More than 100 reporters, most of them from the developing world, were unable to attend the International Catholic Union of the Press convention at Bishop's University this week because they did not meet criteria to obtain a visa to enter Canada."This provides a really bad image of Canada," conference coordinator Pierre Blanger said yesterday. "We believe the criteria is much too strict."
"It's not easy for reporters from developing countries to obtain visas to come to Canada," he said, noting the majority of Catholic press union members are from poor countries and simply cannot meet Canada's high expectations.
Blanger said visitors must prove they have financial means in their country of origin. "That's not very obvious."
Blanger said that while conference organizers can assure the federal government that Third World participants will be housed and fed while in Canada, they cannot offer more than a moral guarantee all the delegates will go home once the conference ends.
Blanger told The Record that conference organizers estimate that between 100 and 150 potential participants were unable to obtain visas. That's about 40 per cent of those who had been expected.
Some 200 Catholic reporters are registered for the one-week event that is being held in Sherbrooke from June 3 to 10. Of those not in attendance, some were refused visas; others did not ask for them when they saw they list of requirements, Blanger said.
Applicants must pay the equivalent of $75 Cdn to open a visa application, which many could not afford if there was a good chance they would be refused, he added.
Blanger said visas are much harder to obtain since the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington in 2001.
"That's the pretext for tougher requirements," he said. The triennial congress, which is being held in Canada for the first time, travels from continent to continent. The last was held in Asia.
Blanger said that it was much easier for foreign reporters to get into in Bangkok, Thailand.
He said this is the first time strict visa requirement have had such an impact on attendance.
The group of religion reporters from more than 100 countries on five continents are participating in events taking place on the Lennoxville campus of Bishop's University and at Sherbrooke's Catholic archdiocese.
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