Page:United States Reports 502 OCT. TERM 1991.pdf/325

 502us1$14I 08-21-96 15:27:02 PAGES OPINPGT

Cite as: 502 U. S. 164 (1991)

167

Opinion of the Court

motivated large numbers of its citizens to emigrate to Florida without obtaining the permission of either the Haitian Government or the Government of the United States. A small number of those undocumented aliens were eligible for asylum as political refugees,1 but almost all of them were subject to deportation if identified and apprehended. In response to this burgeoning “illegal migration by sea of large numbers of undocumented aliens” from Haiti and other countries, President Reagan ordered the Coast Guard and the Secretary of State to intercept vessels carrying undocumented aliens and, except for passengers who qualified for refugee status, to return them to their point of origin. See Presidential Proclamation No. 4865, 3 CFR 50 (1981 Comp.); Exec. Order No. 12324, 3 CFR 180 (1981 Comp.). The President also directed the Secretary of State to enter into “cooperative arrangements with appropriate foreign governments for the purpose of preventing illegal migration to the United States by sea.” Ibid. Following this directive, the Secretary of State obtained an assurance from the Haitian Government that interdicted Haitians would “not be subject to 1

Article 1.2 of the United Nations Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, Jan. 31, 1967, 606 U. N. T. S. 268, to which the United States acceded in 1968, 19 U. S. T. 6223, 6261, T. I. A. S. No. 6577, defines a “refugee” as a person absent from his or her country due to a “wellfounded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.” The Protocol obligates the United States to comply with the substantive requirements of Articles 2 through 34 of the United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, July 28, 1951, 189 U. N. T. S. 150. 19 U. S. T., at 6225. Article 33.1 of the Convention, 19 U. S. T., at 6267, states: “No Contracting State shall expel or return (‘refouler’) a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the frontiers of territories where his life or freedom would be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.” See generally INS v. Stevic, 467 U. S. 407, 416–418 (1984). Article 34, 19 U. S. T., at 6267, provides that “Contracting States shall as far as possible facilitate the assimilation and naturalization of refugees. . . .” See generally INS v. Cardoza-Fonseca, 480 U. S. 421, 436–441 (1987).