US embassy cable - 03OTTAWA2436

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 OTTAWA 002436 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: CA, CVIS, PGOV, PREL, PTER, SMIG 
SUBJECT: CANADA'S VISA ISSUING PROCESS 
 
 
1.  (U) (Summary) Canada,s visa issuing process closely 
resembles that of the United States.  There exist, however, a 
number of structural and procedural differences between the 
two countries.  In general, the United States tends to have 
stronger security measures in place and rejects a higher 
percentage of its applicants than does Canada.  In the last 
few years, Canada has taken a few steps to improve its visa 
issuing process, but a number of additional actions are 
needed to bring its practices in line with U.S. standards. 
(End summary) 
 
--------------------------------- 
The Structure and Staffing of CIC 
--------------------------------- 
 
2.  (U)  Poloff met recently with Keith Carter, Director of 
Citizenship and Immigration Canada's (CIC) Western 
Hemispheres Bureau, and received a broad overview of the 
Canadian visa issuing process.  Poloff also met separately 
with H.G. Pardy, Director General of the Department of 
Foreign Affairs and Trade's (DFAIT) Consular Affairs Bureau 
and received additional information pertaining to Canadian 
visa issues. 
 
3.  (U)  According to Carter, Citizenship and Immigration 
Canada (CIC) is the agency responsible for issuing both 
immigrant and non-immigrant Canadian visas to citizens of 
other countries.  It was once a part of Canada,s Department 
of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT), but broke 
off to form its own agency in 1994 and currently employs 
4,700 employees worldwide.   DFAIT continues to maintain a 
Bureau of Consular Affairs, but officers in this bureau do 
not issue visas; rather they have the responsibility of 
aiding Canadians abroad.  They perform duties roughly 
analogous to the American Citizen Services duties performed 
by U.S. consular officers. 
 
4.  (U)  There are relatively few Canadian posts that are 
actually staffed and equipped to issue visas.  There are, for 
example, only 18 such posts in the Western Hemisphere and six 
of these are located within the United States.  CIC uses 
these posts as hub-centers and applicants often have to 
travel outside of their home countries to one of these 
hub-centers to apply for visas.   Carter explained that CIC 
is experimenting with a drop-box system in which smaller 
regional centers collect applications and forward them on, 
without interviewing, to a hub-center for adjudication.   To 
illustrate, someone in El Salvador (a regional center) can 
currently drop off his/her application in El Salvador and it 
will be sent via the Computer Assisted Immigration Processing 
System (CAIPS) to Guatemala (a hub center) where an officer 
can decide to either accept, reject, or call the applicant to 
Guatemala for a personal interview. 
 
5.  (U)  Carter explained that CIC staffs its posts with both 
Canadian Foreign Service Officers and Locally Engaged Staff 
(LES).  The local hires are given a great deal of 
responsibility.  Most significantly, CIC allows them to 
adjudicate both immigrant and non-immigrant visas. Because 
they are given such a high degree of responsibility, these 
local hires are usually either Canadian expatriates or 
trusted Embassy employees who have served in the Embassy for 
several years.    While the Canadian Foreign Service Officers 
are technically the supervisors of the locally hired staff, 
the two groups, in fact, work side-by-side and perform many 
of the same duties.  This sharing of duties occurs even 
though the local hires receive both less training and a 
significantly less comprehensive security check than their 
commissioned colleagues. It should be noted, however, that 
only Canadian Foreign Service Officers have access to the 
actual visa foils, which are kept locked away, and the 
locally hired staff is also denied access to all classified 
information. 
 
6.  (U) Carter could not remember any recent occasions when 
locally hired staff abused their right to adjudicate visas. 
He said that when scandals occur, they usually arise as money 
is moved back-and-forth during the accounting part of the 
process, not from malfeasance in the visa issuing process. 
Carter did admit, however, that there are some regions where 
CIC feels that local staff could be easily compromised. 
Therefore, in these areas, CIC does not allow local staff to 
adjudicate visas.  There are, for example, no local staff 
adjudicating visas in Moscow or the Middle East, and in 
Beijing only Canadian expatriates are used.  The place where 
local staff adjudicators are most greatly utilized is in the 
United States. (Note: Despite Carter,s claims, there have 
been several incidents recently in which Canadian local hires 
have been found guilty of malfeasance.  Two weeks ago, a 
Syrian Embassy worker (part of the PA office and not 
affiliated with CIC) was fired after allegedly taking a bribe 
to help someone illegally obtain a visa.  In 2002, two 
locally hired CIC employees were fired in New Delhi after 
recommending favorable decisions for their relatives. End 
note). 
 
