The FPA Migration Blog is proud to post a film review by Sean Patrick Murphy of the FPA Global Film Review Blog.  Sean’s review involves issues regarding migrants from Central America coming to the US, namely Honduras to Texas, and the increasing numbers coming from the region and the dangers they face in the process. Sin Nombre (2009) is a film which addresses these issues. Sean’s review is posted below:

Right from the start this film draws the audience in. It is a movie about a young Honduran woman named Sayra who rides on top of trains hoping to reach Texas through Mexico. It is also about Casper (a.k.a. Willy), a Mexican gang member in trouble who meets up with Sayra along the way. Casper’s association with the gang shows how brutal life is for him and his protégé, Smiley. Their initiation rituals are physically punishing.

This film is also about desperation, about the crushing poverty that leads people to risk everything to find a better life. It is also about gang style brotherhood and the long reach of certain gangs. There is at least one point when Casper, who protected Sayra once, tries to leave Sayra by hopping off a train while she sleeps. But she is stubborn and places her fate in his hands and joins him. The acting is superb. All of the characters are believable and the audience sees clearly, even in his quietest moments, how Casper (played by Edgar Flores) struggles with his past, a past he is trying to leave behind. The story also shows how one decision can alter a person’s life, how difficult it is to escape one’s lot in life.

The relationship between Sayra and Casper is refreshingly non romantic. They have an affinity for each other and look out for one another but remain just friends. This film also puts a human face on migration. All the while the audience asks, “Will Casper escape his past? Will Sayra make it to the United States?” It is worth watching to find out.

“Sin Nombre” is available for rent.

Murphy can be reached at:  Lojano at comcast.net

This post can also be found on FPA’s Latin America Blog.

It came as no surprise to those who knew about the past rights abuses by Iran’s government when many Iranians, especially young Iranians, took to the streets in the last two weeks and were met with brutal retribution affecting every sector of Iran’s vibrant society including intellectuals, the media, youth and diverse cultures. While much of Western media sought to compare the protests in Iran to those of Eastern Europe and China, Iran is unique and is forming what must be regarded as its own unique movement that will produce its own unique results. A comparison of best judgment is one that would compare opposite popular political movements to that of the one in Iran, namely those in many left leaning governments in Latin America.

This week while the protestors in Iran were slowly being arrested and assaulted, Honduras had its own coup with the Judiciary, Legislature and military forcing out the Honduran President Jose Manuel Zelaya. Honduras’ other policy branches sought its own change by placing its own leader in power in order to quell the Executive Branch from leading a populist move to allow the President to stand for election indefinitely. Such a constitutional change for the benefit of the President and the Executive branch was successfully accomplished by Hugo Chavez in Venezuela a few short months ago. This altering of constitutional powers that limit the Executive from seeking election past a designated term in office is a common limit to the power of the President in many nations with a similar political system. While Parliamentary Democracies often have leaders stand for election well past six years (as technically you are electing the party, and not the leader), it is seen as a violation of the democratic system in many nations and allows the tyranny of the majority to rule over all sectors of society in those countries considered a Republic. In those systems, the power of the President is paramount and is only limited by the legislature and judiciary. While Venezuela’s battle over control between the branches took hold in debate and via legal measures, Honduras’ branches of government took the direct route, upsetting many supporters of the President as well as supporters of Zelaya outside of Honduras, including Mr. Obama who often is seen as the culprit of actions against leftist leaders in Latin America.

