Committee on the Protection of the Rights of All

Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families

Fortieth session

Summary record of the 592nd meeting

Held at the Palais Wilson, Geneva, on Monday, 7 April 2025, at 3 p.m.

Chair:Ms. Diallo

Contents

Consideration of reports submitted by States Parties under article 73 of the Convention

Fourth periodic report of Mexico

The meeting was called to order at 3 p.m.

Consideration of reports submitted by States Parties under article 73 of the Convention

Fourth periodic report of Mexico (CMW/C/MEX/4; CMW/C/MEX/QPR/4)

In accordance with rule 12 (1) of the Committee ’ s rules of procedure, Mr. Corzo Sosa withdrew during the consideration of the fourth periodic report of Mexico .

At the invitation of the Chair, the delegation of Mexico joined the meeting.

A representative of Mexico, introducing her country’s fourth periodic report (CMW/C/MEX/4), said that it had been prepared with the cooperation of more than 20 governmental bodies and all three branches of government. Mexico continued to exercise a leadership role in advancing migrant rights, including through its active support for the Convention and the regular submission of resolutions on the topic to the General Assembly and the Human Rights Council. The Government was convinced that the best way to counter the discourse of rejection and discrimination towards migrants was to recognize their valuable contribution to development and to promote full respect for their rights.

A representative of Mexico, continuing the introduction of the report, said that the fact that Mexico was a country of origin, transit, destination and return presented its authorities with a grave responsibility and an enormous challenge: to identify and meet the needs of migrants on its territory while ensuring their safety and respecting their human rights. In the previous decade, migration flows had increased as the confluence of multiple factors had pushed people across borders in search of safety and well-being. The number of undocumented migrants in transit through Mexico had risen sharply. In the first five months of 2024 alone, the National Institute of Migration had identified about 1.4 million foreign nationals in an irregular situation. However, Mexico was actually witnessing mixed migration flows that included migrant workers and members of their families as well aspersons in need of international protection. They were composed of family groups, women, children and adolescents, older persons, LGBTI+ persons, persons with illnesses and disabilities, and members of Indigenous Peoples.

In recent years, the picture had darkened as a result of the increasingly restrictive immigration policies adopted by the United States of America, which had applied measures including the return of asylum-seekers to Mexico, the restriction of entry in order to prevent the spread of contagious disease during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic and the immediate expulsion of migrants at the border. In response, the Government of Mexico had prioritized a humanitarian and human-rights-based approach. Mexico had neither closed its borders nor suspended international protection activities. Rather than resorting to pushbacks and returns, the authorities had allowed the entry and stay of migrants, provided them with vaccines and facilitated voluntary returns. Mexico had received and processed 41,000 asylum requests in 2020 and approximately 130,000 in both 2021 and 2022, with an acceptance rate of 70 per cent. Some 140,000 asylum requests had been received in 2023 and about 79,000 in 2024.

In 2019, the Ministry of Health had published the Comprehensive Healthcare Plan for the Migrant Population in order to provide healthcare to migrants on a basis of equality during their transit and stay. In accordance with the Committee’s recommendation, the Migration Act had been amended to prohibit the placement of children or adolescents in migrant holding centres. Protocols had been designed that prioritized the best interests of the child and the unity of families.

The Government had also undertaken reforms to strengthen legal frameworks for gender equality, which it recognized as a cornerstone of sustainable development, justice and social cohesion, and had designed programmes to combat gender-based violence, trafficking in persons and discrimination against women and children. The Comprehensive Programme to Prevent, Address, Punish and Eradicate Violence against Women included targeted actions for migrant women in situations of risk.

A representative of Mexico, continuing the introduction of the report, said that the Government continued to build institutional capacity to combat migrant smuggling, with the involvement of multiple stakeholders. Although Mexico did not have a specific law on migrant smuggling, it was a party to the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and the Protocols thereto. A comprehensive national strategy to combat migrant smuggling had been adopted in 2023, and the Migration Act provided for the offence of migrant smuggling and for aggravating circumstances in cases involving children or adolescents or the participation of public servants.