----------------------------- 
Canada,s Visa Issuing Process 
----------------------------- 
 
7.  (U)  Canadian non-immigrant visas come in only three 
types: tourist, student, or worker visas.  Canadian officers, 
however, have a wide variety of choices for rejecting these 
non-immigrant visa applicants.  The most often cited reasons, 
according to Carter, for rejection are "insufficient funds" 
or "lack of bona fides;" however, there is no overarching 
reason for rejection equivalent to the United States, 214 
(b).  A Canadian officer writes notes on all of his/her 
refusals and these notes are stored in the CAIPS computer 
system for two years. During this time, all other 
adjudicating officers can view these notes.  There is no time 
restraint on reapplying and an applicant has the right to 
reapply for a visa immediately if he/she desires. 
 
8.  (U)  Canada,s process for immigrant visas differs from 
the non-immigrant visa process.  The immigrant visa process 
involves a point system in which candidates receive points 
for meeting certain criteria (5 points for a high school 
diploma, 24 points for speaking both French and English, 10 
points at the discretion of the interviewer, etc.).  Once an 
applicant reaches the 75-point threshold, he/she qualifies 
for the immigrant visa.  The rejection notes for immigrant 
visas are kept for five years, three years longer than 
non-immigrant visas. 
 
9.  (U)  It is not unusual to have a high discrepancy between 
the visa rejection rate of an American mission and a Canadian 
mission located in the same country.  In Albania, for 
example, the U.S. rejection rate is close to 70% while the 
Canadians reject only about 40%.  This is most often the 
case, although not the rule: American visa rejection rates 
are usually higher than their Canadian counterparts.  Carter 
theorized that this discrepancy might occur because, at many 
Canadian consulates, a secretary acts as an initial vetter 
for applications and tells those with no chance not to waste 
their money.  This eliminates many potential rejections and 
deflates the Canadian rejection average as compared to the 
U.S. average.  It should also be noted that Canada,s refusal 
rate has been consistently climbing over the last few years. 
Statistics furnished by CIC show that the refusal rate for 
visitor visas to Canada this year are 3.5% higher than last 
year and student visa rejection rates are up 4.2 % over 2002 
numbers. 
 
----------------- 
Security Measures 
----------------- 
 
10.  (U)  According to Carter, the Computer Assisted 
Immigration Processing System (CAIPS) is not directly 
connected to any type of security lookout list.  There is, 
however, a domestic lookout system called the Field Operation 
System (FOS) that is maintained by CIC.  Adjudicating 
officers can perform security name checks using this FOS 
system.  Carter said that there are plans to integrate FOS 
into CAIPS by 2005 so that the two will no longer be separate 
systems.  Since FOS is not integrated with the databases of 
either the Canadian Security and Intelligence Services (CSIS) 
or the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), its usefulness 
as a security mechanism is not fully developed.  Carter was 
not aware of any plans to consolidate these agencies, 
databases in the way that databases were combined in the U.S. 
after September 11th. 
 
11.  (SBU)  One of the larger security changes that CIC 
adopted following September 11th was reducing the number of 
countries that qualify for the Canadian visa waiver program. 
A few years ago, Canada allowed a great many more countries 
to travel visa free than did the United States.  The 
differences between the two countries have narrowed over the 
past few years; however, many of the countries that Canada 
has removed are considered by the U.S. to be relatively 
insignificant security threats.   After significant U.S. 
pressure, Canada did recently remove Saudi Arabia and 
Malaysia from its visa waiver program; however, there still 
remain some significant differences between the U.S. and 
Canadian visa waiver programs.  Most significantly, citizens 
of Greece, Mexico, and Korea are allowed to travel to Canada 
without a visa.  Carter said that Canada realizes how 
concerned the U.S. is about these three countries being on 
the visa waiver program.  He said that there have been some 
discussions about removing these three from the program, but 
he did not have any information regarding their imminent 
removal.  Carter was able to report that Costa Rica, the last 
country in Latin America able to travel visa free, would be 
removed from the visa waiver program shortly. 
 
12.  (U)  Comment:  Communication and cooperation between the 
United States and Canada on visa procedures have improved 
over the last few years.  The Canadians appear to be 
sensitive to U.S. concerns and are beginning to take steps to 
alleviate them.  The increase in Canada,s visa rejection 
rate and the decrease in the number of countries on the visa 
waiver list are steps in the right direction.  Canada, 
however, still has much left to do to reassure U.S. 
authorities that the country is not being used as a Trojan 
horse by aliens whose ultimate goal is to bypass U.S. visa 
requirements on their way into the United States.  Three 
significant actions that Canada should undertake are: 1) to 
reduce the level of responsibility currently enjoyed by its 
locally hired staff; 2) to create a consolidated database 
system that allows its Foreign Service Officers to do 
thorough security name check searches on applicants; and, 3) 
to remove Greece, Korea, and Mexico from its visa waiver 
program. 
Visit Canada's Classified Web Site at 
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/wha/ottawa 
 
KELLY