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As Trump has taken a strong stance on illegal immigration, a recent report claimed India has agreed to take back at least 18,000 Indians living illegally in the United States.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar addressing a media briefing in Washington (MEA)
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Wednesday responded to media reports claiming that India is collaborating with the Trump administration to repatriate 18,000 migrants living in the US, saying the identities of those individuals have to be verified.
The EAM represented India as the Special Envoy to the PM and participated in the first Quad meeting held after Donald Trump took oath as the country’s 47th president. He also held a bilateral meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
In a press briefing, Jaishankar said, “In terms of the irregular migration, we had a discussion on a range of issues and one of the issues which came up was mobility of people. We have a principled position on mobility that applies to all countries – as a government, we are very much supportive of legal mobility. We do believe in a global workspace. We want Indian talent and skills to have the maximum opportunity at a global level.”
“At the same time, we are very firmly opposed to illegal mobility and migration because when something illegal happens, many other illegal activities get joined into it. This is not reputationally good. We have always taken the view that if there are any of our citizens who are not there illegally, if we are sure that they are our citizens we have always been open to their legitimate return to India. It is not a position unique to the US. I also told him (Rubio) that while we understand all of this, it is in our mutual interest to facilitate legal mobility,” he added.
He cautioned the public about the number of 18,000 Indians reportedly living illegally in the US. “At our end, we have to verify if they are really Indians because naturally there are sensitivities involved there,” he further said.
Is India Taking Back Illegal Immigrants From US?
Trump returned to the White House after a campaign centred around reducing illegal immigration and began his second term by ending birthright citizenship and declaring an emergency on the border. A report has surfaced that India has expressed willingness to collaborate with the Trump administration to take back 18,000 Indians living illegally in the US, although the real number could be much higher.
Sources told Bloomberg that the Indian government was collaborating with the US authorities to identify undocumented Indian immigrants for deportation after the Trump administration began work on illegal immigration by mobilising troops along the US-Mexico border.
According to the Pew Research Center, there are an estimated 725,000 undocumented Indian immigrants in the US, making them the third largest group after those from Mexico and El Salvador. The move to identify and deport Indian immigrants was described as an attempt to placate Trump just as he takes office and avoid a trade war, the report said.
Trump had previously made threats of steep trade tariffs for India as part of his America-first policy and New Delhi is keen to avoid any trade conflicts as India-US ties have seen an upswing in the last few years. The Ministry of External Affairs earlier confirmed that both sides are engaged in a process to deter illegal migration.
The Indian government is also looking to protect the status of the H-1B visa for skilled migrants to the US, as 75% of the H-1B visas are given to Indian employees. Furthermore, a large-scale deportation of Indian migrants can lead to social and economic disruptions in India.
- Location :
Washington D.C., United States of America (USA)
