Immigration Issues Hit Home

Another issue that is actually very important to me has to do with immigration. I never fully understood how hard it was to try to live and work in a country without a visa, until I was forced to leave Italy due to an expired visa. This coming just days after Silvio Berlusconi basically said that Italy will no longer accept immigrants. Many times while watching the news I saw boat loads of Moroccans, Africans and Romanians being deported back to where they came from, hoping to build a better life for themselves and their families.

However, in the past year, new laws being enforced in Italy are making it much harder for immigrants to stay, including marriage laws and extending visas. The newest law however comes as a surprise to many: immigrants who have school age children born in Italy are no longer allowed to stay and will be deported, regardless of the impact on the children.

The Supreme Court said thursday that foreigners with out permission to live in Italy mus be expelled from the country even if they have young children at school and from whom they will be separated. Italy's highest appeals tribunal, the Court of Cassation, overturned its own previous rulings that "indicated the welfare of the children was paramount in these cases" regarding immigration.

The Supreme Court most recently rejected an appeal by and Albanian national, whose wife is ready to give birth to their third child and currently awaiting citizenship in Italy, stating that the mans situation was not sufficiently exceptional to prevent his expulsion under the Italian law.

The court also said that they can only overlook illegal residency for a limited period of time and only "when there are serious concerns linked to psychological and physical development of a minor arising from an emerging situation."

This ruling also overturned two previous rulings by the same court, the most recent ruling made in January. In both cases the Judge ruled that a child's welfare takes precedence over a parents immigration status.