The Interministerial Commission for Comprehensive Support in Migration Matters, established in 2019, had adopted a migration model that envisaged the humanitarian management of irregular migratory flows, promoted labour mobility pathways, provided support for Mexican communities abroad, addressed the structural causes of migration and developed statistical tools to support evidence-based decision-making. To promote the labour integration of migrants, the Government had designed and implemented a labour mobility strategy and a fair recruitment mechanism, launched the “Mexico Employs You” (México te emplea) microsite, established partnerships with more than 400 companies, registered 142,000 migrant workers with the Mexican Social Security Institute and organized job fairs and similar events.

In March 2025, the Government had opened a multi-service centre for inclusion and development, in Tapachula, Chiapas, whose structure and operations had been designed in cooperation with international organizations. The purpose of the facility was to bring government services closer to persons in need of international protection, thereby ensuring their socioeconomic integration. Mexico was committed to establishing regular channels to facilitate the mobility, social integration and employment of migrants and to ensure that migration took place in safe, orderly and regular manner. Consulates worked to protect the labour rights of Mexican nationals abroad, especially in the United States, where persons in an irregular situation were particularly exposed to rights violations. In January 2025, the Government had supplemented its Inter-Institutional Strategy on Comprehensive Support for Repatriated and Returned Mexican Families with the “Mexico Embraces You” (México te abraza) programme, which coordinated efforts at all levels to receive and support returning Mexican nationals in a dignified manner.

Mr. Ceriani Cernadas (Country Rapporteur), observing that few other countries faced such a complex and challenging situation as Mexico, said that he would be interested to know more about the measures the Government had taken to control and regulate migration. In particular, he wished to know why the Government had taken a militarized approach to dealing with the issue of migrants in transit. Why, for instance, had the Government deployed thousands of members of the National Guard to the southern border in 2019 and to the northern border in 2024? He wondered whether the Government had evaluated its policy of assigning the armed forces to migration control and, if so, what had been the human rights impact of that policy. Furthermore, recalling that there had been several instances of excessive use of force by the security forces – including the case of the six migrants who had been shot dead by the army in Huixtla, Chiapas, and the case of the Cuban citizen Cristóbal Cobreiro, killed by the National Guard in 2021 – he wished to know what steps had been taken to investigate those crimes, punish the perpetrators and guarantee non-repetition.

As irregular migration was indeed a growing problem, he wished to know the extent to which the State Party had established regular migration channels in order to reverse that trend. Information on any mechanisms that had been put in place to facilitate regular migration would be welcome. The introduction of the requirement for Venezuelan nationals to obtain a visa had evidently had a serious impact on patterns of regular and irregular migration, as the figures suggested that, instead of entering the country legally, Venezuelans had taken to doing so in an irregular manner. He therefore wished to know whether the Government had evaluated its policy of requiring visas for Venezuelan nationals.

The Committee had received numerous reports concerning the automatic detention of migrants in an irregular situation, meaning that they did not benefit from an individual assessment but were simply taken to a migrant holding centre. He would therefore like to know what steps had been taken to give effect to the Committee’s recommendation, in the previous concluding observations (CMW/C/MEX/CO/3), to develop an action plan to ensure that deprivation of liberty on migration-related grounds was applied only as a measure of last resort and for the shortest possible time. The delegation might also comment on reports that the authorities tracked the number of detentions but did not maintain individual records on persons who were admitted to immigration detention, and explain why the State Party used unclear concepts such as “securing” and “presentation” when alluding to deprivation of liberty. He would like to know whether any non-custodial measures had been introduced for asylum-seekers and other vulnerable persons as an alternative to immigration detention, and what efforts had been made to relieve overcrowding and improve health and hygiene in immigration detention facilities. Regarding the criminal proceedings in relation to the fire at the migrant holding centre in Ciudad Juárez in which 40 migrants had died, he wondered whether there had been any political accountability for the conditions that had led to the fire, and whether any guarantees of non-repetition had been provided.

