Rights Group: Screening For Asylum Seekers Is Flawed
A report released Thursday from Human Rights Watch claims United States border agents are routinely denying migrants from Central America the chance to ask for asylum. The report focused on asylum-seekers from Honduras, which has one of the highest murder rates in the world.
According to the report, some Honduran migrants are fleeing to the U.S. to escape threats from violent gangs or domestic abuse.
Often they are apprehend by U.S. Border Patrol and placed in expedited removal proceedings.
When migrants detained at the border say they fear going back to their home countries, Border Patrol agents must refer them to a “credible fear interview” with an asylum officer.
The credible fear interview is the first step in making an asylum claim.
But Human Rights Watch interviewed Honduran deportees who said they told Border Patrol agents they were scared to go home, but were deported without getting a credible fear interview.
“Instead, what happens is they are being sent back, sometimes very summarily, to Honduras where they face real threats and some of them are very much in hiding,” said Clara Long, one of the report’s authors.
Through a Freedom of Information Act request, Human Rights Watch determined that among Central Americans and Mexicans in expedited removal proceedings, Border Patrol agents only flagged 1.9 percent of Hondurans, 0.8 percent of Guatemalans, 5.5 percent of Salvadorans and 0.1 percent of Mexicans for credible fear interviews.
This was not the case, however, for migrants from other countries.
According to the report, “21 percent of migrants from countries other than these, who underwent the same proceedings in the same years, were flagged for credible fear interviews by CBP.”
"What we are identifying is an immediate problem and one that has been going on for awhile and it is a life-or-death problem for the folks with whom I spoke," Long said.
Human Rights Watch interviewed 25 people recently deported to Honduras and 10 Central Americans held in immigration detention in the U.S.
Customs and Border Protection said in a statement that Border Patrol agents are trained to properly refer individuals for interviews with asylum officers.
The statement also said the Department of Homeland Security, “takes allegations of this nature seriously and will investigate, and if warranted, take corrective action.”
In 2013, more than 64,000 Hondurans migrants were apprehended entering the country illegally, according to federal data. That is more than double the number apprehended in 2011.
Many believe the increased migration is in part related to that country’s rampant violence.
Some Central Americans have won asylum in the U.S. based on persecution by gangs, but such cases are not easy to win. A Board of Immigration Appeals ruling in September opened the door for more Central American women who are victims of domestic violence to win asylum.
Last year, immigration judges granted 92 Hondurans asylum and rejected 525, according to statistics from the Executive Office of Immigration Review.
