U.S. Immigration Service Commissioner Submits Resignation

WASHINGTON, Aug 17 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Embattled U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service Commissioner James Ziglar, who has been severely criticized for failing to adequately screen foreigners coming to the United States, has tendered his resignation after just a year in office.

The U.S. has been struggling to reform its immigrant screening procedures following the attacks on September 11. A major step in the process has recently resulted in the fingerprinting of all foreigners entering the U.S. - a move that civil rights activists say will seek to only target people of Muslim and/or Middle Eastern descent.

In a letter to agency employees made public Friday, Ziglar said he formally submitted his resignation Thursday to President George W. Bush but had not set a date for his departure.

"Assuming the legislative process continues on its projected schedule, I presently contemplate staying on through the passage of the homeland security bill, and for a reasonable period thereafter to assist with the merger of the INS into the new department," Ziglar said, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.

However, he said he expected to be no longer working for the immigration service by December 31.

The Department of Homeland Security, as envisioned by the White House, would have more than 170,000 employees and an annual budget of $38 billion and would include the Coast Guard, Secret Service, Border Patrol, Federal Emergency Management Agency and the INS.

However, a bill approved last month by the House of Representatives breaks up the INS into two separate entities.

Under that legislation, the agency's enforcement services are to be folded into the new department while employees processing regular immigration cases are to stay within the Justice Department.

The proposed breakup of the INS follows stringent criticism of the agency's performance ahead of the September 11 terrorist attacks, with many officials inside and outside the U.S. Congress arguing the service had failed to adequately screen foreigners coming to the United States.

The alleged hijackers who rammed passenger planes into the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon outside Washington, and crashed a fourth plane in Pennsylvania had entered the United States on valid visas, according to immigration officials.

Critics said this mere fact pointed to serious deficiencies in the immigration service's applicant screening process.

Moreover, the agency has been accused of being aware of this problem for years and failing to fix it.

As many as 41 of the 47 foreign-born individuals who were charged, pleaded guilty or were convicted of involvement in terrorism on U.S. soil in the last 10 years had been approved for a visa by a U.S. consulate overseas at some point, said congressional officials.

But the simmering frustration with the INS came to a boil in March, when the service sent to two of the dead hijackers - Mohammed Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi - official notification that their visas had been upgraded.

Despite criticism of Ziglar's performance, Attorney General John Ashcroft praised his work in a terse two-sentence statement.