Migrant Policy Conference (Mexico)


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RIGHTS-MEXICO:  NEW CALLS FOR MIGRANT PROTECTION

OTC 5/12/1999 5:04 PM

MEXICO CITY, (May 11) IPS - Each year some 320,000 Mexicans head 
for the United States in search of work. Last year, more than 350 
Mexicans lost their lives making the attempt. 
   Now, government officials and social groups alike are looking for 
a solution to the problem of emigration through the lack of work 
opportunities here. It was discussed at length at a weekend 
Colloquium on Migrant Policy held in Oaxaca, 400 kilometres south 
of Mexico City. 
   Experts agreed that the migration of Mexicans to the United States 
is fundamentally a labour problem that threatens to create social 
conflicts. 
   Noting that 357 Mexicans died in 1998 while attempting to cross 
the Mexican-U.S. border, Under-Secretary of Population, Fernando 
Solis, stressed the need to convince the United States not to treat 
the migration problem as a police issue. 
   Police operations -- increasing in the number of agents or building 
walls on the border -- would not solve a problem "that is eminently 
human...an immigrant is not a criminal," Solis said. 
   "We should demand this conception of the migrant problem, but we 
should also apply it (in Mexico) to undocumented people from any 
other country," he added. 
   Mexico is a bridge to the United States for hundreds of thousands 
of Central Americans. According to officials, each year, 10 million 
people enter Mexico with legal documentation, while 100,000 are 
deported by Migration officials because they do not have travel 
documents. 
   Smugglers of illegal immigrants, known as "coyotes", attempt to 
bring people from Mexico or Central America into the United States. 
Usually the immigrants are from the poorer regions and must travel 
dangerous routes in closed train cars or trucks that ultimately may 
become their coffins. 
   In the state of Oaxaca alone, whose capital hosted the Colloquium, 
between 100,000 and 150,000 people abandon their communities and 
head for the United States every year. 
   The migrant workers send $6 billion annually to their families in 
Mexico, an amount representing the fifth largest source of cash 
for the country, said Jorge Bustamante from the Northern Border 
College. 
   The researcher proposed the creation of "Mexican migrant houses" 
in U.S. cities, which would serve as a kind of "embassy or 
consulate" for undocumented workers. 
   Jose Murat, Governor of Oaxaca, said the migration phenomenon 
results from the lack of opportunities, while Rene Juarez, from 
Guerrero, recognized that efforts to meet the migrants' needs are 
insufficient and asked for more federal resources for the states 
with the highest rate of emigration. 
   Abuses against migrants do not occur only in the United States. 
   In the agricultural areas of northern Mexico, such as Sinaloa and 
Sonora, indigenous people arriving from Mexico's south are 
exploited, according to the vice-coordinator of the Oaxacan 
Indigenous Front, Rufino Dominguez. 
   Since the end of the 1970s, approximately 45,000 Guatemalans have 
sought refuge in the southeastern states of Mexico. The Guatemalan 
refugees were escaping the violence of their country's civil war. 
   In 1992, after the Guatemalan government and guerrillas signed a 
peace agreement, the process of repatriation began, and is to end 
this July. However, some 20,000 indigenous Guatemalans have chosen 
to stay and live in Mexico permanently. 
   
Copyright 1999 IPS

 
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