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Migrants

US Border Force Reported To The UN For Human Rights Abuse

A legal non-profit in the US has sent damning evidence of US border force officials appalling persisting record of human rights abuses at open air detention sites, to the United Nations. On Monday 7 April, the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law (CHRCL) and the Southern Border Communities Coalition (SBCC) submitted a report to the United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) on US Customs and Border Protection (CBP)’s continued human rights abuses at open air detention sites. The CHRCL is a legal non-profit that protects and advances the rights of migrants.

Top Manta Co-op Helps Barcelona’s Street Vendors Formalise

Undocumented migrants arriving in Spain with hopes for a better life get trapped into a life of informality. Their undocumented status prevents them from accessing jobs in the formal economy, and, as a result, they cannot get healthcare or contribute to the social security system. According to the International Labour Organization’s Recommendation 204 on the Transition from the Informal to the Formal Economy, “most people enter the informal economy not by choice but as a consequence of a lack of opportunities in the formal economy and in the absence of other means of livelihood.”

Law Firm Demands Release Of 238 Venezuelans Detained In El Salvador

The prominent Grupo Ortega law firm filed a habeas corpus petition on Tuesday before El Salvador’s Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ). The legal action seeks the immediate release of 238 Venezuelan migrants currently detained at the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT). In an official statement, the firm argued that these detentions may violate fundamental rights, including personal liberty, due process, and protection against cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment. They emphasized that these rights are protected under both El Salvador’s Constitution and international treaties ratified by the country.

Venezuela Demands Immediate Repatriation Of Detained Migrants

Thousands of Venezuelans rallied in Caracas on Tuesday, March 18, to protest the deportation of Venezuelan migrants from the United States to a high security prison in El Salvador. Family members of the deported migrants addressed Venezuelan officials and fellow citizens to demand the immediate return of their loved ones, with many insisting that their relatives are not criminals or members of the infamous Tren de Aragua as Donald Trump claims. The mobilization occurred days after the deportation of over 200 migrants to El Salvador in one of the most controversial acts by the administration of Donald Trump during his two months in office.

Venezuela Vows ‘All Strategies’ To Repatriate Citizens

Venezuelan National Assembly President Jorge Rodríguez declared Monday that the government will mobilize multilateral organizations and international law firms to repatriate citizens detained abroad. He accused the United States of “kidnapping” Venezuelan migrants and collaborating with El Salvador in a “modern slave trade.” The announcement came after reports that more than 200 Venezuelan migrants were transferred from U.S. custody to prisons in El Salvador based on unproven allegations of ties to the Aragua Train criminal gang.

Venezuela Condemns Washington’s Criminalization Of Migrants

Venezuela has categorically condemned the United States government’s persecution of Venezuelans in the US, calling it an “infamous and unjust criminalization of Venezuelan migrants.” The Venezuelan government’s official statement in this regard, issued on Sunday, March 16, likens Washington’s position to “the darkest episodes in human history, from slavery to the horrors of Nazi concentration camps.” The statement condemned in strong terms the persecution of Venezuelan citizens in the US, including the expropriation of their personal property, assets, businesses, vehicles, and bank accounts.

Family, Supporters Demand Release Of Venezuelan Migrant In Guantanamo

Family members of José Medina Andrade, a 29-year-old Venezuelan migrant and father of two, learned of his transfer to Guantanamo Bay through an article in the New York Times, revealing the latest chapter in what supporters describe as a pattern of family separation and human rights abuses in the US immigration system. At a press conference held Sunday, February 16, outside the courthouse building in downtown Seattle, José’s wife and sister joined community organizers to demand his immediate release. They contested his designation as a “high-threat” migrant, describing him instead as a family man who fled Venezuela and had become an active member of Washington’s migrant community.

122 Years Of US Imperialism In Guantánamo

Colonialist Christopher Columbus landed in Guantánamo Bay on his second voyage to the Americas in 1494. The empires of England, France, and Spain later disputed Guantánamo, a territory of 45 square miles. This “discovery” of the Cuban island unleashed a Spanish extermination campaign against the indigenous population, through disease, starvation, and brutality. What followed the genocide was the “vertiginous growth of the slave trade based in Havana”. Today, Guantánamo Bay remains occupied by the United States. It is used as a detention center by the most powerful military in history.