The irony of these latest popular protests in Iran and Honduras come from the support given by those who ideologically would naturally support “the other” in these conflicts. As mentioned above, Obama, who represents a US that allows for power to be tempered against the Executive by the Judiciary and Legislative branch when the Executive tries to unbalance its influence in the Republic, has openly supported the power of President Zelaya in Honduras and is helping to return the President to his office in the capital. While the support obviously comes from the manner in which Zelaya was removed, the election of Obama and great support no doubt came from the result of accusations of abuse of the Executive branch by Bush and Cheney when in office as claimed by many constitutional experts in the US and abroad. The other twist in this narrative comes from Chavez’s support of Iran’s illegitimately elected president and ruling Religious Council. While Chavez and Ahmedinejad do get a lot of support from rural and urban poor in both their respective countries, popular support for Mosavi and opposition leaders in Iran are coming from the people themselves, who are protesting against unelected leaders via a populist uprising. Hugo Chavez, the poster child for populism in Latin America, won his own support for his government and changes to the constitution via a majority of people who legitimized his power in office, yet seeks to be a populist against populism when supporting the establishment in Iran. While debate continues to whether or not Chavez forcefully silenced his opposition during elections and referendums in Venezuela, support for Iran’s current government by Chavez may have more to do with Venezuela’s geopolitics than the will of the people in Iran. In the end, the fight for power in Iran did not start with hard opposition to Iran’s Ayatollahs, as true reformers were not allowed to run for government in Iran. Iran’s leadership crisis is one of oligarchs in Iran’s leadership pushing to gain more influence and leverage over Iran’s dominant Councils and clerics and to gain support from Iran’s youth that make up more than 70% of Iran’s population as noted by many experts. As a result of violence however, many in Iran wish to move beyond a simple election of Mosavi dominated by the Religious Councils and wish to move towards a free vote and debate in society.

Iran will likely slowly degrade from within, but maintain its same structure in the process. The true measure of change for those outside of Iran is whether or not a new government, in a similar, form will choose to involve itself in the Arab world, continue to divide and conquer diverse political groups, religions and cultures in Iran and decide to promote Iranian culture and economy outside of Iran towards the West or the East. The reposition of the US and the oil market may grow the influence of populists in Latin America and illegitimate governments in the Middle East, but eventually economics and popular movements will create a debate where the people must choose between two unstable alternatives and hope for great leaders to build their nations. At best, Lebanon without political assassinations would be a welcomed outcome for Iran. Lessons from Latin America for Iran may come from those same intellectuals that are currently sitting in Evin prison in Tehran for speaking their views. One academic from Latin America similar to those imprisoned in Iran is Guillermo O’Donnell, a Latin American intellectual who often writes on differing forms of democracy. Many of his theories surround the issues of democratic institutions and voting. Simply voting does not create a democratic society in itself, but the interaction between different ideas, from grassroots movements, journalists, professors, politicians and communities produce institutions which seek to balance power in the hands of the people, and not in that of a religious oligarchy or simply the Executive. Unfortunately in Iran, once violence takes hold of any election, voting becomes not simply the symbol of a healthy democratic society but it transforms and becomes a means of protest when all other democratic institutions become disenfranchised of their legitimate authority. Equality and rights does not come from a simple ballot, as important as the process is, but comes from institution building and seeking of rights in every unique society. This is what many often abuse in Latin America, and seems to not be understood by religious oligarchs in Iran. The original form of ancient Greek democracy has evolved, and will leave those behind who do not understand it beyond its basic elements. Unfortunately as many Latin American oligarchs have known, the end result is always the same, albeit in differing and unique forms of anarchy.

This post can also be seen on FPA’s Latin America Blog.

This month marked a historic change for El Salvador and popular movements in Latin America as a whole. Central America in the late 70’s and early 1980’s was one of the warfronts of the Cold War between the US and the USSR. Countries such as Cuba and even Mexico became entrenched in the problems in El Salvador where the rebel group FMLN fought in bloody conflict with the government at the time in order to bring some measures of equality and eliminate violence against the populace by the ruling elite that traditionally ruled El Salvador through political and economic oppression. After the death of nearly 75,000 people and the almost complete destruction of El Salvador’s infrastructure, the 1992 peace agreements allowed for a reduction in armed conflict between political rivals in El Salvador, and lead to relative quiet in the region since that time.

While relative peace took hold after 1992 in El Salvador, increased levels of poverty and inequality lead to years of street violence and emigration from the country. Many young Salvadorans found themselves growing up outside of Central America in the 1990s and growing up as refugees from violence due to the conflict, and later on as refugees from poverty post 1992. While the war ended in the early 1990s, the generation which grew up during the war often could not escape the after-effect of violence and a society which at the time was at the pinnacle of absolute chaos. Many young Salvadorans post-1992 grew as expats in often low income parts of the US, Canada and Mexico. With the influence of poverty in El Salvador and their new adopted homelands, small parts of the Salvadoran community fell into gang violence and culture, often moving between sections of large US cities like Los Angeles and El Salvador, re-importing gang violence into El Salvador from abroad. While many others have taken to improving the life of Salvadorans in el Salvador and abroad, the effect of the past still holds many traumatized from the war in the 1980s.

