Holding our governments accountable

Another International Justice Day has come and gone; the day reminds us that government officials are not free from impunity for the world’s worst crimes.  It is also a reminder that holding our governments accountable is a nonstop effort that requires our constant vigilance.  This is especially important for the nearly 2,000 individuals who are held in the world’s largest detention center for asylum-seeking women and children, in Dilley, Texas.  They came to the U.S. seeking help, only to experience further human rights violations by the U.S. government. 

The women and children are incarcerated at the “South Texas Family Residential Center,” (STFRC) a dusty 55-acre compound comprised of a series of portable trailers reminiscent of Japanese internment camps.  The U.S. government picks up young mothers and children who are seeking asylum and takes them to Dilley, TX with little to no explanation of what’s happening.  They must sit for weeks – or more often, months – while being actively denied information necessary to pursue their asylum claims.  These women are detained like criminals for attempting to exercise their basic human right to asylum, which the U.S. government is required to respect.

{mosads}These detained asylum seekers are further subjected to gross violations of their body. On July 3, the U.S. government injected 250 children with adult dosages of the Hepatitis A vaccine between 4-6am in the morning, without their parents’ informed consent.  Reports from detainees and volunteer lawyers on the ground reveal that women and children are regularly denied medical care for broken bones, asthma, fevers, and infections.  And proper nutrition is an issue – the women and children have stated they’re tired of being served beans and rice every day.  The US government is failing to provide a standard of living adequate for these families’ health and well-being, despite forcing them to remain in this facility indefinitely instead of letting them live with family while they await their court hearing.

Misinformation permeates every aspect of their detention.  While writing this article, we witnessed several women be refused access to the free legal services that the CARA Family Detention Pro Bono Project offers. That access to counsel could mean the difference between release and being forced to return to the violence from which they fled.  Terms of release are set without consistency, and family members who attempt to pick up the women and children are repeatedly turned away for arbitrary reasons.  The government’s actions reflect a systematic denial of agency to these women – over their cases, bodies, lives.

The women and children detained in the STFRC came to the U.S. in an attempt to escape the persecution they experienced in their home country. They came seeking an affirmation international justice. Yet, it remains elusive.

They are seeking asylum in an effort to live free from fear and brutal violence.  Many of them come from countries with justice systems that failed them daily; gangs in El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala are so powerful they operate alongside the country’s official government, instituting their own rules and meting out violent punishment.  With no way to hold these non-state political actors accountable, brutal crimes go unpunished.  Women detained in Dilley recount appalling stories of violence, rape, and threats against themselves and their family members.  Some women have been targeted because they opened a business in an attempt to support themselves or their family.  Some women have been persecuted merely because they are indigenous, or belong to a particular religious group.  And some women have been targeted simply because of their gender.

Detaining these women and children at the STFRC when they came to the U.S. for help only serves to further the message they don’t matter – the crimes they fled will go unpunished, and instead of finding help, their human rights continue to be violated. 

This is why we must fight to release these women from the STFRC so they can have a fresh start, free from unfettered violence and abuse.  We must fight for their human rights when the government refuses to help.  We must fight to empower them so they may live the lives they tried to have in the countries from which they fled.  These women symbolize why #JusticeMatters.

Cline, a volunteer with the CARA Pro Bono Project, is based in DC and experienced in international criminal law, immigration, and public interest law.