He would be grateful if the delegation could comment on allegations that the authorities applied a policy of intercepting migrants and taking them to states along the southern border that were farther from their destination. He would appreciate an explanation of why so many migrants had been turned back at the county’s airports; why Colombian nationals had accounted for up to half of the 100,000 persons who had been turned back at Mexican airports in 2024; and what remedies were available, both in airports and after deportation or return, for persons wishing to challenge the measure. Furthermore, in the light of the information that the authorities had detected almost 1 million migrants with an irregular status in the first eight months of 2024, he wished to know what would happen to the 900,000or so individuals who had been issued with an official notice to leave.

The Committee was concerned at reports of the State Party’s failure to bring prosecutions following a number of massacres in which migrants had been killed by organized crime groups. It would like to know about any progress made in investigating such cases, including the massacres at Cadereyta, Nuevo León and Camargo, Tamaulipas, and in bringing perpetrators to justice. Furthermore, he wished to know what measures were being taken to address enforced disappearance in the context of migration. He would welcome information on the adoption of the regulations of the General Act on Enforced Disappearance of Persons, Disappearance Perpetrated by Individuals and the National Missing Persons System and clarification of whether the Bureau for the Search for Missing Migrants had commenced work. He wondered whether the authorities had accepted any recommendations from civil society to improve the guidelines for the Mechanism for Mexican Support Abroad in Search and Investigation Activities. He would like to know whether the State Party had taken any measures to strengthen exchanges between the Forensic Commission and its counterparts in other countries, and whether it was true that the Consulate of Mexico in El Salvador was no longer receiving complaints from the relatives of migrants who had gone missing in Mexico.

Furthermore, in the light of numerous reports of “migrant rescue operations” conducted by the armed forces, he would appreciate clarification as to whether those operations were conducted by the same personnel who were otherwise engaged in migration control activities. While it was certainly necessary to rescue migrants from situations in which they were at risk of trafficking or abduction, he did not understand how operations for the protection of migrants could be conducted by the same authorities that were responsible for detaining and expelling them.

He would welcome confirmation of reports that the authorities had stopped collecting data on persons in an irregular situation. He wished to know whether the system for collecting migrant data was being evaluated and, if so, what the status and purpose of the evaluation was and whether it would result in changes to the way that information was gathered. He wondered to what extent the National Institute of Migration was responsible for decisions affecting child migrants, whether child migrants were effectively deprived of their liberty in referral centres and social assistance centres and why migrant fathers were separated from the other members of their family. It would be useful to know why the authorities had ceased issuing visas to asylum-seekers on humanitarian grounds, particularly given that the documentation with which they were currently issued did not afford them the same rights as visas.

In 2019, the Governments of Mexico and the United States of America had issued a joint declaration in which the Government of Mexico had committed itself to providing jobs, healthcare and education to migrants of other nationalities who had been returned to Mexico from the United States. In that connection, it would be interesting to know what the Government of Mexico was doing to promote and protect the rights of such migrants and whether it would consider concluding another agreement with the United States to strengthen the protection of their rights.

Mr. Charef (Country Rapporteur), noting that the Supreme Court had ruled that migrants must not be held in detention for longer than 36 hours, said that he wished to know how long, on average, migrants were detained in migrant detention centres, how such centres operated and who managed them. It would be interesting to know how many people worked for the Beta Migrant Protection Groups, how those groups functioned, what budget they were allocated and how their offices were distributed across the country. He would be grateful to hear about any steps being taken to ensure access to healthcare, including mental healthcare, for migrants. What conclusions had the Government drawn from its investigations into the fire that had killed 40 persons in a migrant holding centre in March 2023?

He would like to know what was being done to collect information on the number of migrants unlawfully entering Mexico and transiting through the country to the United States and what routes that they took. He would be grateful to learn how the Government used data on migration in developing its migration policies. It would be useful to have information on migrant victims of enforced disappearance, disaggregated by nationality, age, sex, type of migration and, in cases where the victims had died, the places where their remains had been found. Information on the work carried out, and the results obtained, by the Forensic Commission responsible for investigating violations of migrants’ rights would also be welcome.

