Rights group urges Obama to close detention centers for immigrants
A prominent rights group in the United States has called on US President Barack Obama to close detention centers for undocumented immigrants following reports of civil rights violations of the detainees.
In a report released on Friday, Human Rights First called for the immediate release of all families from the detention centers for immigrants.
The rights group praised a study by the US Commission on Civil Rights on the state of civil rights in immigration detention facilities in the United States.
The US Commission on Civil Rights accused the US Department of Homeland Security on Friday of violating undocumented migrants’ rights and treating them like criminals.
The US Commission’s recommendations rightly found that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) failed to comply with detention standards relating to health care, access to legal information and legal counsel, language access, and complaint procedures, Human Rights First reported on its website.
“Locking up children and their mothers in immigration detention is a cruel and misguided policy. This report makes clear that the administration’s detention of asylum seekers and immigrants, including families, violates their due process rights by impeding access to counsel,” said Olga Byrne, Human Rights First’s senior associate on refugee protection.
“We urge DHS to heed the call of the Commission and many human rights organizations to immediately release all families from immigration detention. Detention has been proven to negatively impact the health of children. There is simply no reason to hold children and their parents who are seeking asylum in detention centers,” she added.
Last month, Human Rights First warned that undocumented immigrants and their children held at US immigration facilities have suffered physical and mental abuse, including sexual violence.
The American human rights organization also highlighted the trauma children go through when guards enter rooms of sleeping families with flashlights every fifteen minutes through the night.
Immigration has become a controversial topic in the US presidential campaign.
Republican presidential candidate Scott Walker said last month his immigration policy is "very similar" to the plan proposed by GOP frontrunner Donald Trump which amounts to curtailing legal and illegal immigration.
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