Professor Valle writing for openDemocracy.net explains that this past month might have brought an official end to the political conflict in El Salvador. While post-1992 brought in political and electoral gains for the right wing parties of El Salvador, last week the election of a left leaning leader, Mauricio Funes of the FMLN allowed for a quiet revolution to take place in El Salvador with a 51% victory for the Presidency of the country. While not a major lead, the importance of the victory through electoral means allows for the President and the Opposition to lead with an obligation to cooperate with other groups in Salvadoran society for the first time in that nation’s modern history. Placing violence in the past, and exchanging it for political compromise may not be the end of problems in El Salvador, but it can be agreed upon that it is likely the beginning of compromise in a society that has slowly rebuilt itself after a bloody and unresolved revolution.

This Blog has also been posted in FPA's Latin America Blog.

  Since the election of the PAN in Mexico and Vicente Fox, there has been a slow movement towards Free Trade economics, policies in cooperation with the US and a cooling of relations with Cuba. In the late 1970s and early 1980s it was quite the opposite, with new oil wealth in Mexico pushing the government at the time into a position of a regional leader in Central America. With the collapse of the oil prices in the early 80s, the ambitions of Mexico as a regional power were extinguished and relations via NAFTA and the free market took hold in order to pull Mexico out of the numerous pesos crashes that plagues the country in the 1980s and 1990s. With the election of Vicente Fox and the diminishing of the PRI party which ruled Mexico for over 75 years, the PAN and Fox set Mexico on a new path, trying to create a framework for trade, jobs and immigration with the Bush administration in 2000 and after.

While the War on Terror took attention away from immigration and Mexico until 2007, Mexico still has been on the path of solidifying external relations since the victory of Fox and within the administration of the current President Calderon. Part of the reintegration of Mexico into the world community and its transformation as a strong emerging market came with political changes as well. Traditionally, Mexico has been seen in the light of policies which saw the US as an aggressor, with much of the 20th century being framed in policies from Cardenas and nationalisations of foreign industry that took hold in the interwar period and into the 1960s. Mexican-US relations were minimal until the late 1960s, and with these policies also came the support, at least verbally, for anti-US movements in Latin America, especially passive support for Cuba via trade and cultural ties. With ties came immigration, and until this week Cubans who can gain asylum in the US have been coming through Mexico as well as the sea in order to make a new life in the United States.

While over 11,000 Cubans came into the US through Mexico last year, Mexico has finally taken actions to close many of the routes for Cubans coming into the US through Mexico, mainly for security reasons, but also satisfying many Cuban officials who saw their citizens leaving for the US via Mexico as politically damaging to Cuba itself. While Cuban-Mexican relations have become more tense since 2000, this action, while likely not for the benefit of the Cuban Government is seen as an olive branch between the two nations. In the end, the tightening of borders will only stop a fraction of migrants from passing into the US. While economic troubles and tighter security may deter some from coming, economic osmosis will still bring Cubans and Mexicans across the border to seek a living in the US and escape intense poverty in their own countries.

This post can also be read in the FPA's Latin America Blog.

With Olympic fever set to bring the world to China, much interest on the future of China on the world stage is seen as having its debut today, crowned by the lucky number in Chinese culture, 08/08/08, set to being at 8pm. With external writers and leaders and internal government officials set to bring China into its new position of influence, the effect of Chinese foreign policy, timid by Western standards, has become an issue of global public discussion, highlighted by internal struggles from the recent earthquake, housing issues and of course Tibet.

Another external issue has yet to be discussed, that may prove to be the greatest influence on world commerce and culture coming out of China, the people themselves. For generations Chinese communities have crossed to other Asian countries, the West and even parts of the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe. The Americas have been one of the greatest recipients of Chinese culture and communities, having not only come to the US, but with large communities in Canada, the Caribbean and Latin America as well.

