Pope Francis warns Trump over mass deportation: In a major rebuke to the Trump administration in the US, Pope Francis on Tuesday warned that if Washington moves ahead with its programme to forcefully deport people purely based on their illegal status, it will deprive them of their inherent dignity, adding, “It will end badly.” Pope, in a letter to the bishops of the United States, who have criticised the expulsions as harming the most vulnerable, highlighted the US migrant crackdown.
Pope cites Bible to reaffirm people’s right to seek shelter
The Pope affirmed people’s right to seek shelter and safety in other lands as he cited the biblical stories of migration, the people of Israel, the Book of Exodus and Jesus Christ’s own experience. He said that he has closely followed the major crisis that is unfolding in the United States due to the initiation of mass deportation programmes.
He said, “The rightly formed conscience cannot fail to make a critical judgement and express its disagreement with any measure that tacitly or explicitly identifies the illegal status of some migrants with criminality.”
Nations have right to defend themselves: Pope
While the Pope acknowledged in his letter that nations have the right to defend themselves and keep their communities safe from criminals, he underscored, “the act of deporting people who in many cases have left their land for reasons of extreme poverty, insecurity, exploitation, persecution or serious deterioration of the environment damages the dignity of many men and women.”
He added that such acts of deportation “place families in a state of particular vulnerability and defencelessness.”
History’s first Latin American pope has long made caring for migrants a priority of his pontificate, demanding that countries welcome, protect, promote and integrate those fleeing conflicts, poverty and climate disasters. Francis has also said governments are expected to do so to the limits of their capacity.
“What is built on the basis of force and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being begins badly and will end badly,” he said. He distinguished between the acts of developing a policy to regulate migration legally and expelling people on the basis of their illegal status.
(With inputs from AP)
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