Border

Hundreds of refugees from Africa dying as they attempt to cross into Italy, Spain and other parts of southern Europe. Tens of thousands of displaced Syrians searching for safety. Kids fleeing the violence in Central America and ending up in detention centers in places like Dilley, Texas.

The dominant issue of our times will be the movement of people. Not voluntary movement as we know it but movement that is forced, desperate and dangerous. No country knows how to deal with it...

I’m with a group of officials and participants in the cross-border economic development project started by Mayor Philip Skinner of Columbus, New Mexico. The first meeting took place in Columbus on September 13, 2014 and I wrote about it in the article “Rebuilding Economies on the Border.” I missed the second meeting but attended the one in Deming on December 6, a meeting that was much more heavily attended than the first and included a number of private sector representatives like the Deming-Luna County Chamber of Commerce, the Deming Visitor’s Center and managers of Deming hotels...

With the terrible killings in Paris, attention has finally turned to the thousands of North Africans who have not been assimilated into those societies, live separate lives, and do not feel that they are a part of the future of those countries. We saw it repeatedly in both Spain and France.

Europeans will talk about discrimination in the United States. This is understandable because our issues are open and public, always making the headlines. In France and Spain, however, the problem is much worse because it is hidden – or at least has been hidden until now.  Outsiders, whether they have come from Algeria or Morocco or are gypsies, are simply forgotten...

“I came home from work on April 3 and Alfredo was just gone,” Adrianna says. “His breakfast was on the table, nothing had been taken, not even his toothbrush.” They then tell me how they had gone to every town in the area, talking to police officials, checking jails and asking for Alfredo. I’m stunned because I thought that the wave of violence that swept through Palomas a few years earlier had disappeared. It sounds, however, that he and two cousins had been kidnapped and are now dead and buried somewhere out in the desert...

“Mexico is the draw and we’re along the way,” says Mayor Philip Skinner of the tiny village of Columbus, noting how the violence across the border in Palomas, Mexico and further south had cut into the number of visitors who passed through Columbus, thus hurting the local economy. He was speaking at a recent and historic meeting of local political leaders from both sides of the border, stretching from Silver City in the north to Casas Grandes to the south. The meeting took place in Columbus and he was the organizer and this driving force in this bi-national effort...

Families and young people decide to flee the horrendous violence in their Central American countries of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, arrive on our border after a terrifying journey through Mexico and surrender themselves to our immigration authorities. Suddenly we have another immigration crisis.

What happens?

Congress argues but does nothing. President Obama ponders and then defers until after the elections. Is anyone going to do anything this humanitarian crisis? Allegra Love from Santa Fe is one of the very few...