It would be helpful to know what steps had been taken to deal with the migrant caravan that had passed through Mexico in 2023, including any measures to ensure access to shelter, water, sanitation and other services for the migrants concerned. He wondered what conclusions had been drawn from the Government’s handling of the caravan and what measures had been taken to protect migrants against COVID-19. He wished to know how many migration centres there were in Mexico, where those centres were located and whether they were run by the civilian or military authorities. He would like to know how the federal police and other bodies checked the status of migrants and what human and financial resources were allocated to agencies responsible for managing migration.

The Chair (County Rapporteur) said that she wished to know what measures had been taken to ensure that migrants were not held in administrative detention for longer than 36 hours, in line with the ruling issued by the Supreme Court. She wondered how the State Party saw to it that laws on migration and procedures for managing migratory flows took account of the finding by the Supreme Court that certain provisions of the Migration Act were unconstitutional as they failed to ensure respect for freedom of movement and for the right to equality and non-discrimination.

She would appreciate the delegation’s comments on reports that migrants who had been detained for the maximum legal time period of 36 hours were, in some instances, transferred to a different centre where they remained in detention, in violation of the law. It would be useful to know how many children had been removed from migrant detention centres since 2020 and how many children remained in such centres.

She would welcome information on the number of applications submitted for asylum and refugee status, including the number of applications made by, or on behalf of, children. Information on the support provided to migrants at shelters or social assistance centres would also be welcome. She would be grateful to know why children in possession of a temporary permit on humanitarian grounds were issued with a unique population registry code and whether the allocation of such codes was in their best interests.

Given that child migrants could no longer be expelled without having undergone an individual assessment, it would be interesting to learn about the mechanisms in place, especially in border areas, to assess any risks that would be faced by child and adolescent migrants in the event that they were expelled. It would be useful to know how many expulsions, deportations, refoulements or returns had been averted as a result of the assessments. She wondered what happened to the large number of migrants for whom an administrative procedure intended as an alternative to expulsion or refoulement had been initiated but not completed and what steps were taken to support children in that situation.

She would like to know what measures were taken to protect the rights of Mexican migrants employed in other countries under temporary work programmes, such as the Mexico-Canada Seasonal Agricultural Worker Programme. In particular, she wished to know how the State Party ensured that they were paid in accordance with their contract, were not required to work undue amounts of unpaid overtime and could file complaints without their contract being terminated or their visa withdrawn.

She would appreciate the delegation’s comments on reports that a significant number of women migrants living in shelters or detained at the country’s southern border had been subjected to abuse, including sexual violence and intimidation, by members of the armed forces and the National Guard. It would be interesting to hear about any measures taken to tackle such abuse and to protect women and child migrants against acts of gender-based violence. Information on any steps taken to identify, prosecute and punish the perpetrators of such acts would be welcome.

She would appreciate details of the financial and human resources allocated to the various agencies responsible for migration, including those that processed applications for asylum. She wished to know what measures were taken to protect the rights of migrant domestic workers and to prevent them from being subjected to stigmatization and discrimination. She wondered how the Government dealt with migrants from sub-Saharan Africa who attempted to enter the United States via Nicaragua and whether the Government cooperated with their countries of origin in the event that they were expelled from Mexico or the United States.

Mr. Babacar said that he wished to know why the State Party had not ratified the International Labour Organization (ILO) Migration for Employment Convention (Revised), 1949 (No. 97), the ILO Migrant Workers (Supplementary Provisions) Convention, 1975 (No. 143) or the ILO Labour Inspection Convention, 1947 (No. 81). He would welcome information on the number of labour inspectors in Mexico, their distribution around the country and the material and human resources allocated to them. Did labour inspectors enjoy independence in decision-making and in the management of their finances?

Mr. Kariyawasam said that he wished to know whether there was any scope to renegotiate the rules of the Mexico-Canada Seasonal Agricultural Worker Programme with a view to making changes favourable to migrant workers from the State Party.

Mr. Frasheri said that it would be helpful to know what questions the delegation had for the Committee and what it believed the Committee and the United Nations could do to help the State Party, which was in a delicate position as a result of its location, build its capacity to manage migration and implement the Convention.

