Mexico: Asylum Seekers Face Abuses at Southern Border
--- "‘Sharp rise’ in Nicaraguans fleeing to Costa Rica, strains asylum system "Nicaragua "The Rise of Ortega-ismo" A Trump wish list. [Here, add to that all Republicans working to thwart a relatively fair and just democratic electoral system in the U.S.A.] [...] Since taking office in 2007, the government of President Daniel Ortega has dismantled nearly all institutional checks on presidential power. The Electoral Council, stacked with the president’s supporters, removed opposition lawmakers in 2016 and has barred opposition political parties ahead of the 2021 presidential elections. A constitutional amendment approved by President Ortega’s party, which controls the National Assembly, abolished term limits in 2014. President Ortega was elected to a fourth consecutive term in November amid government repression of critics and the political opposition. Many governments from the region and Europe said the elections had not met minimum guarantees to be considered free and fair. P - To pave the way for his re-election, authorities arbitrarily arrested and prosecuted government critics and political opponents, including presidential candidates, journalists, lawyers, and leaders of community, business, and student groups."
Related: conix, Some truth for you which you could comment on: Trump’s Next Coup Has Already Begun [...] For more than a year now, with tacit and explicit support from their party’s national leaders, state Republican operatives have been building an apparatus of election theft. Elected officials in Arizona, Texas, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, and other states have studied Donald Trump’s crusade to overturn the 2020 election. They have noted the points of failure and have taken concrete steps to avoid failure next time. Some of them have rewritten statutes to seize partisan control of decisions about which ballots to count and which to discard, which results to certify and which to reject. They are driving out or stripping power from election officials who refused to go along with the plot last November, aiming to replace them with exponents of the Big Lie. They are fine-tuning a legal argument that purports to allow state legislators to override the choice of the voters. ,, https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=167072165 .. Noted conix declined comment. " ---
June 6, 2022 12:00AM EDT
Improve Conditions, Procedures; US Should End Pressure to Block Arrivals
(Los Angeles) – Migrants and asylum seekers who enter Mexico .. https://www.hrw.org/americas/mexico .. through its southern border face abuses and struggle to obtain protection or legal status as a result of policies aimed at preventing them from reaching the US, Human Rights Watch said today. As leaders meet in Los Angeles for the Summit of the Americas, they should commit to ending abusive anti-immigration policies and to ensuring people seeking protection are received humanely in the US, Mexico, and elsewhere.
Refugee status applications and migrant apprehensions in Mexico have risen dramatically as US President Joe Biden has continued restricting access to asylum .. https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/04/08/us-end-misguided-public-health-border-expulsions .. at the US southern border, and pushed Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to heavily regulate travel to and within Mexico in order to prevent non-Mexican migrants from reaching the US .. https://www.voanews.com/a/usa_us-vice-president-calls-immigration-effort-mexico/6205565.html . Those who cross Mexico’s southern border fleeing violence and persecution struggle to obtain protection, face serious abuses and delays, and are often forced to wait for months in inhumane conditions near Mexico’s southern border while struggling to find work or housing.
“Outsourcing US immigration enforcement to Mexico has led to serious abuses and forced hundreds of thousands to wait in appalling conditions to seek protection,” said Tyler Mattiace, Americas researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The Summit of the Americas is an opportunity for regional leaders, including presidents Biden and López Obrador, to commit to a regional migration agreement that moves away from heavy-handed enforcement policies and towards protection and human rights.”
Most of those entering the southern border are Black, brown, and Indigenous people from Central America and the Caribbean who lack visas to enter Mexico. Nearly half of all asylum applicants in Mexico in 2021 were Haitians. Most enter near the city of Tapachula, in Chiapas state. Around 70 percent of those who apply for refugee status in Mexico do so in Tapachula.
