Visa cancelations sow panic for international students, with hundreds fearing deportation

Buses operated by the GEO Group depart from King County International Airport after transferring detainees to and from a plane chartered by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on April 15, 2025 in Seattle, Washington. (AFP)
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Updated 16 April 2025
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Visa cancelations sow panic for international students, with hundreds fearing deportation

  • Last month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the State Department was revoking visas held by visitors who were acting counter to national interests, including some who protested Israel’s war in Gaza and those who face criminal charges
  • Many of the students losing their legal status are from India and China, which together account for more than half the international students at American colleges

WASHINGTON: At first, the bar association for immigration attorneys began receiving inquiries from a couple students a day. These were foreigners studying in the US, and they’d discovered in early April their legal status had been terminated with little notice. To their knowledge, none of the students had committed a deportable offense.
In recent days, the calls have begun flooding in. Hundreds of students have been calling to say they have lost legal status, seeking advice on what to do next.
“We thought it was going to be something that was unusual,” said Matthew Maiona, a Boston-based immigration attorney who is getting about six calls a day from panicked international students. “But it seems now like it’s coming pretty fast and furious.”
The speed and scope of the federal government’s efforts to terminate the legal status of international students have stunned colleges across the country. Few corners of higher education have been untouched, as schools ranging from prestigious private universities, large public research institutions and tiny liberal arts colleges discover status terminations one after another among their students.
At least 790 students at more than 120 colleges and universities have had their visas revoked or their legal status terminated in recent weeks, according to an Associated Press review of university statements and correspondence with school officials. Advocacy groups collecting reports from colleges say hundreds more students could be caught up in the crackdown.
Students apparently targeted over minor infractions
Around 1.1 million international students were in the United States last year — a source of essential revenue for tuition-driven colleges. International students are not eligible for federal financial aid, and their ability to pay tuition often factors into whether they will be admitted to American schools. Often, they pay full price.
Many of the students losing their legal status are from India and China, which together account for more than half the international students at American colleges. But the terminations have not been limited to those from any one part of the world, lawyers said.
Four students from two Michigan universities are suing Trump administration officials after their F-1 student status was terminated last week. Their attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, Ramis Wadood, said the students never received a clear reason why.
“We don’t know, and that’s the scary part,” he said.
The students were informed of the status terminations by their universities via email, which came as a shock, Wadood said. The reason given was that there was a “criminal records check and/or that their visa was revoked,” Wadood said, but none of them were charged or convicted of crimes. Some had either speeding or parking tickets, but one didn’t have any, he said. Only one of the students had known their entry visa was revoked, Wadood said.
Last month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the State Department was revoking visas held by visitors who were acting counter to national interests, including some who protested Israel’s war in Gaza and those who face criminal charges.
But many students say they don’t fall under those categories. Students have filed lawsuits in several states, arguing they were denied due process.
In New Hampshire, a federal judge last week granted a temporary restraining order to restore the status of a Ph.D. student at Dartmouth College, Xiaotian Liu. On Tuesday, a federal judge in Wisconsin issued a similar order, ruling the government could not take steps to detain or revoke the visa of a University of Wisconsin-Madison gradate student.
In a break from past, feds cancel students’ status directly
At many colleges, officials learned the legal immigration status of some international students had been terminated when staff checked a database managed by the Department of Homeland Security. In the past, college officials say, legal statuses typically were updated after colleges told the government the students were no longer studying at the school.
The system to track enrollment and movements of international students came under the control of Immigration and Customs Enforcement after 9/11, said Fanta Aw, CEO of NAFSA, an association of international educators. She said recent developments have left students fearful of how quickly they can be on the wrong side of enforcement.
“You don’t need more than a small number to create fear,” Aw said. “There’s no clarity of what are the reasons and how far the reach of this is.”
Her group says as many as 1,300 students have lost visas or had their status terminated, based on reports from colleges.
The Department of Homeland Security and State Department did not respond to messages seeking comment.
Foreigners who are subject to removal proceedings are usually sent a notice to appear in immigration court on a certain date, but lawyers say affected students have not received any notices, leaving them unsure of next steps to take.
Some schools have told students to leave the country to avoid the risk of being detained or deported. But some students have appealed the terminations and stayed in the United States while those are processed.
Still others caught in legal limbo aren’t students at all. They had remained in the US post-graduation on “optional practical training,” a one-year period — or up to three for science and technology graduates — that allows employment in the US after completing an academic degree. During that time, a graduate works in their field and waits to receive their H-1B or other employment visas if they wish to keep working in the US
Around 242,000 foreigners in the US are employed through this “optional practical training.” About 500,000 are pursuing graduate degrees, and another 342,000 are undergraduate students.
Among the students who have filed lawsuits is a Georgia Tech Ph.D. student who is supposed to graduate on May 5, with a job offer to join the faculty. His attorney Charles Kuck said the student was likely targeted for termination because of an unpaid traffic fine from when the student lent his car to a friend. Ultimately, the violation was dismissed.
“We have case after case after case exactly like that, where there is no underlying crime,” said Kuck, who is representing 17 students in the federal lawsuit. He said his law firm has heard from hundreds of students.
“These are kids who now, under the Trump administration, realize their position is fragile,” he said. “They’ve preyed on a very vulnerable population. These kids aren’t hiding. They’re in school.”
Some international students have been adapting their daily routines.
A Ph.D. student from China at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill said she has begun carrying around her passport and immigration paperwork at the advice of the university’s international student office. The student, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of being targeted by authorities, said she has been distressed to see the terminations even for students like her without criminal records.
“That is the most scary part because you don’t know whether you’re going to be the next person,” she said. ___
Seminera reported from Raleigh, N.C., and Keller reported from Albuquerque, N.M.