The meeting was suspended at 4 . 30 p.m. and resumed at 4 . 55 p.m.

A representative of Mexico said that, in the wake of the ruling in which the Supreme Court had found articles 97 and 98 of the Migration Act to be unconstitutional, a protocol had been drawn up to ensure that the migration status checks that took place outside official points of entry were compatible with the Constitution. Officials from the National Institute of Migration who carried out such checks had to be clearly identified, for example, and the places and times of day at which the checks could take place had been defined. Adult migrants who were found to be in an irregular situation were taken to migrant holding centres, and at that point administrative proceedings were instituted.

Her country did not have migration courts. Irregular migration was a non-criminal breach of the law, and it was the National Institute of Migration itself that was responsible for the administrative proceedings that were instituted in respect of migrants in an irregular situation. Those proceedings were to conclude within 36 hours of a migrant’s admission to a holding centre, and they culminated in the release, the assisted return or the deportation of the migrant.

Under the Migration Act, child and adolescent migrants were categorized as unaccompanied, accompanied or separated and, since the conclusion of reforms undertaken in 2021, there had been specific proceedings for each of the three categories. In all cases, however, such migrants were referred to the child protection authorities who, acting in the best interests of the child, decided what steps were to be taken by officials from the National Institute of Migration. The steps in question could include the regularization of the migration status of the child or adolescent and members of his or her family or an assisted return to the country of origin. No provision for the deportation of children and adolescents was made in the Migration Act.

The country had more than 120 shelters or reception centres for child and adolescent migrants and members of their families. From January to June 2024, nearly 85,000 children and adolescents of the three categories defined in the Migration Act had been referred to the child protection authorities. In each of the years from 2021 to 2023, too, referrals of such migrants had numbered in the tens of thousands. The migration authorities processed child and adolescent migrants, not in migrant holding centres but in special offices whence they could be referred to the child protection system. In short, children and adolescents were in the custody of the migration authorities only until they were referred to the child protection authorities and admitted to an appropriate shelter. In one State, Nuevo León, the National Institute of Migration had opened a referral office in a shelter operated by the State System for the Comprehensive Development of the Family.

The Migration Policy, Registration and Identification Unit of the Ministry of the Interior, which produced statistical data on migration, was currently reviewing databases and the links between a number of information systems with a view to publishing up-to-date statistical information later in the month. Under an agreement with the International Organization for Migration, the Unit had collected data on migration routes that would inform the development of migration policy.

Initially, the migrant caravans that had arrived in Mexico had originated chiefly in Guatemala and Honduras. Subsequent large migration flows had come from other countries but, like the caravans, had entered Mexico from the south. The migrants involved were provided with humanitarian assistance, and in some cases travel documents, by a network of migrant protection groups operating under the oversight of the National Institute of Migration.

Measures to rise to the challenges posed by the new migration policies adopted by the United States of America had begun being applied two months earlier. Her country’s consular network in the United States, which was the largest such network in any country anywhere, operated a programme for the support of the Mexican community in the United States. The legal aid programme administered by the consulates had been strengthened, and a centre, whose findings were meant for both the Mexican authorities and the public at large, had been established to monitor the anti-immigration laws and policies, including executive orders, adopted in the United States. An assistance centre that provided information and advice around the clock on migration-related matters had likewise been strengthened. In addition, consular officials had increased the frequency of their visits to prisons and other places of detention. Other recent measures included the development of a digital application that made it possible for Mexican nationals to provide the consular authorities with emergency contact information, efforts to reduce paperwork and the linkage of information systems administered by the consulates and other public agencies.

A representative of Mexico, notingthat everyone in her country had the right to free healthcare, said that a number of public initiatives had proved effective at ensuring access to such care. One initiative was the Comprehensive Healthcare Plan for the Migrant Population, the aim of which was to coordinate the provision of health services to resident migrants and migrants in transit. The Mexican authorities had also been active internationally. In 2023, for example, the delegations of her country and Portugal had submitted a draft decision to the Executive Board of the World Health Organization (WHO) with a view to extending the application of the WHO global action plan on promoting the health of refugees and migrants to 2030.

