World

Separation of migrant families prompts global condemnation

June 20, 2018
Pope Francis gestures during an exclusive interview at the Vatican on June 17, 2018. — Reuters
Pope Francis gestures during an exclusive interview at the Vatican on June 17, 2018. — Reuters

VATICAN CITY/LONDON — Pope Francis criticized the Trump administration’s policy of separating migrant families at the Mexican border, saying populism is not the answer to the world’s immigration problems.

Speaking to Reuters, the Pope said he supported recent statements by US Catholic bishops who called the separation of children from their parents “contrary to our Catholic values” and “immoral”.

“It’s not easy, but populism is not the solution,” Francis said on Sunday night.

One of his most pointed messages concerned President Donald Trump’s zero-tolerance immigration policy, in which US authorities plan to criminally prosecute all immigrants caught crossing the Mexican border illegally, holding adults in jail while their children are sent to government shelters.

The Trump administration faces a growing swell of condemnation at home and abroad for the separations, the product of a “zero-tolerance” policy on undocumented migrants.

Francis’ comments add to the pressure on Trump over immigration policy. The pope heads a church which has 1.3 billion members worldwide and is the largest Christian denomination in the United States.

Joining the growing chorus of protest, British Prime Minister Theresa May on Wednesday said images of children being held in cages in US migrant detention facilities were deeply disturbing and that Britain did not approve of separating migrant families.

“The pictures of children being held in what appear to be cages are deeply disturbing. This is wrong, this is not something that we agree with, this is not the United Kingdom’s approach,” May told parliament.

The United Nations, international rights groups, Christian evangelicals, former US first ladies and prominent figures in the president’s own Republican party have all criticized the policy.

In a joint letter Monday, Mexico and the Vatican said that “children are the ones who are suffering the most” from forced migration and the turmoil it leads to.

Guatemala expressed its “concern” Tuesday over the US policy and its effects. The human rights ombudsmen of Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala and Honduras meanwhile petitioned the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in Washington to intervene to block the “dangerous” practice of separating families.

US officials say more than 2,300 children have been separated from their parents or guardians since early May, when the “zero-tolerance” policy was announced.

“Mexico’s foreign minister on Tuesday called the separation of children from immigrant parents at the US-Mexico border “cruel and inhumane” while the leftist front-runner ahead of next month’s presidential vote called it “racist.”

Images published this week of children and youths sitting in concrete-floored cages in US shelter facilities have generated outrage.

“This is a clear violation of human rights and puts children, including those with disabilities, in a vulnerable situation,” Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray told a news conference in Mexico City, where he urged the United States to reconsider the practice.

Videgaray said the Mexican government had made its position clear to US President Donald Trump’s administration and raised the issue with senior United Nations officials, including UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who leads polls ahead of the country’s July 1 election, asked Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto to “act urgently” to stop “that arrogant, racist, inhuman attitude of deporting children, putting them in cages and separating them from their parents.”

“Soon, very soon, when our movement triumphs, we will defend the migrants from Mexico, Central America, all the American continent, and all the migrants of the world,” he said at a rally in Culiacan, the capital of the north-western state of Sinaloa. — Agencies


June 20, 2018
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