In Canada's largest city alone, Toronto according to many experts has a community of between 200,000-300,000 alone. Many of these immigrants have come after the opening of Canadian immigration in the 1960s, which was closed to many non-white immigrants after the late 1800 to well into the second half of the 20th Century. More recently, ties with the Commonwealth and interest in Canada brought many from Hong Kong to Canada before the return of the small nation to China. Mainland Chinese, as well as Taiwanese and Chinese communities from Malaysia, Vietnam and Singapore also have resided in Canada, many mainlanders living in central Toronto, Montreal, Calgary and Vancouver, know for its diversity and home to many from different parts of Asia.

Latin America and the Caribbean also have received large communities from China as well, albeit more historically than recently in large numbers. In Mexico, the early 20th Century brought more than 5,000 Chinese immigrants to northern Mexico, near Mexicali. This small community which survives today at one point outnumbered traditional Mexicans and formed many cultural organizations to bring in other Chinese people from the East, while developing their community in Mexico and as Mexicans over the last 100 years. Cuba also is known for its connections with China, seen in its prominent Chinatown in central Havana. While being very Cuban with a strong Chinese influence, many Chinese came to Cuba, a US protectorate for the late 19th to mid-20th Century, to work in labour and to build US infrastructure as in the US on the islands on Cuba and Puerto Rico. Jamaica, Nicaragua and Panama also obtained many of their Chinese migrants for similar reasons, making the Caribbean one of the notable destinations for Chinese and other immigrant groups from around the globe.

In South America, while many Japanese immigrated in large numbers to Brazil, Argentina to a lesser degree, many Chinese immigrants also moved to Peru with large numbers coming to Venezuela. Venezuela has one of the largest Chinese immigrant communities to historically settle in Latin America. Recently new immigration from Mainland China and Taiwan has come to Venezuela and Latin America as a whole. While this blog cannot go into great detail on every community, it is worth researching many of these communities worldwide and show how China's past might create strong ties to China's future in the world.

*This post has also been cross-posted in the FPA's Latin America Blog.

Behind oil export and above tourism, remittances from Mexicans abroad to their home country makes up a large part of the cash that builds homes and futures in many Mexican communities. With the recent economic crisis in the US, America's neighbours are starting to feel the fallout of the Mortgage Crisis that is slowly presenting problems in countries outside of the G8. With many Mexicans living in the US in hard hit areas, those funds that used to pay for medicine, food, homes and everything else for families of migrants from Mexico are now suddenly being cut off with great effect.

With a decline in remittances of 7% since last year, many in Mexico who were just keeping afloat may slip into poverty this year. Many small villages who sent their young men and women over the border and who often are mired in economic troubles are the hardest hit communities in Mexico when economic troubles loom. With remittances to Mexico increasing five and a half times since 1997 to $24 billion, these funds are not only a necessity, but is Mexico's second largest source of foreign revenue. What also seems to focus the tension on Mexico is that areas in the US where Mexicans have migrated to are also those worst hit by the crisis. While migrants from El Salvador and Guatemala are also affected, those communities often have settled in the Washington-Maryland areas which have been less affected by the crisis according to The Washington Post.

The likely effect of the crisis outside the US may result in more illegal migration across the border. Despite the troubles in the US, communities in Mexico near poverty will not weather the lack of funds as easily as much of the United States. Economies tied in with the US will slowly feel the effects of economic troubles in their largest export market. The lack of sympathy for future trade agreements and harder policies on immigration will also likely take hold with the poor economy and continued anti-NAFTA and FTA sentiments in the US Congress. The next American President will have a lot of repair work when beginning his or her job in 2009.

Since 1954, there has been a decline in the vision of America as a liberator of nations and people as they were known for in the Second World War and the Korean Conflict and their anti-colonial position after 1945.  Since 1954, the realization that US Foreign Policy could do more harm than good was defined in Guatemala where the CIA helped oust democratically elected leader Jacobo Arbenz in a coup and installed a military leader Colonel Armas on behalf of the United Fruit Company. United Fruit feared that land reforms by Arbenz would lead to expropriations by the government and hurt United Fruit who owned the majority of Guatemala's rural farm production and was one of the top banana producers worldwide at the time. The CIA actively aided United Fruit by overthrowing the government and labelling Arbenz and communist and using force to remove Arbenz from power. It resulted in decades of human rights abuses and dictatorships in Guatemala and still produces much conflict today in Guatemala with the Chiquita company, the altered name of United Fruit Co.