Shortly after the COVID-19 outbreak had been declared a pandemic, the authorities had set in motion a plan to provide comprehensive care to the migrant population, in particular on the country’s northern and southern borders. Death certificates had been issued in timely fashion regardless of the deceased’s migration status. Mexico had been one of the few countries to have kept its borders open during the pandemic and, as a result, a number of communities of foreign nationals who had been unable to return to their countries of origin had remained in Mexico. Members of those communities, too, had received the health services they needed.

The development of new modes of temporary alternative care for unaccompanied child and adolescent migrants was under way. The National System for the Comprehensive Development of the Family, for example, was the driving force behind measures being taken within the framework of a comprehensive strategy for the care of children and adolescents deprived of or at risk of being deprived of parental care, including unaccompanied child and adolescent migrants. As part of the strategy, furthermore, work was under way to properly equip the shelters that received the largest numbers of unaccompanied minors.

The Commission on Assistance for Refugees was required by law to take the necessary steps to ensure that applicants for refugee status needing special support – including pregnant women, persons with disabilities and victims of gender-based violence or trafficking in persons – received institutional assistance. The General Act on Women’s Access to a Violence-Free Life applied to all women and girls in the country, regardless of their nationality or migration status. Training on gender and immigration had been provided to federal employees in 2023 and 2024. There were 73 women’s justice centres in 31 federative entities.

A technical opinion was being prepared on the feasibility and advisability of moving forward with the ratification of the ILO Migration for Employment Convention (Revised), 1949 (No. 97) and the ILO Migrant Workers (Supplementary Provisions) Convention, 1975 (No. 143). The Mechanism for Mexican Support Abroad in Search and Investigation Activities encompassed all measures to facilitate access to justice and reparation for migrants and their families abroad. Family members living abroad could report cases of missing migrants to Mexican consulates, embassies and attaché offices. A programme to train diplomats and embassy and consulate staff on how to follow up on such reports was being rolled out.

The National Guard was a civilian institution that played a key role in fighting crime and maintaining public safety. The Ministry of Naval Affairs and the Ministry of National Defence carried out their duties in cooperation with the National Guard. Under the constitutional amendments of 2024, the National Guard had been made one of the standing armed forces under the Ministry of National Defence and been given authority to investigate offences within its area of competence. In 2019, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights had signed a framework agreement for the provision of technical assistance to the National Guard in the design of training programmes and the development of protocols on the use of force and on working with vulnerable groups.

It was important to distinguish disappearances from enforced disappearances. The Government neither engaged in a systematic practice of enforced disappearance nor gave orders to have persons disappeared. The disappearance of persons was a serious human rights concern, and a variety of measures had been taken in response, including the creation of the National Missing Persons Commission. A presidential decree on capacity-building for the Commission had recently been signed. Local missing persons commissions, public prosecutor’s offices, police forces and other bodies took part in searches for missing persons. Legislative initiatives had been launched to create a national forensic information database and a national platform for the identification of human remains.

With respect to the incident of 1 October 2024, in which members of the armed forces had shot at a vehicle travelling at high speed, the Executive Commission for Victim Support had represented the victims during the investigation and provided the necessary medical assistance. Most of the victims – who were from countries including Egypt, Cuba, Pakistan, India, Peru, Nepal, Honduras, El Salvador and Mexico – had decided either to return to their home countries or to continue their journey to the United States of America. The National Institute of Migration had brought the family of an Egyptian minor injured in the incident to Mexico. In terms of reparation, immediate assistance in the amount of 203,400 pesos had been awarded to five direct victims of homicide, bodily harm and trafficking in persons. Thirty-two victims had been entered in the National Register of Victims, 27 as direct victims and five as indirect victims.

The victims of the 9 October 2023 confrontation involving the Ministry of National Defence and the National Guard in Chihuahua, which had resulted in injuries to six people, had received support during the investigation and been given the necessary medical assistance from the day of the events. The Executive Commission for Victim Support was processing the recommendation issued by the National Human Rights Commission in the case of Cristóbal Cobreiro, with a view to assessing the harm to the family members and issuing a reparation plan.

