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“Canada is quite demanding in terms of all of the paperwork,” said Janet Dench, executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees. “The UNHCR … can’t just pull out 10,000, let alone 25,000, referrals in a matter of weeks,” she added.

Experts say the timeline calls for the type of alternative approach that Canada employed to resettle 60,000 Indochinese boat people in 1979 and 1980, and to airlift more than 5,000 Kosovar refugees into the country in 1999.

The Kosovar refugees, who were fleeing a campaign of ethnic cleansing, were quickly moved. “You just do the basics in terms of entry into Canada on a temporary basis, which includes a basic security screening,” said Dench. They could apply for permanent residency later.

In the case of the Indochinese boat people, the Canadian government sent personnel to set up tables in refugee camps and process applications there. The refugees than travelled to Canada on chartered planes.

“These staff worked 18-, 20-hour days,” said Michele Millard, coordinator of the Centre for Refugee Studies at York University. “I’ve heard stories of them falling asleep at their desk and then waking up and continuing the lineup. That sense of urgency was there.”

These alternative approaches require Canada to pick refugees and decide whether to focus on groups that have been especially brutalized by ISIS, such as Syria’s Yazidi minority, or on everyone fleeing the dangerous civil war, said Guidy Mamann, an immigration lawyer based in Toronto.