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 Editorials | Issues | August 2007 
Mexico Slams Border Shooting, US Congress for Failing to Pass Immigration Bill
 Associated Press
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| | Mexican President Felipe Calderon (R) gives a speech during a dinner to honor Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (L) at the "Castillo de Chapultepec" in Mexico City, 06 August 2007. Calderon on Thursday called the US Congress "insensitive" to the dignity of Mexican migrant workers. (AFP/Presidencia) |
Mexico City - Mexico criticized the "excessive use of force" by American border authorities and slammed what it called insensitivity among U.S. legislators who failed to approve immigration reforms.
Tensions over the immigration issue boiled to the surface after an unidentified Border Patrol agent shot and killed the Mexican man, a suspected immigrant smuggler, at the fence that separates El Paso, Texas from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico on Wednesday.
"The Mexican government expresses a firm protest against the use of lethal weapons in the face of situations that do not represent a proportionate risk," the Foreign Relations Department said in a statement. "Mexico reiterates its condemnation of the excessive use of force by U.S. immigration authorities on the border."
The statement said the Mexican consulate in El Paso had sent notes to the office of the border patrol, the FBI and local authorities, demanding an investigation into the shooting and that "all the weight of the law be brought to bear against the person or persons responsible."
The dead man, Jose Alejandro Ortiz Castillo, 23, had been caught crossing the border 28 times since 1999. He was carrying a bolt cutter and picked up a rock when the U.S. agent tried to detain a group of migrants, Border Patrol spokesman Doug Mosier said.
It was at least the third fatal shooting involving Border Patrol agents this year. In January, Agent Nicholas Corbett shot and killed an illegal crosser from Mexico in Arizona. Corbett, who has been ordered to stand trial in federal court on a charge of second-degree murder, has claimed self defense.
Last month, an undercover border agent in the San Diego area fatally shot an illegal immigrant from Mexico after the pair reportedly scuffled over control of a gun.
Mexico has suggested that guns are an excessive response to rock-throwing. The Border Patrol, meanwhile, says shootings are on the rise because more agents are being assaulted, and notes that its agents have suffered serious head injuries after being pelted with rocks and other projectiles.
Earlier Thursday, President Felipe Calderon unleashed some of his harshest criticism yet of the U.S. Congress, calling its members insensitive and saying they ignored reality by failing to pass an immigration reform bill in June.
The bill would have expanded guest worker programs and provided a path toward citizenship for many of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants now in the United States, about half of whom are Mexican nationals.
"The U.S. Congress, which today turns its back on reality, knows full well that the American economy could not move forward without the labor of Mexicans," Calderon said in his home state of Michoacan.
"The insensitivity of the American congressmen will only spur us to redouble our efforts for the full recognition of the enormous contribution Mexican migrants make to the U.S. economy, and for the respect of their human rights," he said.
Calderon argued that the United States should not try to cut off immigration, because Mexico's labor-intensive economy "clearly" complements the capital-oriented economy of its northern neighbor.
In June, Calderon claimed the U.S. Senate had made a "grave error" by killing the bill, and he has frequently criticized the proposed construction of a fence along the U.S.-Mexico border. |
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