29 Nov 2012

UN agency becomes involves in case of stateless man in American Samoa

3:04 pm on 29 November 2012

The office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has sent a film crew to American Samoa recently to shoot a documentary about stateless person Mikhail Sebastian.

He was born in Azerbaijan but became stateless when the former Soviet Union collapsed, and after ten years living in the US he travelled to Pago Pago on holiday but was denied to re-entry to the US mainland for lack of citizenship.

Beverley Tse has more:

"The film crew from the UN refugee agency firstly spent 2 days in Los Angeles interviewing his friends before they traveled to the territory. During their four day stay the crew interviewed the Nu'uuli family that has housed Sebastian, and shot video of the island, particularly places that show it is a US territory. Mr Sebastian says the UNHCR is trying to use the video to persuade the US Government to let him back in. It will first be shown at UNHCR headquarters for White House and Department of Homeland Security officials."