People come and go so quickly here

Usually I try to add links to verify my facts in blog posts, but this morning I was busy getting ready to go to court hearing about my late husband's will. 

The post I am referring to is HERE.

I mentioned the Rohingya, a group of Bengalis who migrated to Burma a hundred or more years ago and are now getting thrown out.

AlJ has an article on them

Bangladesh is pushing ahead with a controversial plan to relocate tens of thousands of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar to a remote island, despite warnings it is uninhabitable and prone to flooding. ...Thengar Char in the Bay of Bengal.

 "The committee will assist transferring both registered and unregistered refugees from Myanmar to Thengar Char near Hatiya island in Noakhali district," according to an order issued by the Cabinet Division last week and posted online....
Some 232,000 Rohingya Muslims - both registered and unregistered - were already living in Bangladesh before more than 65,000 stateless Rohingya fleeing violence in neighbouring Myanmar's western state of Rakhine began crossing into the country last October.

READ MORE: Rohingya camps in Bangladesh and Thailand, worlds apart

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AlJ also has an article on Trumpie's plan for safe zones in Syria.

That link between establishing a safe zone and suspending the admission of Syrian refugees to the US was evident in the draft executive order dedicated to prevent "foreign terrorists" from entering the country. Ultimately that provision was not included in the final version of the executive order released on January 27. However, Trump remains adamant about advancing this issue. On January 29, he officially requested Saudi support for implementing safe zones that help alleviate the burden of "those who are suffering".

they go on to discuss the Turkish safe zones and hint at Russia and Iran's stakes in the idea.

Right now, most of the western stories are skeptical and pointing out problems for the plan, but most of these stories are a few days old. However, RT has two articles published within the last 24 hour that hint it might work.

Syria plan is a game changer,,bad news for ISIS... quoting Russia's foreign minister, whi in a different interview notes that Syria will have to agree with it.

I've even seen the proposed map published at Debka, but that is indeed a "fake news" site so it may or may not be accurate.

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I mentioned about the millions of Afghan refugees in Iran and in Pakistan who fled the Taliban. One of the undercovered news stories is that a lot of them went home after the Taliban was thrown out.

here is a UNHCR report from 2005:

Speaking in Brussels on Wednesday at a high-level meeting of officials from Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan, Lubbers expressed appreciation to donors for their assistance in the return of more than 3.5 million refugees to Afghanistan since a voluntary repatriation programme began in 2002 following the fall of the Taliban regime....He said more than half a million people could return this year from Iran and Pakistan, and a similar number in 2006.

true, a lot have settled down in their host countries, but that was a lot of refugees who went hom when things got safe.

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for China, it is harder to find stuff there. The enter/exit laws are very strict, but it's harder to find data and stories.

So do they have immigrants? it's hard to become a citizen unless you are a Chinese ethnic. And you read stories of Filipinos or Vietnamese sneaking into work in factories, or North Koreans sneaking over the border.

But then you read stories that make you go WTF:

This nice story is about a "left over woman" (a woman considered too old to marry in chinese culture) who married an African immigrant at the local Pentecostal church.and in the middle of the article comes this factoid:

"CHOCOLATE CITY" OR "Little Africa", as it has been dubbed by the Chinese press, is a district of Guangzhou that is home to between 20,000 and 200,000, mostly male, African migrants (calculations vary wildly due to the itinerant nature of many traders and the thousands who overstay their visas).

the article has a lot of information about problems getting visas to work and live in China, and how this tears these families apart. It also mentions that a lot of Chinese are in Africa. Many of these Africans are well educated and successful in business.

however, this article says there are only 600 thousand foreigners living/working in China.

only about 12000 are Filipinos, but in Hong Kong there are 120 000 OFW, mainly maids. and there are 17 000 in Macau.
 and 70 000 in Taiwan.

the Arab and African diaspora are making headlines in Europe, but the dirty little secret is that everyone is moving everywhere.

They are part of the Asian diaspora

There are more than 10 million overseas Filipinos worldwide, about 11% of the total population of the Philippines.
Each year, the Philippines sends out more than a million of its nationals to work abroad through its overseas employment program. Others leave to become permanent residents of their country of destination.
Overseas Filipinos are typically known to be as doctors, accountants, IT professionals, entertainers, teachers, nurses, engineers, military servicemen, students, domestic helpers, housekeepers, and caregivers. 

the article notes that there are 2 million in the USA but also that there might be another one million there illegally. This article notes 3.5 million there, sending home 25 billion dollars a year... but of course this might not count the kids and grandkids.

but we are not the only Asian country who exports workers.

The Filipino diaspora is the third largest in terms of population among overseas Asian groups. The Overseas Chinese is the largest, with about 35 million followed by the Overseas Indian at 22 million.

iin our family, we have relatives in the USA, Germany, Italy, and Canada. We also have had family members working in Malaysia, Mexico, Macau, Saudi, and Kuwait.

and of course, a lot of foreigners live here. Americans, especially GI's and men with Filipina wives, live here

The largest number of foreign citizens in the country came from the United States of America (29,959 persons). The next largest numbers came from China (28,750 persons), Japan (11,583 persons), and India (8,963 persons).

but this may not take into consideration student (e.g. Iranians attending school (est 7000) or the Koreans, (100 000)  many of whom come here to study English or retire.

so when you read the hysteria about immigration, just remember: Most are not criminals or refugees, but trying to find jobs.

I dislike the anti immigration rhetoric of Trump, but there does need some control over it, and indeed most countries do insist on such control.