The New Yorkers Standing Behind Migrants

Flatbush, New York — Shelves of weathered shoes line the purple basement walls of the Bridge, a nonprofit, on Dec. 14, 2024. Used coats hang from rolling racks. Residents of Floyd Bennett Field, a remote former airport-turned-migrant-shelter in Brooklyn, queue up with slips of paper in their hands, listing the ages and genders of their children. Kids weave among parents’ legs before moving to the second floor for childcare. Waiting is part of the ordeal for migrant families in shelters. But now the stakes have increased. The 2,000 Floyd Bennett Field residents will soon be moved to other shelters, and questions loom: Do other shelters have space?

Actions Planned Across The US In Opposition To Immigration Raids

As Trump’s administration escalates immigration enforcement raids across the United States, detaining around 1,000 immigrants on a daily basis in sweeping arrests, the movement against harsh measures has grown. Protests have been called for the weekend of February 7 through 9 to oppose Trump’s mass deportation agenda. Demonstrations have been scheduled in cities across the country including Riverside, California; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; San Antonio, Texas; Anchorage, Alaska; Chicago, Illinois; New York City; Phoenix, Arizona; Charlotte, North Carolina; and Indianapolis, Indiana.

How Does Trump Propose To Redefine Immigrants So They’re Beyond The Reach Of The Law?

On January 20, as Donald Trump took office for the second time, it seemed that the “war on terror” prison at Guantánamo Bay, which had recently marked the 23rd anniversary of its opening, might become as marginalized and generally forgotten as it was in his first term in office, when he largely sealed it shut for four years. Last Wednesday, however, and seemingly out of the blue, Trump suddenly announced that he had just issued a new executive order, “Expanding Migrant Operations Center at Naval Station Guantánamo Bay to Full Capacity”, to expand an existing migrant detention facility at the naval base.

Trump To Order Gitmo Prepared As Offshore Prison For Migrants

U.S. President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he will sign an executive order instructing the departments of Defense and Homeland Security to prepare the U.S. naval base on Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to hold tens of thousands of migrants. "We have 30,000 beds in Guantanamo to detain the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people," Trump said at the White House at a ceremony to sign the Laken Riley Act, an immigrant detention bill, into law. "Some of them are so bad we don't even trust the countries to hold them because we don't want them coming back. So we're going to send them out to Guantánamo," he said.

Calls For A Migrant Labor Strike Grow On Social Media

Since the xenophobia-fueled presidential re-election of Donald Trump, calls have been growing on social media for a pro-immigrant labor strike beginning on January 11, days before Trump is to take office. The emerging movement’s goal is to highlight the social, cultural, and economic importance of immigrants in the United States. The Trump campaign’s racist rhetoric — targeted at Latin Americans and Caribbean Islanders — is an urgent threat driving the need to speak out against his proposed immigration policies — such as the plan to conduct mass deportations.

Trump 2.0 Poses An Even Bigger Threat To Migrants

This election cycle was defined — yet again — by Donald Trump’s fearmongering over immigration. Like his previous two campaigns for president, Trump fueled a racist panic over “migrant crime” and capitalized on people’s fears over economic insecurity by scapegoating immigrants for all of the U.S.’s problems, including but not limited to the housing crisis, opioid crisis and inflation. But unlike those previous elections, rather than challenging Trump’s rhetoric, the Democrats capitulated to the Republicans and solidified the rightward lurch on the issue.

Three New Kinds Of Refugees In A World Of Migrants

One summer evening, the unrelenting sun over Niger refused to dip below the horizon. I sought out some shade with three anxious men in Touba au paradis, a small quiet restaurant in Agadez. These three Nigerians had tried to make the crossing at Assamaka, to our north, into Algeria, but found the border barred. They hoped their final destination would be Europe across the Mediterranean Sea, but first they had to make it into Algeria, and then across the remarkable Sahara Desert. By the time I met them, none of these crossings were possible. Algeria had closed the border, and the town of Assamaka had become overrun by desperate people who did not want to retreat but could not go forward.