Undocumented immigrants not same as criminals, says Vatican official

(Wed.11July,2007): Being an undocumented immigrant is not the same thing as being a criminal, a Vatican official told the Global Forum on Migration and Development. "Independently of their legal status, migrants are human beings with rights that must be respected, said Archbishop Agostino Marchetto, secretary of the Pontifical Council for Migrants and Travelers. The archbishop spoke July 9 at the opening of the global forum, a gathering of nongovernmental and faith-inspired organizations and, labor unions convoked by the Belgian government to come up with concrete proposals for improved international policies on migration and development. While people have a right to live at peace and with dignity in their home countries, they also have a right to migrate when those needs are not met, Archbishop Marchetto told the forum. He said the international community must find more effective means to promote peace and development throughout the world so that people do not feel forced to leave their homelands and to increase channels for legal migration. Migration is prompted not only by war or poverty in the developing world, but also by the need of the world's richer countries for laborers, he said. "Thus, migrants contribute to their host country's well-being," he added. At the same time, the archbishop said, migrants have the obligation to respect the laws of their host country and to "strive for proper integration, into the host society and learn its language. They are to foster esteem and respect for their host country, even to the point of loving and defending it" Archbishop Marchetto added .