This is the last article you can read this month
You can read more article this month
You can read more articles this month
Sorry your limit is up for this month
Reset on:
Please help support the Morning Star by subscribing here
THE US government’s bid to legalise indefinite detention of child refugees from today has been slammed as a “cruel attack on children” by human rights groups.
The White House announced on Wednesday that it would today withdraw from 1997’s Flores Settlement Agreement, which imposed a 20-day limit on child migrant detention.
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) policy counsel Madhuri Grewal said: “This is yet another cruel attack on children, who the Trump administration has targeted again and again.
“The government should not be jailing kids and certainly shouldn’t be seeking to put more kids in jail for longer.”
The ACLU has warned that US President Donald Trump’s government has manipulated agency budgets to evade congressional scrutiny on anti-immigration spending.
It says that this has allowed border agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) to take funds from other federal agencies.
“Last year, Ice raided nearly $10 million (£8.22m) from the Federal Emergency Management Agency during hurricane season to expand the detention of immigrants,” Ms Grewal and policy analyst Yesenia Chavez pointed out this week.
The Congressional Hispanic Caucus also condemned the move.
“Flores protects migrant children from indefinite detention and inhumane conditions,” it tweeted. “Now, the Trump admin is trying to tear it up and indefinitely imprison families. This will cause irreparable harm to children.”
The indefinite detention of refugees and asylum-seekers breaches Article 9 of the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
The United Nations condemned Australia for enacting a similar policy last year.
The new rule will not take effect for 60 days and must be approved by a federal court. Resistance is likely.
But it follows a string of anti-refugee decrees, including a ban on applying for asylum at the southern border last month and one denying visas to people in receipt of welfare payments, food stamps, housing assistance or Medicaid.
Mr Trump also claims to be looking at ending the right of children born on US soil to citizenship if their parents are not citizens, though this would require a change to the constitution.
