Syrian Woman Caught in Costa Rica With Fake Passport Traveling to US
Days after five Syrian men were detained in Honduras reportedly trying to use stolen and doctored Greek passports to enter the Unites States, Costa Rica has detained a Syrian woman with a fake Greek passport who was trying to do the same.
According to the BBC, Costa Rican authorities revealed the woman, who had flown in from Peru, was arrested in a hotel in the capital city of San Jose.
As previously reported, the five Syrians who were detained on Tuesday appeared to have no link to militant Islam. Reuters reports that the Syrians stopped in Honduras had traveled through five countries, Turkey, Greece, Brazil, Argentina and Costa Rica, before arriving in Honduras.
For years, migrants from Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria have attempted to get to the U.S. through Central American nations. The recent terror attack in Paris has compelled U.S. lawmakers to look for legal ways to keep some Syrians from coming into the country.
As CNN reports, on Thursday the House passed a bill that would suspend the current program that allows Syrian and Iraqi refugees into the U.S. until national security agencies can be certain that the incoming refugees pose no security risk to the country.
Both Democrats and Republicans came together to support the bill, which passed 289 to 137.
New House Speaker Paul Ryan informed reporters that passing the bill was an urgent matter.
“We cannot and should not wait to act, not when our national security is at stake," Ryan said.
The Obama administration has threatened to veto the bill.
Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi voted against the bill and said she saw the Republican-led legislature as a missed chance for unification between Republicans and Democrats. Pelosi felt that a better bill would have reformed the current visa waiver program and would make sure that people on a terrorist watch list could not get guns.
Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy remarked that the real problem affecting the U.S. regarding militant Islamists was a lack of a plan.
"The real problem is ISIL and the lack of a strategy," McCarthy said.
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