While the US has assisted greatly in places like Korea, Japan and Bosnia in the last fifty years, the interference by US Foreign Policy in places where the objective was unclear or stability of government to achieve an economic or political objective took precedent over natural power trends and democratic movements in the country often resulted in disasters inside the US and abroad.

Unclear objectives were part of the conflict in Vietnam and were inherited by the War in Iraq and subsequent civil war that has commenced in what is currently the most dangerous place in the world. It was finally admitted this week that the Iraqi Government will likely not be able to manage the future situation in the country, and unlike in Vietnam where Saigon was taken by the communist forces, Iraq has nothing but splinter groups who will push the country further into anarchy.

Stability of governments to meet an objective was also a strong motivation for US involvement. While in cases such as Bosnia where the objective was clear and noble, other cases such as those in Latin America often produced hundreds of thousands of refugees as well as one party states to ensure stability in the region. The trend and methods in the Guatemalan case spread most notably in Chile in 1973 where Agusto Pinochet was able to murder his democratically elected opposition with CIA aid and ensure his dictatorship until the late 1990s. The 80s saw more bloodshed with support for traditional leaders in Nicaragua and El Salvador who are still suffering from effects of the conflict to date.

Until Iraq, the activities of the US were seen as becoming more as a policing duty as in the Balkans as opposed to producing coups like in Guatemala and Chile. In the 90s, Colombia and the War on Drugs brought US aid to the conflict, albeit more debatable in its result as FARC and other groups often do not represent the people of Colombia, but took to kidnapping western oil workers in the region and contributed to hurting locals in Colombia which have suffered greatly from instability over more than two decades. While the US was not the aggressor in many cases in the Andean region, companies were seen to abuse their position in developing regions but without direct US support for the companies, but only military aid to democratically elected Colombian government officials. These conflicts continue to plague Colombia to this day.

In the end despite moral and immoral activities by the US, the result for many errors in US foreign policy has been a reflection of the errors committed in Guatemala in 1954. Millions of refugees have fled Iraq, Colombia, Vietnam, Chile, Central America and Guatemala of course due to poor decisions and sometimes active punishment of those in opposition. Many of these individuals live in your communities today, and are a reflection of why choosing leaders and their decisions do make a difference to the health of communities worldwide.

Please refer to Kyle de Beausset's articles on the Chiquita Bananna Boycott and his article on Illegal Aliens and Guatemala.

  Jacobo Arbenz: Elected Leader or Communist? The Media Decides… 

In this week's New Roundup we highlight skilled workers and their challenges working in the United States as well as the surprising death threats against community leaders of minority heritage in a small city in Canada and further findings of Migrants in Southern Europe. We also look at fighting racism in the Czech Republic and Russia and problems on the Mexico border.

• Border Crossings - Rising Breed of Migrant Worker: Skilled, Salaried and Welcome: The New York Times discusses why while many countries are seeking to restrict immigration by low-skilled migrants, they are increasingly working to attract those with advanced degrees and scarce skills. See the story here. 
• In a small East Coast Canadian city of Saint John, a city councillor who says he's been a victim of race-related incidents is not surprised to see more incidents in the city, after another councillor with Korean ancestry received death threats. The suprising threats against the tiny city's minorities has shocked a country while prides itself on multiculturalism. See the story here.
• Italian coastguards rescued more than 400 migrants off the southern island of Lampedusa on Thursday, including a group of 300 men, women and children crammed into a wooden boat, officials said. See the story here. As well,  a similar incident in Spain A new wave of illegal migrants has set a course for Spain's southeastern coast in an attempt to reach European shores. See the story here.
• The Prague Jewish Community took issue about the Czech football team Sparta's fans racism  and sent an open letter to representatives of the Czech first soccer league team Sparta complaining about its fans who yell anti-Semitic slogans during the team's games. See the story here.
• Student held over internet video of Nazis beheading ‘migrants’ as Russian police detained a university student on Wednesday on suspicion of circulating an Internet video which appeared to show neo-Nazis beheading one non-Slav migrant and shooting another in the head. See the story here and here. 
• At least 3,000 Central American migrants remained stranded along railroad lines in southern Mexico after an American train operator shut down its operations there. See the story here.
• Soccer's world governing body slapped Jaime Grondona with a nine-month ban on Wednesday in response to the Chilean player's behaviour at last month's FIFA U-20 World Cup in Canada. See the story here.

