US Separated Thousands Of Children From Parents At Border Inspector General

The United States has separated thousands more migrant children from their families at the border than previously believed, the Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General said in a new report on Thursday

NEW YORK (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 17th January, 2019) The United States has separated thousands more migrant children from their families at the border than previously believed, the Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General said in a new report on Thursday.

"In the summer of 2017, prior to the formal announcement of the zero-tolerance policy, ORR (Office of Refugee Resettlement) staff observed a steep increase in the number of separated children referred to ORR care. Officials estimated that ORR received and released thousands of separated children prior to the June 26, 2018, court order that required ORR to identify and reunify certain separated children," the report said.

At the time of that June court order, ORR identified at least 2,737 separated children in its care and the US agency received another 118 children from the Department of Homeland Security between July 1 and November 7, 2018, the report said. But due to poor record keeping, the total number of separated migrant children detained the United States since an uptick in detentions began in 2017 remains unknown, it added.

According to the report, there was an increase in immigrant family separations in the summer 2017, before the formal enactment of the zero-tolerance policy that detained immigrant parents entering the US illegally and held their children in the ORR's care.

The report explained that it is unknown whether these separated children were reunified with their parents.

To gather the information, the HHS analyzed reviewed court filings and internal data, as well as conducted interviews with its senior officials and staff members.

In the spring of 2018, the Trump administration implemented a "zero-tolerance policy" that led to the separation of thousands of families who were detained at the US-Mexico border.

On June 26, a Federal judge in California issued a preliminary ruling to stop the separation of families at the US border and immediately reunify children with their parents.

In response to the ruling, the US government identified 2,654 children in Office of Refugee Resettlement custody who potentially met reunification criteria, of which 437 children remained in custody as of September 10 according to the General Accountability Office (GAO).

In October, Amnesty International reported that more than 6,000 families were forcibly separated as a result of the White House policy. Since 2017, an estimated 8,000 asylum-seeking families have been broken up, the report said.