A Strategic Meeting with Obama

Protecting migrant minors’ human rights is a moral and diplomatic challenge. The mass exodus of children to the United States cannot be treated as mere collateral damage of the current socioeconomic backdrop of Central America. The issue demands that the countries in the region accept their collective responsibility.

The criticisms that have been made about the passiveness with which the matter has been approached in the region forced the governments of the three countries to request an audience on July 25 with President Barack Obama in Washington in order to search for solutions to the issue.

Central American governors must not miss the opportunity in the meeting with Obama to request a comprehensive migration reform and to put forward the need for greater U.S. cooperation aimed at social development in the isthmus that is Central America. In a letter to Congress June 30, Obama asked for $3.7 billion. The head of state has said that he will allocate $161 million this year to the Central America Regional Security Initiative in order to finance the most pressing challenges of the security and governability of the region.

The U.S. leader is clear on the fact that the exodus of minors is a product of the social inequalities that exist in the region; hence that is why he is proposing to work with other members of the international community to promote development, economic growth and security in the area. His goal is to tackle what he considers to be the root of the problem of migration in Central America: insecurity and a lack of opportunities for young people in their countries of origin.

In his recent visit to Guatemala, U.S. Vice President Joseph Biden stated that the migration of minors would continue as long as social issues of “poverty, insecurity and the absence of the rule of law” endure in the countries of the region.

The backdrop against which the meeting with Obama was to be held is appropriate for the governments of Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras to insist on the migratory reform that will benefit thousands of citizens from the three countries that have not regulated their migratory situation in the United States. Additionally, this will allow protection of the children locked up in hostels in Texas and Arizona so that their basic rights are upheld.

This opportunity must not be fruitless, especially the meetings that the governors of the region hold with U.S. senators and members of Congress. The governors must insist on the necessity of migratory reform given the refusal of the Republicans in the House of Representatives to pass it even in the face of Senate support last year.

I hope the mass exodus of minors in Central America will be a starting point in reaching the long-awaited migratory reform in the United States.