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Immigration
and Naturalization Commissioner James W. Ziglar in the hotseat |
By
Steve Smith, IOL Washington correspondent
WASHINGTON,
March 20 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - "Broken,"
"bureaucratic" and "worse than useless" - the U.S.
Congress spared no insult Tuesday, March 19, for the Naturalization
and Immigration Service (INS), which issued visa notifications
posthumously to alleged September 11 hijackers, news agencies
reported.
"There
is a serious intelligence failure at the INS," said Pennsylvania
Republican George Gekas, chairman of the House immigration
subcommittee. "The INS is irreversibly broken."
INS
director James Ziglar was named just seven months ago and had to field
questions from irate committee members. He recognized its
shortcomings, especially an over dependence on paperwork instead of
computers, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
"It
has become clear over time, the processes and procedures involved ...
have become far too bureaucratic, involving too many steps, many of
which add no real value to the final outcome," said Ziglar of the
bureaucracy he heads adding that reforms are in the works, not the
least of which is the procedure for granting student visas.
A
week ago, Mohammed Atta and Marwan Al-Shehhi, suspected of taking part
in the attacks, were notified that their student visas had finally
come through - six months to the day after the September 11 attacks.
The
Florida flight school that trained the men received paperwork showing
that their student visas had been approved, reported U.S. newspaper, The
Washington Post.
"The
two students had applied for the visas through their flight school,
Huffman Aviation International, in August 2000. But because of
backlogs and an antiquated processing system at the Immigration and
Naturalization Service, notification of the approval did not arrive at
the Venice, Fla., flight school until nearly ten days ago," the
paper said.
The
belated receipt of the documents underscores the chronic problems that
continue to plague the beleaguered INS - the target of strenuous
reform efforts since the September 11 attacks - and prompted howls of
outrage yesterday from Capitol Hill.
"March
11 created a red alert day," said Democrat Sheila Jackson-Lee,
who couldn't see why the visas weren't revoked before the notices were
sent out. "The inertia is simply outrageous."
The
hearing came after President George W. Bush proposed a reorganization
of border patrols, customs and immigration. Currently, INS divides its
time among different functions that Bush would split up.
Something
needs to be done, said Republican Congressman Darrell Issa, because
INS is more of a hindrance than a help. "I consider your
organization today as worse than useless."
INS
and U.S. Justice Department officials acknowledged that the delayed
mailings were embarrassing but stressed that the change to student
visas for Atta and Alshehhi was actually approved last summer. The
pair had entered the United States on tourist visas, the paper said.
In
addition, the INS said in a statement, "when the applications
were approved, the INS had no information indicating that Atta or
Alshehhi had ties to terrorist organizations."
The
records received by Huffman, first reported by CNN, show that Atta's
visa was approved July 17 and Al-Shehhi's was approved August 9. The
visa approvals came well after the two would-be hijackers had
completed their training course at Huffman, which cost $27,300 each
and ended in January 2001.
It
took the INS nearly a year to process the visa applications after they
were submitted by Huffman in August 2000 and seven more to return the
forms back, the paper said.
The
schools are not required to deny instruction to foreign nationals
while the visa applicants wait for an INS decision, officials said,
reported the Post.
INS
officials said in a statement last night that the agency "regrets
the late arrival of notifications to the school," and blamed the
delay on an "antiquated, inaccurate, untimely" and
inefficient paper-based processing system. The INS is switching over
to a computer-based system, which was first mandated by Congress as
part of an immigration reform package in 1996, said the paper.
"How
can these guys get training before they're approved to get training?
That's a legitimate issue," one senior Justice official said.
"But it's important to note that these guys were approved long
before anyone in law enforcement knew they had ties to terrorist
groups."
Rep.
Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.), head of a congressional caucus that seeks
reduced immigration, said the agency is "completely and totally
dysfunctional.
"The
INS is the Mickey Mouse Club of federal agencies, but this actually
would indicate that's an insult to Mickey Mouse," Tancredo said.
"I do not know what straw is possibly going to be the one that
will break this back. The pile is so high now you can't see over
it."
"This
kind of thing happens all the time to people who aren't terrorists,
but then it's not news," said Mark Krikorian, executive director
of the Center for Immigration Studies, a frequent critic of the INS.
"The very fact that this falls through the cracks tells you that
they do not really own their own data, or have much control over what
happens to it."
