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America backs down from human rights-violating bill

22/6/18


After withdrawing from the United Nations Human Rights Council, the U.S. continue to giving up before human rights values in a different way. President Donald Trump has backed down after widespread criticism of an immigration policy that split families at the US border, signing an executive order that will put a stop to the practice.
The issue has plagued his administration after it was revealed that at least 2,000 children had been torn from their parents under a new “zero tolerance” immigration policy.
His administration’s “zero tolerance” stance toward undocumented migrants and asylum seekers who enter the US means it will seek to prosecute each one criminally. Because their children cannot be taken to jail due to prior legal rulings, they are separated and put into the Department of Health and Human Services’ care.
Images of children held in cages have prompted bipartisan and international criticism.
Mr Trump said on Wednesday that the zero tolerance policy would continue, but that he “didn’t like the sight or the feeling of families being separated”.
The executive order, he said, was “about keeping families together, while at the same time being sure that we have a very powerful, very strong border”.
“I think the word ‘compassion’ comes into it, but it’s still equally as tough, if not tougher,” Mr Trump added. The day before, he had accused immigrants of “infesting” the country, and declared the US would not be a “refugee holding facility”.
Family separations have escalated under Mr Trump’s new zero tolerance policy, which requires all adults caught crossing the border illegally to be referred for prosecution. Adult immigrants facing charges are housed separately from their children, resulting in the separation of parents from children reportedly as young as eight-months-old.
The president denied allegations that he was backing down from his strict stance on immigration, telling reporters at the signing that the southern border was “just as tough” as before.
A spokesman for Health and Human Services, which oversees the resettlement of migrant children, told multiple outlets on Wednesday that the more than 2,000 children already separated from their parents would not be immediately reunited under the new order. Kenneth Wolfe, a spokesman for the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), told the New York Times there would be no "grandfathering of existing cases".
Still, immigrants' rights activists criticised the order, saying it did not address the larger issues concerning the zero tolerance policy. The executive order, they pointed out, only solved the problem of family separations by requiring parents and children to be detained together for an indefinite amount of time.
“Make no mistake – this executive order is a betrayal of families fleeing violence and persecution,” said Denise Bell, a refugee and migrant rights researcher at Amnesty International USA. ”Mothers, fathers, and children must not be held behind bars for prolonged periods for seeking safety.”
The order came after weeks of backlash, as video circulated of families being housed in large metal cages and children crying after being taken from their parents. The Associated Press reported the night before that the administration had set up three “tender age” shelters to house young children – many under the age of 5. 
“Then they wake up from their naps and again they’re crying for their mom, asking: ‘Where’s my dad’,” said Chris Paulsey, the CEO of the largest agency handling young migrant children in the US. “They absolutely need their parents right now.” 
To many critics of the Trump administration, family separation is an unpardonable atrocity. Articles depict children crying themselves to sleep because they don’t know where their parents are; one Honduran man killed himself in a detention cell after his child was taken from him.
In an interview with Reuters, Pope Francis has called Donald Trump‘s “zero tolerance” policy that leads to the separation of migrant children from their parents at the US-Mexico border “immoral”.
“Populism is not the solution” to America’s immigration crisis, the pontiff said.
Human rights groups, religious organisations, and legislators across the political spectrum have called for the end of family separations. Several states pulled their National Guard troops from the US-Mexico border this week, and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced plans to sue the federal government./.


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All comments [ 15 ]


LawrenceSamuels 23/6/18 11:20

The policy is facing mounting criticism, even from first lady Melania Trump, who said she “hates” to see families separated at the border and hopes Republicans and Democrats can reform the U.S. immigration laws.

Duncan 23/6/18 11:23

Even the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights official called on Trump administration to halt its “unconscionable” policy, saying it punishes “children for their parent’s action.”

Jacky Thomas 23/6/18 11:24

Nearly 2,000 children were separated from adults at the U.S.-Mexico border between mid-April and the end of May, according to the U.S. officials — and the Trump administration is now hoping to enforce even stricter border enforcement policies.

Robinson Jones 23/6/18 11:27

The policy has drawn condemnation from medical professionals, religious leaders and immigration activists, calling the separation cruel and un-American, as well as warning that some children could suffer lasting psychological trauma.

Enda Thompson 23/6/18 11:29

Critics have also accused the president of effectively turning the children into political hostages to secure stricter immigration measures, such as funding for a U.S.-Mexico border wall.

Kevin Evans 23/6/18 11:30

This zero-tolerance policy is cruel. It is immoral. And it breaks my heart!

Alian 23/6/18 11:32

That’s traumatizing to the children who are innocent victims, and it is contrary to the global values in the U.S.

Socialist Society 23/6/18 11:36

Screaming children heard crying for parents at US detention centre after being separated at border under Trump policy.

Egan 23/6/18 11:38

The UN’s top human rights official has likened the situation at the border to child abuse, and the American Association of Paediatricians has said it could cause “irreparable harm.”

Roger Brown 23/6/18 11:40

Children should never be detained for reasons related to their own or their parents' migration status. Detention is never in the best interests of the child and always constitutes a child rights violation.

Gentle Moon 23/6/18 21:05

The U.S. doesn't have a "moral right" to keep the families together and stressed that most of the time the separations could be measured "within days."

Red Star 23/6/18 21:11

This is now the criminalization of asylum-seekers now being penalized for the way they're coming to the U.S. and seeking protection.

Me Too! 23/6/18 21:13

The Trump administration’s practice of separating children from migrant families entering the United States violates their rights and international law.

yobro yobro 23/6/18 23:56

Once again, the United Nations shows its hypocrisy by calling out the United States while it ignores the reprehensible human rights records of several members of its own Human Rights Council.

Me Too! 23/6/18 23:57

Neither the United Nations nor anyone else will dictate how the United States upholds its borders.

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