With the failure of the Immigration Reform Bill there has been a refocusing on the issues regarding the current state of affairs surrounding illegal immigration. This year there has already been 275 bodies found between US-Mexico border and it is expected that that number is going to rise to a record of over 500 bodies in 2007. Much of the criticism coming from some border experts is that increased border security creates a situation where migrants seek more dangerous and unfriendly means to make it across the border, and since 1994 when border security was tightened nearly 4,500 Mexicans and Central Americans have perished trying to make it to the US.

While there is much debate on why it has become more dangerous to cross the border, it is believed that while in the past many met their fate due to traffic accidents, the main culprit in recent history is hypothermia from cold desert temperatures and many being drenched while crossing the Rio Grande river between Mexico and the US and not being able to warm themselves to save their lives. Another risk mentioned are the cases of some smugglers, commonly called "coyotes" abandoning their migrants or physically assaulting them. While much of the statistics show the evident rise in risks in crossing the border and the links with border security, much of the information details only the situation US side of the border. Despite all these statistics, or lack thereof, much of these issues are common knowledge on both sides of the border.

The question that needs to be asked in my opinion is whether these migrants from Mexico and Central America and the US and its economy and people are two independent issues, or whether in that part of the Americas those two groups are completely interdependent on each other. One can only give their best observation, but I believe there is a solid point to be made in the film A Day Without a Mexican-2004 where California is ground to a halt when on May 14th every Mexican worker disappears from the streets of California and its citizens attempt to manage their lives without the thousands of illegal immigrants who do much of the labour in today's America.

Despite the humoristic observations of the filmmakers, in reality the situation on the border is one of perpetual crisis. With an economy so dependent on its inexpensive labour and so resistant to accept the workers who do those tasks, it seems the solution to many of these issues are non-existent except to make a movie about something no one can agree on yet everyone knows they could not live without.

The Washington Post is reporting that remittance payments from US resident immigrants to Latin American countries has slowed down over the past two months. While remittances are subject to cyclical economics, much like any other payments, analysts are speculating whether this could signal a more profound shift:

“Many remittance-rich nations would fall into a recession if immigrants began sending home significantly less money, which could encourage more poor Latin Americans to find work in the United States, according to the study and Donald Terry, manager of the Multilateral Investment Fund at the Inter-American Development Bank.”

The article highlights the important role that remittances play in Central American economies, such as Honduras and El Salvador, where they constitute 18 percent of the national income and surpass foreign aid and investment, according to a study by the think tank, Inter-American Dialogue.

The Inter-American Development Bank is studying possible reasons for sluggish payments, noting that anecdotal evidence suggests that raids on migrant communities by U.S. law enforcement officers and fear of deportation has prompted some to curb spending. Other reasons may be saving money to pay U.S. citizenship fees, wagering that a congressional debate over immigration law would result in allowing them to pay a penalty and legalize their immigration status. A downturn in the U.S. housing industry could also be trickling down to immigrants, who fill the majority of U.S. construction jobs.”

For further reading on the role of remittances in aiding developing countries, please take a look at these documents:

• “The role of remittances in the World's Economy”, Immigration Policy Brief, The American Immigration Law Foundation, 2003.
• The Migration Information Source of the Migration Policy Institute has a full overview of the topic, including special coverage of the ‘Year of Migration and Development’ 2006.
• “Migration and Remittances”, an overview compiled by the World Bank.
• “Close to home - The Development Impact of Remittances in Latin America,” World Bank Report, 2006 (pdf).
• “Card-based Remittances: A closer look at supply and demand,” Inter-American Dialogue, 2007 (pdf).
• “International Flows of Remittances: Cost, Competition and Financial Access in Latin America and the Caribbean–Toward an Industry Scorecard,”  Inter-American Development Bank, 2006 (please scroll down the list of documents to download the PDF from the IADB's website).
• “Migrants’ Remittances,” Ch. 2 of a World Bank report on Migration Trends in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union, 2006. To access the report in full, take a look at the World Bank's website on the topic.