Damascus/Spousal since Jan 2010 or late 2009
- Thread starter kamal225
- Start date
f.k im sooo happy, my 8 days vacation got approved and now i can go ahead and book my lovely flight to go to my lovely wife for Christmas 
Hey everyone,
I think it's time for us to write a letter to Ankara and ask for an explanation. In the Canadian system petitions won’t put any negative effects on anything what so ever.
We are getting close to holidays and I'm really worried. Damascus had 13 months at its worst condition (the last 2 months it was open). For most of us, it's been 13 months and even more now in Ankara! If we talk for another 20 more pages it's not going to do any good for anyone.
We still have people from Sept. 2011 - Oct 2011 including myself. A friend of mine also applied one week after me with no results yet. All those from 2011 who haven't received any notes should sign it by including their application numbers and names. If they are pushing sponsors on the side or pushing students first or whatever, they are able to ignore individual letters because who else will know?! But when a group writes to them, they know it's a group where many are connected and know about their performance. I'm ready to give my Application # and name as the first person.
We have applied a lot earlier than students or visitors and we have a status in Canada. This should give me at least 1% priority over these groups. How come student's screening is this much faster?!
See, medical expiries used to make alot of trouble for both sides. They are now extending it themselves in a country where you will not even get 1 cent off with a expired Safeway card! For screening this is the same thing. I believe if they want they can push the third part screening company... THIS is all about the security thing and it can be changed...
Please comment.
I think it's time for us to write a letter to Ankara and ask for an explanation. In the Canadian system petitions won’t put any negative effects on anything what so ever.
We are getting close to holidays and I'm really worried. Damascus had 13 months at its worst condition (the last 2 months it was open). For most of us, it's been 13 months and even more now in Ankara! If we talk for another 20 more pages it's not going to do any good for anyone.
We still have people from Sept. 2011 - Oct 2011 including myself. A friend of mine also applied one week after me with no results yet. All those from 2011 who haven't received any notes should sign it by including their application numbers and names. If they are pushing sponsors on the side or pushing students first or whatever, they are able to ignore individual letters because who else will know?! But when a group writes to them, they know it's a group where many are connected and know about their performance. I'm ready to give my Application # and name as the first person.
We have applied a lot earlier than students or visitors and we have a status in Canada. This should give me at least 1% priority over these groups. How come student's screening is this much faster?!
See, medical expiries used to make alot of trouble for both sides. They are now extending it themselves in a country where you will not even get 1 cent off with a expired Safeway card! For screening this is the same thing. I believe if they want they can push the third part screening company... THIS is all about the security thing and it can be changed...
Please comment.
E
Erina
Guest
Yes definitely... We Iranians are used to stay quiet at every condition. See how other nationalities stand for their rights, and we just remain silent and say "well it's beyond our control, it's CIC, they do longer processing for middle eastern, etc, etc" it's true but at least we can say something!!!! They may not give a shit about us or they take our letter into consideration. We have nothing to lose. I'm not saying this for my own good, it's for everybody. I'm sure there are people like Kazhal who are waiting for almost two years... Anyways, I'm in.mohammad K. said:
Exactly. This way we have at least tried. I think even those who have applied after October can include themselves since we all know we are waiting just for the security screening and this will affect them too in the future.
I haven't written any letter to CIC. If Kazhal or anyone else has something to start with, please share so I can edit it as a general letter; otherwise, I can start one too.
We have 4 people so far.
I haven't written any letter to CIC. If Kazhal or anyone else has something to start with, please share so I can edit it as a general letter; otherwise, I can start one too.
We have 4 people so far.
I agree that we should so something but I am not sure how effective a petition to a regional VO would be. There are privacy concerns as well if people were to put their personal information on a public list and frankly without this info, the petition wouldn't be of much use. I suggest instead that we contact our community organization to lobby the Government on our behalf. I know that Immigration Minister, like many other elected officials, is particularly sensitive to the concerns of Iranian voters. We have seen this in his response to the concerns raised by an Iranian MPP from Toronto on the closure of the VO office in Tehran and also in the Government reaction to the complaints by Iranians whose bank account had been closed due to sanctions regime.mohammad K. said:
The community organization I have in mind is the Iranian-Canadian Congress based in Toronto. They seem to be a credible outfit and are well-known by the media as well. A well written email in Persian that could be forwarded individually by members of this forum and perhaps many other silent applicants may be the way to go. We need to let the Government know that the Iranian-Canadians and thier families can't be victimized twice, once by their Gov't of Iran and again by the Gov't of their country of refuge.
