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US-MEXICO: Bad Year for Immigrants

Diego Cevallos

MEXICO CITY, Dec 18 2007 (IPS) - More than one Mexican a day died this year while attempting to cross the U.S. border, and there are no prospects for that number to drop over the next year. In the last three years alone, nearly 1,500 people have died this way.

The problems of mistreatment, deaths and persecution "will never be resolved" if the United States insists on adopting unilateral measures, Jorge Bustamante, United Nations special rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, said Tuesday, International Migrants Day.

The issue is "bilateral by definition" and must be treated as such, said Bustamante, who lamented that the U.S. government and lawmakers insisted on seeing the question as a domestic one that requires military and police solutions.

Around 500,000 Mexicans make it into the United States every year, while more than 500,000 are deported.

Migrants’ rights advocates complain that the human rights of immigrants are frequently abused when they are rounded up or intercepted and deported.

There has been a rise in anti-immigrant sentiment in the U.S. this year, as well as an increase in the number of workplace raids. At the same time, construction of walls and fences along the border with Mexico has continued apace, with 120 km of barriers built so far.


Meanwhile, several legal initiatives are moving ahead in different states to limit the rights of immigrants and their access to health and education services.

In an apparent expression of racial hatred, four undocumented Mexican migrants were stabbed to death early this month in an apartment in the state of Ohio.

"It was a terrible year for Mexican migrants, but that&#39s not surprising because things have been getting steadily worse for a long time now and there is no end in sight," Sergio Peláez, an expert in international politics at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, told IPS.

Some 11 million people who were born in Mexico live in the United States today, around six million of whom have no legal documents and live in constant fear of being deported.

Mexican Foreign Ministry figures indicate that from Jan. 1 to Dec. 5, 447 Mexicans died along the U.S.-Mexican border – just slightly less than last year’s total of 485, and the 2005 total of 516.

As border controls are stepped up, immigrants attempt to make the crossing in increasingly remote desert zones along the 3,200-km border, where they face many risks. Most of those who die got lost in the desert or died of thirst, starvation or exposure. Others drown crossing the Rio Grande or suffocate in boxcars or trucks.

"The death of our fellow countrymen along the border has become routine," said Peláez. "It is a tragedy that should be seen as an alert for the governments of Mexico and the United States."

In both countries, officials lament the deaths, but the anti-immigrant climate and measures that generate them remain in place.

Many aspiring U.S. presidential candidates for the November 2008 elections, both Republicans and Democrats, have indicated that they favour tougher immigration controls, and are not at all keen to legalise the status of immigrants.

Mexican President Felipe Calderón said on Monday that there is a climate of resentment and intolerance against Mexican workers, who in his view pose no real problem to the United States.

He said he was convinced that the more hostile and discriminatory that U.S. immigration policy became, the lower would be the productivity and competitiveness of the U.S., because immigrants make a substantial contribution to the U.S. economy.

In 2005, undocumented immigrants in the state of Texas, where a large proportion of Mexican workers live, contributed 1.58 billion dollars to the economy, while the authorities spent 1.16 billion dollars on them, according to a Texas state government study published early this month.

According to the Mexican government, several studies show that Mexicans are 40 percent more likely to start a business than U.S. citizens.

Those who support the police raids that are terrorising immigrants and their families do not want to hear nor see the facts which show the benefits the U.S. population derives from the presence of undocumented immigrants, said the U.N. special rapporteur.

In November, the Mexican government announced that it would open two new consulates in the U.S., bringing the total number to 52, and that all consulates would beef up their legal teams to help migrants suffering from discrimination, as well as providing aid and comfort if they are arrested with a view to being deported.

Awareness-raising campaigns will also be launched in the U.S. media to improve the image of immigrants and "correct distorted perceptions," the government said.

On Monday Calderón visited the Mexican-U.S. border and announced a programme to give shelter and temporary work to the more than half a million immigrants who are expelled annually by the U.S., many of whom have suffered mistreatment and humiliation. The programme is to commence in 2008.

Migrants are to be sheltered in hostels where they may receive medical treatment, food, advice, and the use of a telephone to call their families. They will also be offered work for up to six months in border areas. The programme, which is supported by a number of companies, is known as Repatriación Humana (Humane Repatriation). It will begin in the Mexican border city of Tijuana and will later be extended to other cities along the border.

Bustamante said the initiative was a "decent response" to the mountain of problems faced by migrants.

 
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