Mexico's migrant checks on buses and highways ruled racist and illegal

Source: The Guardian

Mexico’s migrant checks on buses and highways ruled racist and illegal

Landmark ruling follows case of three young Indigenous Mexicans detained and abused on suspicion of being Guatemalan migrants

Nina Lakhani
Sun 22 May 2022 10.30 BST
Last modified on Sun 22 May 2022 10.32 BST

Mexican immigration agents can no longer conduct stop and search operations on buses and highways after the country’s supreme court ruled that such checks are racist, discriminatory and therefore unconstitutional.

The landmark ruling, handed down in Mexico City on Wednesday, found in favour of three young Indigenous Mexicans who were detained and abused by immigration (INM) officials in 2015 during a US-backed crackdown.

The siblings – aged 15 to 24 – were on a bus of seasonal farmhands in Querétaro, central Mexico, when apprehended by agents who targeted them because of their physical features, clothes and limited Spanish.

The agents accused them of being undocumented immigrants from neighbouring Guatemala, but they were Indigenous Tzeltal Mayans from the state of Chiapas in southern Mexico, where 25% of the population speak an Indigenous language.

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After considering the case, the supreme court ruled that the 2011 immigration reforms allowing agents to stop and search anyone anywhere in Mexico are unconstitutional – because the discretionary powers rely on agents identifying undocumented migrants based on their race, skin color, physical appearance and language spoken.

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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/may/22/mexico-migrant-checks-racist-illegal-supreme-court