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PROVIDENCE , R.I. – The state health director appealed to a congregation of Liberian Americans Sunday to set aside their anger and mistrust of their home country’s faltering response to the Ebola outbreak to help stop an epidemic that has surely killed far more people than official estimates show. “Ebola in Liberia isn’t a problem of a virus,” Dr. Michael Fine told about 150 members of the congregation of Christ Center of Praise. “It is a problem of poverty and mistrust.” If members of Liberian enclaves around the United States, such as those in Rhode Island, Minneapolis and Dallas, call...

The first case of Ebola diagnosed in the U.S. has been confirmed in a man who recently travelled from Liberia to Dallas, sending chills through the area's West African community whose leaders urged caution to prevent spreading the virus... Stanley Gaye, president of the Liberian Community Association of Dallas-Fort Worth, said the 10,000-strong Liberian population in North Texas is skeptical of the CDC's assurances because Ebola has ravaged their country...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama is allowing thousands of Liberians living in the United States to remain in the country for an additional year and a half. A presidential memorandum issued Friday applies to Liberians who fled the country amid years of civil war and who are living in the United States under "deferred enforced departure status." Their stay was to have expired on March 31, but Obama is directing the Department of Homeland Security to extend it by 18 months.

Sen. Al Franken and 12 other congressmen signed a letter to the white house Tuesday urging President Obama to extend the Deferred Enforced Departure (DED) for Liberians living legally in the United States. "For the last twenty years, Minnesota has been home to one of the largest Liberian communities in the country," said Sen. Franken. "Roughly 25,000 Liberians currently call Minnesota their home and over 1,000 of them would face deportation if we allow these protections to expire." Since 1991, Liberians who were forced from their homes because of civil war and sought refuge in the United States have been...

President Barack Obama signed an Executive Order on March 20, extending the temporary stay in the US of an estimated 3,500 Liberians for another 12 months. Their current stay of deportation would have expired in about 10 days on March 31st, 2009 and would have subjected them to deportation. Liberians breathed a sigh of relief. Many are asking what about the Haitians? They are similarly situated insofar as the circumstances that led to their seeking refuge in the United States are not different than those which led to Liberians’ flight. Political upheaval, a shattered economy, a dysfunctional and feeble government,...

President Bush has granted a short-term reprieve for thousands of Liberians who have lived in the United States for as many as 16 years but would have been eligible for deportation on Oct. 1, the date their temporary residency permits were set to expire. Citing "compelling foreign policy reasons," Bush on Wednesday ordered an 18-month stay of deportation for approximately 3,500 Liberians with Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, a category granted to people from certain countries recovering from natural disaster or armed conflict. Since 1991, thousands of Liberians have been allowed to live and work in the United States under...

LIBERIAN rebels declared their second ceasefire in 10 days as forces loyal to President Charles Taylor pushed them to the capital's limits after days of fierce fighting that left hundreds dead. This week's battle for Monrovia sent thousands fleeing and turned up the heat on the former warlord, who was told by US President George Bush on Friday to step down and end a war that has spread turmoil through West Africa. As the guns fell silent after the truce was announced, hundreds of displaced people massed outside the US embassy, calling on Mr Bush to send in American troops...

TOTOTA, Liberia: Clustered around cheap transistor radios, thousands of hungry Liberians who have fled into yet another camp from the latest fighting between government and rebel forces devour war news from Iraq and wonder if American troops will one day liberate them from their misery. Many Liberians wish that America would focus its attention next on their war-riven west African nation and halt years of mass destruction that has killed thousands and uprooted nearly a third of the country's 3 million people from their homes. "We are frustrated. Our children are not in school and in this country, only a...

A Press Release Issued By The Union Of Liberian Associations In The Americas (ULAA)The Liberian Community today describes the late Senator Paul Wellstone as a courageous man. A man of principle, love and determination, who was an advocate for the rights of immigrants and the down trodden. He was one of America's greatest Senators whose advocacy was a blessing to the ordinary man of the American Society. His name is known in every household of the Liberian community and Liberian refugee camps in Africa. He spoke against and condemned warlords in Liberian that continue to destroy the country and impoverish...