that's right, well one of my wife's friends was telling her that she saw news on satellite about Iranian-Canadian who are concerned about the spousal application waiting times. so i'm guessing Iranian in Toronto are doing something to push this forwards but i have to find out from my friends who live in Toronto.HappyGoLucky said:
my lawyer and i have written ankara lots emails in the past and we have not heard anything back from them--it used to be like i would send an email in today and in 2 days i would get a reply back telling to have patients and they are awaiting background checks...and lately they have stopped all together...i have complained to MPs and jason kenneys office, other membs of parliment in near by cities that are from ndp (most recently and i was told they would get back to me in a week)- liberal party, and have called cic but NOTHING has happened and these ppl dont give a shit about what we go through---disappointing on how ppl who use fake papers and marriage get into this country everyday and we have suffer because our spouses live in a country Canada considers as criminals and killers-...... none of them have committed any harm to anyone (look at our histories since our arrivals, most of us dont even have parking tickets never mind harming Canadians), generally we are well behaved and hard working citizens that cause no serious crimes or problems in this country and yet we suffer most!!!! i once use to call this country home, and thought we were all treated equally...but it turns out we are discriminated against even in CANADA, heartbroken... but what ever u guys do count me in...-
mohammad K. said:
Just few comments:
- I dont see having a petition would help too much here unless you take the matter to the court.
- whatever you do, you need to express your concerns based on true and provable facts. Few examples: Visa & Immigration departments are separate and the workload of one does not affect the other. So your problem is not visitor or student visas. Also security screening is done by another government agency and so you can not blame CIC for it. I'm sure government answer would be that this screening is important for Canada and so no one can force them to expedite or bypass it.
- Remember the officers have nothing to do against any body and they dont benefit from delaying the files. Same as you, they have a performance contract and target to meet so they can not slack off too much either. The problem is they have too many files and few people. Some of them are lazy too. Due to closure of Damascus embassy (as a major hub), they had to expand their office in Ankara and hire more officers and then train them all. As someone who is working on an international assignment, I know it's not easy to hire people to work in other countries, and once they hired them it takes few months to get their visas and take care of relocation and stuff like that.
I mentioned these to emphasis that whatever you do it must be realistic to work. Just because something is not fair to you does not mean the officials agree too. 18 months is very normal in these cases and if you expected faster processing then you set your expectations up for failure.
- I dont see having a petition would help too much here unless you take the matter to the court.
- whatever you do, you need to express your concerns based on true and provable facts. Few examples: Visa & Immigration departments are separate and the workload of one does not affect the other. So your problem is not visitor or student visas. Also security screening is done by another government agency and so you can not blame CIC for it. I'm sure government answer would be that this screening is important for Canada and so no one can force them to expedite or bypass it.
- Remember the officers have nothing to do against any body and they dont benefit from delaying the files. Same as you, they have a performance contract and target to meet so they can not slack off too much either. The problem is they have too many files and few people. Some of them are lazy too. Due to closure of Damascus embassy (as a major hub), they had to expand their office in Ankara and hire more officers and then train them all. As someone who is working on an international assignment, I know it's not easy to hire people to work in other countries, and once they hired them it takes few months to get their visas and take care of relocation and stuff like that.
I mentioned these to emphasis that whatever you do it must be realistic to work. Just because something is not fair to you does not mean the officials agree too. 18 months is very normal in these cases and if you expected faster processing then you set your expectations up for failure.
mohammad K. said:
that is exactly my question. why this f.k scrutiny took only few month after they change it into processing in spring up 2 summer and now it takes forever. i have no f.k idea what's going on. i even called Canada Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and they said we don't do this thing. u hafta call the embassy and find out who does it. and im like buddy what are u talking about, the embassy doesn't answer to any person. so idk if he lied 2 me or he gave me honest answer. but i would call them 2mortow again 2 c if somebody else gives me the same answer or not.arsha1363 said:
does anyone here knows the contact info for the office that is assisting Ankara that is located in Ottawa????apparently they are the only ones that have access to our files if anyone has it or knows how to contact them pplz let me know..thunx
if anyone has it or knows how to contact them pplz let me know..thunxI doubt they answer directly to applicants but here is their contact info:
http://www.csis-scrs.gc.ca/cmmn/cntcts-eng.asp
http://www.csis-scrs.gc.ca/prrts/scrt-scrnng-eng.asp#bm04
http://www.csis-scrs.gc.ca/cmmn/cntcts-eng.asp
http://www.csis-scrs.gc.ca/prrts/scrt-scrnng-eng.asp#bm04
Kurdistan-kazhal said:does anyone here knows the contact info for the office that is assisting Ankara that is located in Ottawa????apparently they are the only ones that have access to our files