Human Rights Watch interviewed more than 100 migrants, asylum seekers, representatives of migrants’ rights groups and UN agencies, and officials from Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico, between August 2021 and April 2022, in person and by phone, in Tapachula and Mexico City, and in Tecun Uman, Guatemala, near the main border crossing. Israel
Video, Israel, 24, Nicaragua
Most asylum seekers enter Mexico undocumented. Most said they came fleeing violence or persecution in their home countries but did not attempt to request protection at an official border crossing, fearing agents from Mexico’s immigration authority, the National Migration Institute (INM) would deport them. Most applied for refugee status once in Mexico. A few said they sought protection at the border and were turned away by INM agents or security guards. Many said INM agents dissuaded them from seeking refugee status in Mexico and pressured them to accept voluntary returns to their countries.
“I thought they would help us when we got to Mexico, but when we came to the border bridge and asked for protection they turned us away,” said one man who fled forced gang recruitment in Honduras. “I never thought I would have to leave my country. Now, I know if I went back, I wouldn’t last very long alive. If you don’t obey the gangs there, they force you to – or they kill you.”
In 2021, nearly 90,000 people applied for refugee status in Tapachula, equivalent to a quarter of the city’s population. Most wait many months for their applications to be reviewed and to receive documents proving their legal status and allowing them to leave. They often face discrimination, and struggle to find work and housing. Support programs by UNHCR and the Mexican government are insufficient. Some interviewees said they felt unsafe in Tapachula because it is close to the Guatemalan border, where the criminal groups they had fled were operating.
Mexico’s refugee system has been overwhelmed by the enormous growth in applicants. The budget for the refugee authority, the Mexican Commission for Refugee Assistance (COMAR), which is separate from the INM, has not kept pace, and it has a growing backlog of refugee status applications. In 2021, it received more than 130,000 but only processed 38,005. UNHCR pays for many basic operating costs, including two-thirds of staff’s salaries. UNHCR contributed $4.5 million in 2021. The federal government contributed just over $2 million. State governments provide free space for some offices and refugee centers.
Most asylum seekers said they were fleeing death threats, extortion, and forced recruitment by gangs or drug cartels in Honduras, Guatemala, or El Salvador – or political persecution and generalized human rights abuses in Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.
Senior INM officials said they do not believe most people seeking refugee status in Mexico have legitimate claims, either because they do not believe they are truly fleeing violence and persecution or because they believe most would prefer to seek asylum in the US. Mexican Foreign Relations Secretary Marcelo Ebrard has expressed similar sentiments publicly .. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/25/business/media/new-york-times-mexico-afghanistan.html .
COMAR is able to review only some of the refugee status applications it receives. It grants protection to nearly all Hondurans, Salvadorans, and Venezuelans whose cases it reviews. But it rejects most applicants from Haiti, saying they do not qualify as refugees. COMAR officials have acknowledged that Haitians cannot be safely returned .. https://www.eldiario.es/desalambre/andres-ramirez-jefe-comision-mexicana-refugiados-llegada-miles-haitianos-situacion-sobrepasado_1_8329444.html .. due to the severe security crisis there. The INM issued temporary “humanitarian” visas to about 50,000 Haitians in 2021. In 2022 it began a pilot program to allow 200 Haitian families who do not qualify as refugees to apply for residency in Mexico.
-- [ INSERT: Homeland Security says it will end “remain in Mexico” policy and allow asylum-seekers to enter U.S. The agency announced late Monday that it will end the Trump-era program, which forces asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico while their cases are pending, after a Texas federal judge lifted an injunction. by Nick Miroff, The Washington Post Aug. 9, 2022 9 AM Central https://www.texastribune.org/2022/08/09/remain-in-mexico-migrant-protection-protocols-judge-injunction/ ] --
Both the Biden and López Obrador administrations have a role in improving access to asylum procedures and the processing of refugee status applications in Mexico, Human Rights Watch said. The US should restore access to asylum at its border and stop pressuring Mexico to crack down on migration. Mexico should ensure that COMAR is properly funded and that asylum seekers are able to make claims at border crossings and from detention centers. Mexico should streamline processing of residence visas for those who have been recognized as refugees. And it should ensure that Haitians have access to protection and legal status.
