In a major gathering ignored by US mass media, thousands of migrants
met in Spain from September 11 to 14 to articulate a set of demands
directed at governments across the world. Meeting for the Third World
Social Forum on Migration, delegates represented organizations from
more than 90 nations. Issuing a final declaration, migrant
representatives demanded legalization of undocumented migrants,
strengthened United Nations protections, increased political rights
in destination countries, the compliance of temporary worker programs
with articles 97 and 143 of the International Labor Organization
(ILO), and the ratification of the 1990 International Convention on
the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of
Their Families, among other demands.

"To migrate is not a crime," the World Social Forum declaration
stated. "The causes that give rise to migration are crimes. Let's
raise our voices, defend our rights and struggle toward building a
world without walls." The migrant rights statement blamed the mass
migrations uprooting the planet on the current world capitalist
economic model with all its attendant environmental and economic
consequences. The ILO's Patrick Taran has estimated that migrants
represent three percent of the world population, or 191 million
people.

At the mass meeting held near Madrid, particular criticism was
leveled at the European Union (EU) and the Spanish government.
Approved by the European Parliament last June and set to go into
effect in 2010, the EU's controversial "Return Directive" will allow
member nations to jail undocumented for migrants for up to 18 months
while awaiting deportation. Anywhere from 4.5 million to 8 million
undocumented migrants could be residing in EU member states,
according to recent estimates. As in the United States, migrants are
heavily employed in the construction, agricultural and service
industries. Apart from protests by Amnesty International, the UN High
Commissioner for Refugees and grassroots migrant groups, the new EU
policy caused serious diplomatic frictions with several South
American governments and leaders, including Venezuelan President Hugo
Chavez who threatened to cut oil supplies and curb European capital
flows in his oil-rich nation.

Although the Madrid forum was mainly a NGO affair, several
representatives of international institutions and governments
addressed the attendees. Jorge Bustamante, UN special migrant human
rights rapporteur, charged that migrants living in the United States
were facing a "situation of terror." The UN official likewise
criticized his native country, Mexico, for its own alleged
ill-treatment of immigrants. "With shame, I have to say that we
Mexicans treat them worse than they treat us in the United States,"
Bustamante said. According to statistics from Mexico's federal
Interior Ministry cited in the Mexican press, the United States
deported 528, 822 Mexicans from September 2007 to August 2008, while
Mexico deported 89, 507 foreigners, mainly Central Americans, during
the same time period.

Bustamante took issue with the Spanish government of Prime Minister
Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero for cracking down on undocumented
workers and supporting the EU's return directive. Said Bustamante:
"It is incongruent for the Spanish government to approve this
directive, which is a step backwards, an escalation of the
criminalization of migrants, who are not criminals. Besides, there
was a time that Spain was a country of emigration and many were
victims of abuses. (Spain) should (sign the migrant convention) in
remembrance of the benefits it received from those migrants. Spain
has to honor the role it had in the defense of immigrant rights."
Bustamante's appeal to the Spanish government was echoed by Ignacio
Diaz de Aguilar, World Social Forum coordinator and president of the
Spanish Commission for Refugee Aid.

Enjoying an economic boom in recent years, Spain attracted many
foreigners, who are estimated to make up as much as 11.3 percent of
the country's population of 46 million people. Of the foreign-born
population, Latin Americans, especially Bolivians and Argentines,
make up approximately thirty percent of the total. More recently,
hard economic times have made Spain far less receptive to new
immigrants.

In an interview with Latin American journalists last July, Spanish
Labor and Immigration Minister Celestino Corbacho Chaves said critics
were unfair to lump Spain's emerging immigration policy with the EU's
new directive. Corbacho said the Spanish government was encouraging
voluntary repatriation, but that it would allow returning migrants to
resume benefiting from the country's social security system after a
five-year absence. "There is no change in immigration policy,
Corbacho said. "There is a new context in Spain and in Europe, and an
economic complexity at the global level."

For migrant representatives, not all the news delivered in Spain was
bad. Alberto Acosta, ex-president of Ecuador's constituent assembly,
told delegates that his country's proposed new constitution will
contain provisions for universal citizenship and free transit for
migrants. Ecuador will allow its own migrants living abroad the right
to elect direct representatives to the national legislature if the
political reform is approved, Acosta said. Elaborating on the same
theme, Lorena Escudero, Ecuador's minister of migrant affairs,
proposed the creation of a universal passport to symbolize the ideas
of "universal citizenship, non-discrimination and friendly and
respectful integration."

The World Social Forum's migrant assembly concluded with a march of
about 5,000 people through the streets of Madrid. Slogans shouted by
the demonstrators included "No Human Being is Illegal" and "Our
Voices, Our Rights: For a World without Walls."

In its final statement, the Madrid assembly noted that the meeting
occurred during the 60th anniversary year of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights and other important world political
events including the September 11, 1973 coup in Chile. Keeping with a
political theme, the declaration expressed solidarity with the
embattled government of Bolivian President Evo Morales. The next
World Social Forum on migrant issues is scheduled for Quito, Ecuador,
in 2010.

Sources: Frontera NorteSur (FNS): 09/17; La Jornada: 09/13,15;
Inter-Press Service: 07/16,21; Cimacnoticas.com: 06/18, 09/11;
Proceso/Apro: 07/23; El Universal/AP/Notimex: 07/01, 08/01