3-24-08, 9:47 am

Mexico, Mar 24 (Prensa Latina) The Mexican government reported deportations of its citizens from the United States continues increasing, due to application of more punitive regulations.

National Migration Institute Commissioner Cecilia Romero said that after expelling 500,000 Mexicans from US territory during 2007, the number of deportations keeps rising.

One of the reasons for that increase is validity of the so called Arizona Law, which has established substantial fines. Also important is the withdrawal of licenses from companies that hire workers without legal identification papers.

That has caused the highest rate of repatriations of Mexicans and also an increase in reports of violations of their human rights, which include separation from their children, who remain abandoned in the United States.

The Mexican government is concerned and currently expects that the greatest influx of deported Mexicans arrive in the country through the area of Nogales, in Sonora State, the official said.

Faced with this delicate situation, the Institute will begin implementing on March 31 a repatriation program to prevent Mexicans from being victims of organized crime, with the promise of returning them to the neighboring nation.

Several government departments and levels will coordinate emergency aid to the emigrants that return to their country, supplying food, shelter, and cooperation to reinsert them in their original communities, Romero said.

Emigrants, in their attempt to cross the border to the United States, go through places increasingly dangerous, forced by the US repressive migratory forces, especially the fearsome Border Patrol.

From Prensa Latina