“President López Obrador has often portrayed Mexico as a champion of migrants and asylum seekers,” Mattiace said. “If that is true, he should demonstrate it by ensuring asylum seekers in southern Mexico get a humane welcome.”
For additional information on the findings, recommendations, and a selection of cases, please see below. Unless noted otherwise, the cases are based on the direct testimony of interviewees.
Human Rights Watch interviewed 80 migrants and asylum seekers in Tecun Uman, Guatemala, and Tapachula, Mexico, primarily in August and September 2021, with additional interviews conducted into May 2022, with 28 representatives of UN bodies, the Mexican, Guatemalan, and Honduran governments, the Chiapas state prosecutor’s office, and migrants’ rights organizations. Human Rights Watch also reviewed documents, photos, videos, text messages, and voice notes that supported and often directly corroborated individual case accounts and received information from the Mexican federal and the Chiapas state government.
President López Obrador has intensified immigration restrictions and enforcement efforts in response to US pressure. He imposed new visa requirements, making it harder for Brazilians, Venezuelans, and Ecuadorians to travel to Mexico. He has also imposed new restrictions on domestic travel, including requiring proof of immigration status for domestic bus trips .. https://latinus.us/2021/10/01/inm-lineas-autobuses-documentacion-pasajeros-frenar-crisis-migratoria/ .. and regular immigration status checks on domestic flights.
The INM has a significant presence across Mexico and operates one of the largest immigration detention systems in the world, with over 6,000 staff in 499 locations, including 194 points of entry and 66 immigration detention centers. Soldiers and immigration agents conduct “control and verification” operations nationwide to apprehend undocumented migrants. They operate checkpoints on major roads and conduct patrols and surprise inspections on buses and airplanes, at hotels, along the northern and southern borders, and in public spaces like parks. They regularly publicize these efforts .. https://twitter.com/INAMI_mx/status/1522335246498340865?s=20&t=KgxH9674pkEiFQqPf7B1fA . The Mexican Supreme Court recently ruled these checkpoints unconstitutional. Congress will need to amend the law for the ruling to take effect.
In some cases, efforts to apprehend undocumented migrants have led to serious violence and even deaths. In October 2021, National Guard troops opened fire on a truck carrying migrants, in an apparent attempt to detain them, killing two. According to news reports, survivors alleged that the troops tried to cover up the killings by planting a weapon on one of the victims and claiming they had shot in self defense. This is a common and well-documented practice .. https://www.hrw.org/news/2011/11/09/mexico-widespread-rights-abuses-war-drugs .. by soldiers. In March 2021, soldiers shot and killed a Guatemalan man who failed to stop at a checkpoint. In September, immigration agents were filmed kicking and beating families in a migrant caravan.
Mexico’s Refugee System
Under Mexican and international law, anyone has the right to apply for refugee status and have their claim heard by appropriate authorities. Officials are prohibited from returning people to a country where their life would be threatened or they would be at risk of torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, regardless of whether they intend to apply for refugee status in Mexico.Mexico’s refugee system is overseen by COMAR, a much smaller agency than the INM, which oversees all other immigration issues, including enforcement. COMAR receives and decides refugee status claims at its nine offices throughout the country. It has no permanent presence at airports or border crossings.
Mexican law recognizes anyone fleeing generalized violence, internal conflict, or massive human rights abuses that seriously disturb public order, among others, as a refugee. COMAR has determined that Salvadorans, Hondurans, and Venezuelans come from countries where these conditions are prevalent. As long as their reason for fleeing is connected to the disturbance of public order, COMAR nearly always presumes they are refugees and grants them protection.
But applicants from other countries where Human Rights Watch has documented similarly dangerous conditions, such as Cubans and Haitians, are not given this treatment, and are much less likely to receive protection. COMAR officials say most Haitians do not qualify as refugees, since many previously had legal status in Chile or Brazil and do not cite disturbed public order as a reason for leaving Haiti.