A representative of Mexico said that the federal case law on standards applicable to migrants and persons under international protection was fairly recent. For example, amparo appeals filed in 2020 and 2022 had resulted in a recognition of migrants’ right to an identity document and in a review of the “Remain in Mexico” policy. In two cases filed in 2022, it had been found that, restrictions on a person’s individual liberty amounted to detention, and therefore triggered due process safeguards. The courts had also recognized that a suspension must be ordered automatically as interim relief upon the filing of a petition for amparo, without the petitioner having to take any further steps. In another 2022 case, a collegiate circuit court had indicated that migrant holding centres must meet minimum standards in matters such as food, clothing, hygiene, the separation of men and women and opportunities for filing complaints.

In a 2022 decision on an amparo appeal, the Supreme Court had recognized the right of all migrants to a court-appointed lawyer. The Federal Public Defender Service, which had 43 legal advisers specialized in handling petitions for amparo, had first been allowed to enter migrant holding centres in 2022. Since then it had carried out 3,466 visits to those centres and to other places serving migrants. In addition, a model amparo petition had been introduced for use in cases where a person was held in custody longer than 36 hours. Minimum due process safeguards must be observed in appeals proceedings, including administrative appeals, relating to migration decisions. Several judicial decisions had stated that administrative courts must take account of international standards.

Decisions on amparo appeals filed in 2020 had underscored the importance of giving consideration to the specific needs of migrant children. Those decisions had also stated that children were entitled to legal assistance from the Federal Office for the Protection of Children and Adolescents and that holders of temporary permits granted on humanitarian grounds must be allowed to retain those permits for as long as amparo proceedings regarding their status were ongoing. With respect to reparation, it had been noted in the decision on the amparo appeal relating to the “Remain in Mexico” policy that, even if a government policy had ended, it remained subject to review if its effects were still being felt, and that cases of due process violations must be heard and reparation provided even if the person in question was no longer in the country.

Mr. Ceriani Cernadas said that he would be grateful for further clarification as to why the armed forces and agencies whose function was to prevent crime were involved in carrying out immigration checks. The delegation might also comment on the reasons for the extremely low rate of regularization among migrants with an irregular status.

He wondered whether migrants with disabilities were covered by the programmes of the National Council for the Development and Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities and to what extent the needs of persons with disabilities were addressed in policies on migration-related matters. He would also like to know what steps the State Party was taking to implement the recommendations made by the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in its concluding observations on the State Party’s combined second and third periodic reports (CRPD/C/MEX/CO/2-3), to address disability in legislation on matters affecting migrants and refugees and to ensure that migrants with disabilities had access to education, healthcare and employment. It would be helpful to know whether disability was taken into account in decisions on humanitarian visas or international protection.

He wished to find out whether the parents of children born in Mexico automatically received residence permits, without the need for costly proceedings, and what progress had been made in addressing child labour. Did the State Party plan to amend article 7 of the Federal Labour Act, which required 90 per cent or, in some cases, all of a company’s employees to be Mexican, to bring it into line with the Convention? He would be curious to learn what steps the State Party was taking to strengthen the women’s justice centres and whether those centres effectively addressed the challenges faced by migrant women. The Committee would appreciate details about how the State Party ensured that women in situations of mobility had access to sexual and reproductive healthcare and about the maternal and fetal mortality rates among that group of women. What was the status of the criminal proceedings relating to the killing of Ms. Victoria Salazar, a Salvadoran refugee, in police custody in 2021.

He wondered whether recommendations of civil society organizations made through the Advisory Council on Migration Policy were generally implemented and whether such organizations participated in other bodies, such as the Interministerial Commission for Comprehensive Support in Migration Matters. He would appreciate information on measures taken to protect defenders of migrants’ rights and to reunite Mexican parents deported from the United States with children who had remained behind in that country.

Mr. Charef said that he wished to know whether there was a widespread practice in Mexico of families providing shelter for migrants in their homes as a form of hospitality and how many foreign nationals were living in Mexico as retirees on long-stay visas.

The meeting rose at 6 p.m.