New Immigration Law In Arizona Triggers Heavy Mexican Criticism

Mexican President Felipe Calderon criticized on Sunday a tough new immigration law in the U.S. state of Arizona. Calderon advised Mexicans to avoid unnecessary visits to Arizona, which borders Mexico.

Currently attending an international climate conference in Germany, Calderon spoke at a news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

[Felipe Calderon, Mexican President]:
"It violates the human rights of all people, independent of their migratory status. It has a focus that discriminates on a racial basis and threatens not just the human rights of Mexican migrants in the United States, but of those of any other country even the Mexican-American or Hispanic-American population that live in that country, in that state."

Under the new legislation, state police and local police are required to determine if people are in the country illegally, based on “reasonable suspicion”.

[Felipe Calderon, Mexican President]:
"We've strengthened our consular protective capacity through five Mexican consulates in Arizona. We've also issued a travel alert so that we can let our citizens know the legislation's scope and avoid Mexicans suffering discrimination or oppressive treatment in Arizona. We underscore the necessity to act with caution and to avoid as much as possible unnecessary visits to that state."

The Mexican president says that he will bring up the new law when he meets with U.S. President Barack Obama next month during an official visit to Washington.


In many way I agree with Felipe Calderon. I can undestand that the state Arizona want to keep illegal immigrants out of the U.S. but it needs to be taken to an extent. I agree with the Mexican president as I also think it is against human rights. I believe that the new legislation it is totally unreasonable for state and local police to ask Hispanic-American or Mexican-American for legal documents to show they are allowed to be in the country. In my opinion it is very racist as these people could have lived there all their life and are entitled to be there as any other American citizen. This is discrimination at it's fullest.

However it has to be recognised that the state of Arizona is on the border of Mexico and probably hundereds of illegal immigrants cross the border of American everyday. Also this is not exactly valid as this new legislation has only occured in one state out of fifty and therefore cannot hold this view that American's are not open to migration.

In conclusion I have to agree that the new legislation is very discriminative against Hispanic-American's and Mexican-American's but cannot be looked at the entire "American" view.

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