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 News from Around the Americas | July 2005 
Mexican Candidate Says U.S. Must Liberalize Immigration
 Michelle Mittelstadt - The Dallas Morning News
Washington - While Mexico has enhanced security since the Sept. 11 attacks, future cooperation hinges on U.S. willingness to liberalize its immigration policies, former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda warned Congress on Tuesday.
Castaneda, who is running as an independent in the 2006 presidential race, said security must be twinned with what he called the "whole enchilada" - legalization for the 6 million Mexicans living here illegally, visas for Mexicans desiring to come here in the future, and economic development for impoverished interior regions responsible for the exodus.
"There can be no future cooperation beyond what already exists without some form of immigration package," he told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee during a border security hearing.
Just as immigration is a volatile topic in the United States, Castaneda said the idea of enhanced U.S.-Mexican cooperation on security issues, such as military-to-military involvement, is "very, very sensitive" to Mexicans.
"It is not easy for any Mexican government to move forward on that," he said. "It can be done in a package. If it's done in a sort of salami-type arrangement - slice by slice - I'm not sure it's going to work."
But Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., pointed to the difficulties inherent in enacting a massive immigration-and-security package and instead suggested that both countries tackle measured "confidence-building" steps.
"I can't agree with you that we have to do this in totality," Dodd said. "As a practical matter, it's just very difficult to anticipate Congress adopting large comprehensive proposals."
The Senate Judiciary Committee on July 27 will consider rival proposals that would create guest worker programs for many of the estimated 11 million to 12 million illegal immigrants of all nationalities already here.
One, by Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., would provide a path to citizenship after six years as a guest worker. The other, being drafted by GOP Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Jon Kyl of Arizona, would require the guest workers to return home when their visas expire.
Both bills include enhanced border security measures but fall short of the expansive framework advanced by Castaneda.
The former Mexican official, who resigned from President Vicente Fox's Cabinet in 2003, acknowledged that Mexico must do more to crack down on organized crime gangs operating with near impunity along the Southwest border. He also spoke of the need for Mexico to control its southern border, which Central Americans and other foreigners cross en route to the U.S.
"More and more people in Mexico today understand that our southern border has to be brought back under control," he said. "We are having enormous problems with the Salvadoran gangs, the Mara Salvatrucha, in southern Mexico. We are having enormous problems with prostitution (and) drugs on our southern border."
The United States is confronted with a rising wave of foreigners using Mexico as a platform to cross illegally into the United States, Border Patrol Chief David Aguilar testified.
The Border Patrol is on pace to apprehend 148,000 non-Mexican illegal immigrants this year - nearly twice the 75,000 arrested last year, he said. As many as 4,000 non-Mexicans arrested this year are from Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iraq and other countries known to harbor terrorists, said Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Dick Lugar, R-Ind. |
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