"While appearing before a federal judge in Michigan last week, Mohan Karki saw his 5-month-old daughter in person for the first time. Karki was shackled and standing several feet away, according to his wife Tika Basnet, who was in the courtroom last Wednesday. Minutes later, his daughter began to wail and needed to exit the room, Basnet added. When Karki will reunite with his daughter remains unknown."
"For more than eight months, Karki, 30, has been held in immigration custody amid removal proceedings that stemmed from felony charges of burglary, criminal trespassing and interference with government property, all from a single incident when he was a teenager. Karki's attorneys have been fighting to stop his deportation to Bhutan a small nation between India and China where Karki's family and others with Nepali ancestry were persecuted and driven out in the 1990s. Karki himself was born in a refugee camp in nearby Nepal."
"Despite this, in court documents, the federal government asserts that Karki is a citizen of Bhutan. His attorneys strongly reject that claim, questioning how Karki could be a citizen of a country that he does not have a passport nor a birth certificate from. They also warn that sending Karki to Bhutan would put him at serious risk of statelessness, pointing to reports that some deportees have been denied entry by Bhutanese authorities upon arrival and left stranded in South Asia."
A 30-year-old man has been held in immigration custody for more than eight months while facing removal proceedings tied to felony charges from his teenage years. He briefly saw his 5-month-old daughter in court while shackled and separated. Attorneys contend he lacks Bhutanese documents and warn deportation could render him effectively stateless, citing reports of deportees denied entry by Bhutanese authorities and stranded in South Asia. The federal government asserts Bhutanese citizenship in court filings. A judge denied his petition for release, leaving deportation imminent and prompting concern from refugee advocates about harsh immigration enforcement.
Read at www.npr.org
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