Brutal life for immigrants in Mexico
(Note: This is a little-known or publicized fact: Mexico is not friendly to those passing through it on their way to America. No wonder so many don't tarry and become Mexican citizens: "... the nation of 105 million has legalized only 15,000 immigrants in the past five years.")
April 19, 2006
By Mark Stevenson mstevenson@ap.org The Associated Press The Chicago Sun-Times To submit a Letter to the Editor: letters@suntimes.com
Tultitlan, Mexico - Considered felons by the government, these immigrants fear detention, rape and robbery. Sometimes they are deported; more often police officers simply take their money. While immigrants in the United States have held huge demonstrations in recent weeks, the hundreds of thousands of illegal Central Americans in Mexico suffer mostly in silence. And though Mexico demands humane treatment for its citizens who migrate to the U.S., Mexico provides few protections for immigrants on its own soil. The issue simply isn't on the country's political agenda, perhaps because immigrants make up only 0.5 percent of the population -- compared with 12 percent in the United States. The level of brutality Central American immigrants face in Mexico was apparent Monday, when police conducting a raid near a rail yard outside Mexico City shot to death a local man, apparently because his dark skin and work clothes made officers think he was an immigrant. The National Human Rights Commission, a government-funded agency, documented the abuses in Mexico in a December report. ''One of the saddest national failings on immigration issues is the contradiction in demanding that the North respect migrants' rights, which we are not capable of guaranteeing in the South,'' commission president Jose Luis Soberanes said. While Interior Secretary Carlos Abascal said Monday that ''Mexico is a country with a clear, defined and generous policy toward migrants,'' the nation of 105 million has legalized only 15,000 immigrants in the past five years.
Copyright 2006, Chicago Sun-Times. http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-mex19.html
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Brutal
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