A businesswoman who has been in the retail business on Saipan for the past 30 years said she has been in and out of the island for the past years to attend to her ailing mother in Hong Kong.
On Feb. 19, she said her plane from Hong Kong landed at the Guam airport at 5 a.m.
She had a Chinese passport, an advance parole, a U.S. visa and a separate parole to enter Guam but she was told not to leave the airport.
She stayed at the airport for 22 hours with other passengers who also had advance parole because “our plane broke down and we were not allowed to go out of the airport.”
“I had parole to enter Guam but the immigration officials took it away. I can’t understand why they will not allow me to leave the airport when I have a U.S. visa,” said the businesswoman who declined to be identified.
She said they were given food coupons at the airport but had to sleep on benches.
Upon arriving at the Saipan airport, she said they were ordered to sit down and wait as other passengers got clearance from the immigration officers.
She said she was not even allowed to go to the restroom.
Another businessman, an owner of a hardware and construction supply company on island, said he got the same “rude” treatment from U.S. immigration officers at the Saipan airport.
“We would like to be treated as humans. The immigration officials don’t have to shout at us to ‘sit down and stay put’ as though we were prisoners,” the businessman said.
Upon arriving at the Saipan airport from the Philippines, he fell in line at the immigration counters only to be shooed away and ordered to stay at one side of the room along with all the other advance parole holders.
“We had to wait until all 300 plus Korean tourists were allowed to pass through immigration without any hassle. I don’t know what kind of identification those tourists showed to allow them quick clearance through immigration,” the businessman said.
He said one of his co-passengers, an old Chinese who does not speak English, was a diabetic patient who told the immigration officer that he needed to have his medicine.
“The immigration officer did not understand him but trained a gun at him instead and ordered him to sit down,” the businessman said.
“This is no way for passengers to be treated. We are businessmen here on Saipan, we pay taxes and we are humans. We should not be treated this way,” he added.
He said they are not the only ones who complained of getting the same treatment.
“We have to get this out so that the U.S. immigration officials will start to treat us as humans,” he added.
Not only Chinese citizens are singled out, but Filipinos and other foreigners as well who only have an advance parole, he said.
U.S. immigration authorities had yet to reply to this reporter’s request for comment as of press time last night.
