Haitians arriving illegally in Canada by the thousands

There were 14,467 refugee claims made by people who crossed into Canada outside legal border points in a nine-month period this year, and nearly half of them were from Haiti. Data released by the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) on Wednesday shows that 6,304 citizens of Haiti claimed refugee status after crossing illegally into Canada between February and October, about 44 per cent of the total number. 298 have had their claims finalized so far, and just 29 of them, or 10 per cent, have been accepted.

That number will certainly rise as some 50,000 Haitians who've lived and worked in the United States since an earthquake in 2010 are reeling from news that their special protected status in the US will be canceled.