNN that Canada was very concerned by, and was closely watching, Qunun's case.
      "We are in close contact with partners about her situation," Maron said. "Canada will always stand up for human rights, very much including women's rights."
       
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      I'm very happy my country has granted her asylum but unfortunately this will only add to the growing anger our country's conservatives have over Justin Trudeau...there's been backlash after backlash over his handling of Muslims

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      1 hour ago, le smoking said:

      I'm very happy my country has granted her asylum but unfortunately this will only add to the growing anger our country's conservatives have over Justin Trudeau...there's been backlash after backlash over his handling of Muslims

      @le smoking   Sad to hear that.   I just admire him so much for granting this girl asylum.   I have always been terrified for women in countries when they are stoned to death,  have no freedom and suffer honour killings.  Have always thought since I was a teen that it is so wrong that some women have no freedom whatsoever in some countries.  Have always been kind of shocked at the people that just shrug it off, including a lot of women themselves who enjoy complete freedom in the countries they live in.  Saudi Arabia has a shocking record with human rights.  Just look at Jamal Khashoggi and how he was brutally tortured and murdered for speaking out against the Saudi Arabia leaders.  Sometimes the world seems to just turn a blind eye to it all and see it as part of religion.  But with EVERY single religion, human rights should always come before religious rights.   

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      Guest CzarnaWisnia
      1 hour ago, le smoking said:

      I'm very happy my country has granted her asylum but unfortunately this will only add to the growing anger our country's conservatives have over Justin Trudeau...there's been backlash after backlash over his handling of Muslims

      Well, she fled because she renounced islam, so they should be okay with that I suppose.

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      Wonderful news that in a world which seems to be getting more and more mental/far right, Canada is leading by example. I'm happy with how explicitly we've denounced Saudi Arabia and wish more would as well.

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      1 minute ago, MadFan said:

      Wonderful news that in a world which seems to be getting more and more mental/far right, Canada is leading by example. I'm happy with how explicitly we've denounced Saudi Arabia and wish more would as well.

      Admire Canada so much for denouncing Saudi Arabia and not going along with the way that America and so many other countries excuse Saudi Arabia for their appalling human rights records against women and gay people.  So often many world governments pick on "easy targets"  and let Saudi Arabia off the hook because of the oil and trade deals, when their human rights records are so much worse than the countries that are being punished. 

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      6 hours ago, Jazzy Jan said:

      "Canada will always stand up for human rights, very much including women's rights."

      Kuwait wanted the Thai government to detain the Saudi teens, and Canada rescued her for the sake of so-called human rights.

      What about the Huawei woman whom Trump had requested to detain? What about her human rights?

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      On 1/13/2019 at 3:06 AM, horn said:

      Kuwait wanted the Thai government to detain the Saudi teens, and Canada rescued her for the sake of so-called human rights.

      What about the Huawei woman whom Trump had requested to detain? What about her human rights?

      Are you serious ? You can't be, seriously. If you can't see the difference, you have a big problem. Time for you to read an article or two. 

       

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      On 1/13/2019 at 7:06 PM, horn said:

      Kuwait wanted the Thai government to detain the Saudi teens, and Canada rescued her for the sake of so-called human rights.

      What about the Huawei woman whom Trump had requested to detain? What about her human rights?

      There is a huge difference between a millionaire executive of a company doing shady and illegal trade deals being detained than sending a girl back to a country where she will most likely be killed in an honour killing.   Completely different scenario in every way. 

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      Who is spinning the shady business stories? Huawei is the biggest telecommunications company and had just overtaken Apple. This Asian company had edged out lots of White companies and Trump is not happy cos it doesn't make America great again. He had to think of a way to gun them down. Total white supremacist conspiracy talk.

      He was afraid the trade war negotiations with China would fail and instructed Canada to detain her way before the negotiations and use her to make sure China gives in to make America great again.

      China rises way too fast may be overtaking US and that worries Trump and most Americans.

      Does Iraq has WMD? US said they had. They have the satellite pictures and tons of evidences etc....  They attacked them, they took over the country but didn't talk about WMD. Why? Because they found none. They only interested in testing their newly developed weapons and getting free oil.

      American life... 

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