Manitoba sets up reception centre for asylum-seeking border crossers
Posted May 1, 2017 3:12 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
GRETNA, Man. – The Manitoba government is transforming a former seniors residence into a reception centre for asylum-seekers who walk across the border.
The centre is being set up in Gretna, an official border crossing close to Emerson where refugee claimants have been walking through fields to reach Canada from the United States.
The province says the centre will provide short-term shelter, food and help with the necessary refugee claimant paperwork. In an emailed statement, the government says it expects up to 60 people could be housed in the vacant building. It says the vast majority of asylum-seekers will be moved to Winnipeg within days.
A few hundred people have walked across open fields and through ditches into Manitoba since January 1st.