COMAR provides applicants a certificate confirming their status as a refugee status applicant. They can use it to apply to the INM for a temporary “humanitarian” visa, valid until their claim is resolved, which they can show to avoid being detained if stopped by INM agents. COMAR also provides applicants a temporary national ID number, needed to work and access services.
Applicants are not allowed to leave the state while their application is pending, even if they have a “humanitarian” visa. Those found to have done so by immigration agents are considered to have “abandoned” their application and can be detained and deported.
Once someone is recognized as a refugee, their temporary “humanitarian” visa is no longer valid. They must apply to the INM for a permanent residence visa. Without it, they cannot travel within Mexico and may be detained and considered undocumented if they reach a checkpoint. Recognized refugees are exempt from visa application fees.
Barriers to Protection for Detained Migrants
Human Rights Watch interviewed 19 people who had been held in immigration detention centers. Most said they were detained after entering the country undocumented, before applying for asylum.
Some said immigration agents tried to dissuade them from applying for refugee status and pressured them to agree to voluntary return, even when they said they would be at risk of violence and persecution in their home countries. Some said they were instructed to sign voluntary return documents without reading them. Others said agents used poor conditions in detention as a deterrent, saying they would spend months in detention if they sought refugee status.
Immigration officials said that their agents always inform detained migrants of their right to seek refugee status. However, COMAR rarely receives refugee status claims from apprehended migrants, according to official statistics. Of the over 130,000 refugee status applications received by COMAR in 2021, only 4,177, about 3 percent, came from people apprehended by the immigration agents at the border.
All asylum seekers are identified by pseudonyms for their protection. The following are some of their accounts:
They detained me on Friday. On Monday, the immigration agent arrived. She took us up to the second floor. She told us “You have two options here: deportation or COMAR. The best thing for you to do is request voluntary deportation, because if you request COMAR you could be here from 90 days to three years waiting for a decision. And apart from that you need to wait for your visa. You’re going to waste a lot of time that way. Why don’t you just go back to your countries? - Emiliano, 51, Venezuela Emiliano
The day after I was detained, the immigration agent came and said we all had to sign our deportation papers. I told him “I don’t want to be deported. I want asylum.” He asked me my name. Then he turned to the group and said “Julio is talking about asylum. You should all know that if you request asylum, you will be here for six months.” The others said they didn’t want to be in detention for six months, so they signed the papers and were sent back. I was the only one who refused to sign. - Julio, 29, Honduras
[... much more ...]
Recommendations
To the INM
* Ensure that immigration agents inform all apprehended migrants of their right to seek refugee status or other forms of international protection in Mexico, as required by national law, and do not attempt to dissuade people from seeking protection.
* Improve conditions of migration detention, particularly by ensuring:
- adequate, clean, and safe sanitation facilities;
- proper and clean bedding for each detainee;
- access to telephones; and
- timely, proper responses to requests for medical care.
* Expedite procedures to apply for residence visas for recognized refugees.
* Make it simpler and less costly for those already eligible for legal status in Mexico to apply for and receive it without applying for refugee status.
* Work with the International Organization for Migration to expand the pilot program to help non-refugees obtain legal status and integrate in cities in Central Mexico.
To COMAR
* Place representatives at border crossings and points of entry to facilitate protection for those requiring it.
* Expand presence at detention centers to ensure that detained asylum seekers can seek refugee status.
* Evaluate claims from Haitians using the same standard applied to other applicants from countries experiencing generalized violence, or mass human rights violations that have seriously disturbed public order.
* Grant complementary protection to Haitians who do not qualify as refugees and do not have legal status in another country, since they cannot be safely returned to Haiti.
To the Mexican Interior Ministry
* Conduct an audit of COMAR’s needs and capacity, and ensure that the agency is sufficiently staffed and funded.
To the Biden Administration
* Restore access to asylum at the US border.
* Stop pushing Mexico to prevent migrants from reaching the US border, and collaborate with Mexico and other governments to create a holistic regional plan for access to protection and safe, dignified migration.
* Provide support for COMAR to permanently expand its capacity.
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