 


Chechnya leader’s son, 17, becomes head of Chechen security council

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Chechnya leader’s son, 17, becomes head of Chechen security council

  • It is the fourth time Adam Kadyrov has been appointed to an official position since 2023, when he was 15
  • He already serves as his father’s top bodyguard

The teenage son of Ramzan Kadyrov, the leader of Russia’s Chechnya region and close ally of President Vladimir Putin, has been appointed secretary of the region’s security council, according to the council’s Telegram channel.
Adam Kadyrov turned 17 in November 2024. It is the fourth time he has been appointed to an official position since 2023, when he was 15.
He already serves as his father’s top bodyguard, a trustee of Chechnya’s Special Forces University, and an observer in a new army battalion.
Ramzan Kadyrov has led Chechnya, a mountainous Muslim region in southern Russia that tried to break away from Moscow in wars that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union, since 2007.
He enjoys wide leeway from Putin to run Chechnya as his personal fiefdom in return for ensuring the stability of the region, where an Islamist, anti-Russian insurgency continued for around a decade after the end of full-scale conflict there in the early 2000s.
His rise to power came after his own father, Akhmat, was killed in a 2004 bombing by insurgents who saw him as a turncoat.
In September 2023, Adam Kadyrov was shown, in a video posted by his father on social media, beating a detainee accused of burning the Qur'an. Ramzan Kadyrov said he was proud of his son for defending his Muslim religion.
The detainee, Nikita Zhuravel, has since been sentenced to three and a half years in prison.


Russian drone strike on bus kills 9 in Ukrainian city of Marhanets, Kyiv says

Updated 4 min 12 sec ago
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Russian drone strike on bus kills 9 in Ukrainian city of Marhanets, Kyiv says

Zelensky said the Russian strike hit a bus that was transporting workers of a mining and processing plant
“An ordinary bus. Clearly a civilian object, a civilian target,” Zelensky said

KYIV: A Russian drone hit a bus carrying workers in the Ukrainian city of Marhanets on Wednesday, killing nine people and injuring close to 50, Kyiv officials said, in an attack President Volodymyr Zelensky said was a “deliberate war crime.”
Zelensky said the Russian strike hit a bus that was transporting workers of a mining and processing plant.
“An ordinary bus. Clearly a civilian object, a civilian target,” Zelensky said on X.
“It was an egregiously brutal attack – and an absolutely deliberate war crime,” he added, calling for “an immediate, full, and unconditional ceasefire.”
Russia fired a total of 134 attack drones at targets in Ukraine overnight, Kyiv’s air force said. There was no immediate comment from Russia.
Ukrainian officials arrived in London on Wednesday, even as most other big power foreign ministers pulled out, to hold talks about ways to achieve a ceasefire as a first step toward peace.
Marhanets, in south-central Ukraine, lies on the Ukrainian-controlled north bank of the Dnipro river’s dried-up reservoir that separates the warring sides.
Dnipropetrovsk regional governor Serhiy Lysak said nine people were killed in the attack and 49 were injured.
Zelensky shared photographs of the aftermath of the attack on X, showing bodies lying in and next to the bus and being carried away by emergency workers.
Zelensky added most of the injured were women.
Elsewhere, an energy plant that provides electricity to the city of Kherson near southern front lines was destroyed in an artillery and drone attack, regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin said.
Ukraine’s emergency service also reported a drone strike on the Synelnykivskyi district in the Dnipropetrovsk region that injured two people and sparked a fire at an agricultural enterprise.
Russia further fired drones into the central region of Poltava, injuring at least six people, its governor said.
A drone attack on civilian infrastructure in the suburbs of the Black Sea port city of Odesa injured two people and sparked several fires, regional governor Oleh Kiper said on Telegram.
Russian drone salvoes also set off large-scale fires in Ukraine’s second largest city, Kharkiv, in the northeast, Mayor Ihor Terekhov said on Telegram.
Seven private houses, a storage building and an outbuilding were also damaged by drones hitting the Kyiv capital region, where a fire also broke out in a restaurant complex, its regional governor said.
Both Russia and Ukraine are under pressure from the United States to demonstrate progress toward ending the war that began with Russia’s 2022 full-blown invasion amid warnings that US President Donald Trump could walk away from peacemaking.

