Five illegal Sikh migrants are among eight others asylum seekers who have been released on bond from a prison in the US state of Oregon where they were locked up for three months after getting caught in the Trump administration's controversial "zero-tolerance" policy, immigration lawyers have said.
A group of 52 Indians, mostly Sikhs, has been held at a detention centre in Oregon in May for being part of a large contingent of illegal immigrants seeking asylum. The Indians form the largest group of detainees in the total 124 illegal immigrants being held at the facility in Sheridan.
Five migrants, all twenty-something men from India, made their first public appearance yesterday after nearly three months at the Oregon prison put them in the center of a political firestorm.
"In the beginning I had no hope," Karandeep Singh, 24 was quoted as saying by the Oregon Live.
"Now it's like a dream. I'm so happy. Thank you all of the people who have helped us."
"I don't blame the prison officials," Karandeep said. "They probably didn't know how Sikhs pray."
"We were seriously depressed," said Lovpreet Singh, 22, through an interpreter. We couldn't get out of our cells at all, let alone use the phone to call our families. Even the prison officials didn't know who we were. How were our families supposed to help us when they don't know where we are?"
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