Salvadoran Immigrants Start Getting Notices to Seek Asylum : Immigration: The INS messages--to those granted temporary protected status in 1990--extend for six months the deadline for avoiding deportation.

Almost 200,000 Salvadoran immigrants, a third of them in Southern California, began receiving long-anticipated notices from the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service this week. The message: Apply for political asylum soon or face possible deportation.

In a significant concession, the INS notices extended the asylum application deadline until Jan. 31, 1996, almost six months away, instead of three months hence, which had been expected.

But most eligible Salvadorans face a Sept. 30 cutoff of their work permits anyway, so officials and community representatives nationwide are urging a quick response.

Almost 200,000 Salvadorans who were granted “temporary protected status” by Congress in 1990 will receive the notices. About 70,000 notices will go to Salvadorans living in the Los Angeles area.

U.S. refugee law provides asylum for foreign nationals who would face persecution if they returned to their homelands.

A 1991 court settlement allows affected Salvadorans favorable conditions for filing asylum petitions. Applicants under the court case--known as ABC, shorthand for American Baptist Churches vs. Thornburgh--have the right to work while their petitions are pending. But all job-seekers must file separate applications with the INS for work permit extensions.

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The court case alleged that the Ronald Reagan Administration systematically discriminated against asylum applicants from pro-U.S. regimes in El Salvador and Guatemala, while routinely approving petitions from those fleeing Sandinista-controlled Nicaragua and other leftist governments.

About 50,000 Guatemalans have already applied for asylum under the ABC settlement. The application period for eligible Guatemalans expired earlier this year.