There has been a massive increase of refugees from Central America seeking asylum in the US, many of them unaccompanied children.

The Border Patrol says that, this year alone, more than 50,000 such children have crossed the border from Mexico.

Those grabbed by the authorities have been subjected to brutal treatment, according to a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and immigrant rights organisations.

“Children are being abused on a massive and widespread scale”, said James Lyall, a border litigation lawyer for the ACLU in Arizona.

 The ACLU describes children and teenagers being shackled in stress positions, kicked, yelled at, forced to drink from toilets and denied food and medical care.

These youngsters have been held by the government for prolonged periods in crowded, unsafe and freezing detention cells.

The Washington Post posted videos showing makeshift holding areas at the McAllen, Texas, Border Patrol station. These show dozens of women and children sprawled on concrete floors, in the cold and without blankets.

A 13-year-old boy picked up near Brownsville, Texas, said that a Border Patrol agent set his service dog on him, then denied him medical treatment for his bloody facial wounds and impaired vision from the attack, according to the ACLU.

A 16-year-old travelling with her 2-year-old son was put in a cold holding cell, jammed in with 30 others. After three days, she noticed that her son was feverish. He was given a wet towel but denied any further medical attention.

A 17-year-old woman cut her hand on the border fence. The Border Patrol agent who apprehended her not only refused her medical treatment, but “squeezed the wound, causing her great pain”.

Then he told her, “It’s good that you are hurt, you deserve to be hurt for coming to the US.”

About a quarter of the minors that the ACLU interviewed reported that they were physically abused. Half said they were verbally abused and denied medical care, including a child whose asthma medication was taken from her even as she suffered multiple attacks.

Obama’s ‘solution’: deportation

Shaken by the publicity of these terrible conditions, Obama declared that the situation amounted to a “humanitarian crisis”. His solution is to step up the deporting of these children.

Obama has deported more people than any other president, earning him the sobriquet of “Deporter in Chief” from young Latino activists.

To understand Obama’s proposal, it is necessary to see why these refugees from Central America – mainly Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador – fall into a legal category different from immigrants from Mexico.

Refugees from Mexico are deported immediately under the law. But refugees from countries not bordering the US fall under a different law, which stipulates that they must be processed by a court to determine whether they will be given asylum.

Obama has asked Congress for $3.8 billion to deal with the crisis. About half would be spent on opening facilities that could house the refugees in more humane conditions while their claims are processed.

The rest would go to hiring more judges and increasing forces on the border. The refugees are not allowed legal representation in these courts. So a child can be brought into a court to defend herself with no understanding of what is going on.

The White House states unequivocally that almost all of these refugees, including the children, will be deported. This makes the “judicial process” a farce.

The journey people make across Mexico to get to the US border is arduous and dangerous. Gangsters called “coyotes” charge huge sums to ferry the refugees across the Mexican desert, and abuse them. Women and girls are raped. Some die from lack of food or water.

Impact of NAFTA

What drives people into the extreme desperation even to contemplate such a journey? Extreme poverty and violence, exacerbated by US imperialist exploitation and policies.

Workers and peasants in Central America and Mexico have borne the brunt of the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which further opened their countries to imperialist exploitation and penetration – “free trade” in capital and goods, but not in labour power.

One example among many has been the effect on peasants growing maize. Since NAFTA, local markets have been flooded by cheap US maize, impoverishing millions of peasants and driving them into already overcrowded cities with few employment opportunities.

There also has been the disaster caused by the Great Recession and its aftermath. Workers in the advanced capitalist countries have suffered greatly in this period, but economic crisis and stagnation spill over into even worse conditions in the oppressed countries, on top of their “normal” over-exploitation.

The other factor in the increase in people seeking refuge has been the upsurge in violence related to organised crime. Much of this has its origin in the US-initiated “war on drugs”, which is a war to keep drugs illegal and a source of super-profits.

“Organised crime” refers to capitalist enterprises dealing in services or goods declared “illegal”. Since these enterprises are outside the law (although law enforcement agencies are deeply intertwined with them), they are armed.

Their inter-capitalist competition is regulated by their gunmen. The cartels have grown so large in Mexico and Central America that they operate with virtual impunity. The resulting violence terrifies parents and children. Many attempt to flee.

It is a side business of these cartels to dispatch the “coyotes” to further prey on those seeking asylum.

This current crisis underscores the broader catastrophe of US immigration policy. The immediate need is to grant these children asylum now!

More than this, citizenship should be granted to the immigrants who want it, and the borders should be opened for labour as well as capital and goods – a step toward a world without borders.

To deport these children is a crime against humanity.