Following Kashmir attack, Modi cuts short Saudi trip after talks on energy, defense

Updated 51 min 12 sec ago
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Following Kashmir attack, Modi cuts short Saudi trip after talks on energy, defense

  • Saudi Arabia is one of the top exporters of petroleum to India
  • Modi met Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman before cutting short his visit 

DUBAI: Saudi Arabia and India agreed to boost cooperation in supplies of crude and liquefied petroleum gas, according to a joint statement reported by the Saudi state news agency on Wednesday following a visit by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which was cut short by a militant attack in Indian-administered Kashmir. 

Saudi Arabia is one of the top exporters of petroleum to India. 

Modi met Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman before cutting short his visit and returning to New Delhi after an attack on India’s Jammu and Kashmir territory which killed 26 people, the worst attack in India since the 2008 Mumbai shootings. 

The two countries also agreed to deepen their defense ties and improve their cooperation in defense manufacturing, along with agreements in agriculture and food security.

“The two countries welcomed the excellent cooperation between the two sides in counter-terrorism and terror financing,” the joint statement said.


Staunchly Catholic Philippines begins period of mourning for Pope Francis

Updated 23 April 2025
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Staunchly Catholic Philippines begins period of mourning for Pope Francis

  • “Pope Francis holds a special place in the hearts of the Filipino people,” Marcos said
  • Francis drew a record crowd of up to seven million people at a historic Mass in Manila during a visit in 2015

MANILA: The Philippines began a period of national mourning for Pope Francis on Wednesday, with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr ordering flags on all state buildings across the staunchly Roman Catholic country to fly at half-mast to honor the pontiff.
Francis died on Monday aged 88 after suffering a stroke and cardiac arrest, the Vatican said, ending an often turbulent reign in which he repeatedly clashed with traditionalists and championed the poor and marginalized.
“Pope Francis holds a special place in the hearts of the Filipino people,” Marcos said in a presidential proclamation, adding that the period of mourning would continue until Francis’ funeral at the Vatican on Saturday.
“The passing of Pope Francis is a moment of profound sorrow for the Catholic Church and for the Filipino people, who recognize him as global leader of compassion and tireless advocate of peace, justice and human dignity,” the proclamation said.
The Philippines is home to more than 80 million Catholics, or nearly 80 percent of the population, making it one of only two majority Christian nations in Asia along with tiny East Timor.
Francis drew a record crowd of up to seven million people at a historic Mass in Manila during a visit in 2015.
Since his death on Monday, the Catholic Church has held Masses across the Philippines for Francis.
At the Baclaran Church in Manila, some worshippers on Wednesday wore shirts bearing Pope Francis’ image — leftover merchandise from his 2015 visit.
Emma Avancena, 76, who was a volunteer during the pope’s visit, said she felt sad about his death but added: “I feel blessed because we were blessed face to face, eye to eye (during the visit).”


First Indonesian Hajj pilgrims to reach Saudi Arabia next week

Updated 23 April 2025
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First Indonesian Hajj pilgrims to reach Saudi Arabia next week

  • Kingdom’s Makkah Route initiative will facilitate pilgrims in Jakarta, Surabaya and Solo
  • Thousands of Indonesian Hajj officers will be stationed in Makkah, Madinah and Jeddah

JAKARTA: The first group of more than 1,500 Indonesian pilgrims will depart for Saudi Arabia under the Makkah Route initiative next week, as 221,000 are expected to take part in this year’s Hajj.

In 2025, the Hajj is expected to take place on June 4 and end on June 9.

Though the pilgrimage itself can be performed over five or six days, many pilgrims arrive early to make the most of the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to fulfill their religious duty.

“Indonesian pilgrims will start departing on May 2, and this will be our first batch,” Hilman Latief, director general of Hajj and Umrah management at the Ministry of Religious Affairs, told Arab News.

“Some of them are still in the visa processing stage, but we are optimistic that their visas will be issued before their departure … we hope that the Hajj journey this year can go smoothly, and that our pilgrims will have a comfortable and safe trip.”

Indonesia, the world’s biggest Muslim-majority nation, sends the largest Hajj contingent of pilgrims every year to perform the spiritual journey that is one of the five pillars of Islam.

Its first Hajj flights are scheduled to depart from the cities of Jakarta, Surabaya and Solo, where Indonesian pilgrims will be facilitated under Saudi Arabia’s Makkah Route initiative.

Launched in Muslim-majority countries in 2019, the program allows Hajj pilgrims to fulfill all visa, customs and health requirements in one place, at the airport of origin, and save long hours of waiting before and upon reaching the Kingdom.

When they arrive in Saudi Arabia, Indonesians will be assisted by more than 4,000 Hajj officers who are stationed in Jeddah, Madinah and Makkah.

Each batch will have four officers, including medics, helping them at all times, said Nasrullah Jasam, who heads the Indonesian Hajj Organization Committee in Saudi Arabia.

“On the ground, the officers are also divided into various sectors. They are tasked to serve the pilgrims with things related to accommodation, transportation and food,” Jasam told Arab News.

“Our Hajj officers have undergone the technical guidance in Jakarta and are now preparing for the same in Saudi Arabia … we are ready.”