UN Pushes for Migrants to Be Called Refugees

[Judi Lynn]

UN Pushes for Migrants to Be Called Refugees
SAN JOSE, Costa Rica — Jul 8, 2014, 8:31 AM ET
By ALBERTO ARCE and MARCOS ALEMAN Associated Press

United Nations officials are pushing for many of the Central Americans fleeing to the U.S. to be treated as refugees displaced by armed conflict, a designation meant to increase pressure on the United States and Mexico to accept tens of thousands of people currently ineligible for asylum.

Officials with the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees say they hope to see a regional agreement on that status Thursday when migration and interior department representatives from the U.S., Mexico, and Central America meet in Nicaragua. The group will discuss updating a 30-year-old declaration regarding the obligations nations have to aid refugees.

While such a resolution would lack any legal weight in the United States, the agency said it believes "the U.S. and Mexico should recognize that this is a refugee situation, which implies that they shouldn't be automatically sent to their home countries but rather receive international protection."

Most of the people widely considered to be refugees by the international community are fleeing more traditional political or ethnic conflicts like those in Syria or the Sudan. Central Americans would be among the first modern migrants considered refugees because they are fleeing violence and extortion at the hands of criminal gangs.

More:
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/pushes-migrants-called-refugees-24463380

[yeoman6987]

1. UN is really getting into the United States' business

I am not sure that is a good idea for them to do. I said yesterday on another thread that if the UN keeps this up, the House will stop funding it and then they are in DEEP trouble.

We are going to follow the law with the children crossing the border. Some are going to stay and some will return home. Calling it refugee cannot be done without a process which nobody has done before they crossed.