瑞安·J·福利 人权倡导者周三请求一个联合国小组介入，帮助终止美国政府一项新的做法：对数千名面临驱逐的被拘留者，不向其家属和律师透露他们的下落。
RYAN J. FOLEY Human rights advocates asked a United Nations panel to intervene Wednesday to help end a new U.S. government practice of withholding from families and lawyers the whereabouts of thousands of detainees facing deportation.
美国移民和海关执法局于9月15日从其“在线被拘留者定位系统”中移除了那些已被下达最终驱逐令的被拘留者的姓名，显然是为了加快驱逐速度。这一变更移民和海关执法局并未宣布，也未作出解释，适用于该局羁押的近6.9万名被拘留者中的1.6万多人。
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement removed the names of detainees with final removal orders from its Online Detainee Locator System on Sept. 15 in an apparent effort to speed up their deportations. The change, which ICE did not announce and has not explained, applies to more than 16,000 of the nearly 69,000 detainees who are in ICE custody .
移民律师表示，此举妨碍了被拘留者对其律师的接触，从而干扰了他们对抗即将到来的驱逐的能力，同时也让那些失去亲人下落的家庭遭受沉重打击。
The move has interfered with detainees’ ability to challenge looming deportations by impeding access to their lawyers while devastating families who lost track of their loved ones, immigration lawyers say.
由30多个为美国非公民提供倡导的组织组成的联盟向联合国强迫或非自愿失踪问题工作组请愿，要求宣布该政策违反国际法并推动其终止。
A coalition of more than 30 groups who advocate for noncitizens in the U.S. petitioned the U.N.’s Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances to declare the policy a violation of international law and to push for its end.
“一个没有透明度的系统就是一个没有问责制的系统，这应该让我们所有人感到恐惧，”请愿书签署方之一、罗伯特与埃塞尔·肯尼迪人权中心的律师莎拉·德克尔说。“把人消失到一个偏远拘留场所网络中，隐藏他们的下落，并切断他们获得外界帮助的渠道，这就是强迫失踪的定义。”
“A system with no transparency is a system with no accountability, and that should terrify all of us,” said Sarah Decker, an attorney at the Robert & Ethel Kennedy Human Rights Center, one of the petition’s signatories. “Disappearing people into a network of remote detention sites, hiding their whereabouts, and cutting off their access to outside help is the definition of an enforced disappearance.”
另外，周三，由众议员卢兹·里瓦斯和维罗妮卡·埃斯科巴领导的40多名众议院民主党人敦促ICE恢复定位系统中的姓名，称隐瞒这些姓名的做法“违背美国法律体系的基本原则”。
Separately, on Wednesday, more than 45 House Democrats led by Reps. Luz Rivas and Veronica Escobar urged ICE to restore the names to the locator, calling the practice of concealing them “contrary to foundational principles of the American legal system.”
ICE的上级机构周三否认其做法等同于让人失踪，称所有被拘留者“都有机会与家人和律师沟通”。
ICE’s parent agency denied Wednesday that its practices amount to disappearing people, saying all detainees “have opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers.”
“对于已有最终驱逐令的非法外国人，适当的程序就是驱逐，简单明了，”国土安全部在一份声明中说。“尽管如此，国土安全部已实施严格的执法评估，遵守美国宪法规定的正当程序。”如果被拘留者的 commissary 账户中有钱，他们通常可以给亲属打电话，而给法律代表的电话本应免费。
“The appropriate process due to an illegal alien with final deportation orders is removal, plain and simple,” the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement. “That said, DHS has a stringent law enforcement assessment in place that abides by due process under the U.S. Constitution.”Detainees can typically call relatives if they have money in their commissary accounts, while calls to their legal representatives are supposed to be free.
大约140万居住在美国的人面临最终驱逐令。这通常意味着移民法官已裁定他们应被驱逐出境，且该裁决已在上诉中得到维持或未被上诉。他们仍有若干法律选项来质疑自己的拘留和驱逐。联邦法官已数千次裁定，被拘留者应获释或获得保释听证。
Approximately 1.4 million people living in the U.S. are subject to final orders of removal. That typically means an immigration judge has ruled they should be deported and the decision has been upheld on appeal or not appealed. They still have several legal options to challenge their detention and deportation. Federal judges have ruled thousands of times that detainees should be released or granted bond hearings.
这份提交给联合国的请愿书称，该政策已经“阻碍了法律顾问接触被关押的客户，从而无法进行干预以寻求移民救济、对违宪关押提出异议并阻止非法的驱逐出境。”请愿书列举了数名被关押者的遭遇，其中包括一对母女，母亲和7岁的女儿当时正在德克萨斯州的一处设施中对她们的关押提出异议，但在面临被驱逐到委内瑞拉时，她们却失去了与律师取得联系的渠道。请愿书称，直到法官下令移民及海关执法局（ICE）披露她们的下落后，该机构才在大约18个小时后照办，并将她们释放。
The petition to the U.N. said the policy has already “obstructed legal counsel from accessing their clients in detention, preventing interventions to seek immigration relief, challenge unconstitutional detention, and block unlawful deportations.”It cited examples of several detainees, including a mother and 7-year-old daughter who were challenging their detention at a Texas facility but lost access to their lawyers as they faced deportation to Venezuela. Only after a judge ordered ICE to disclose their whereabouts did the agency do so, about 18 hours later, and release them from custody, the petition said.
根据请愿书，一名男子报告称，在他年迈残疾母亲的下落从系统中被突然抹去后，他承受了巨大的压力，脑海中“闪过了能想象到的最黑暗的想法”。
One man reported intense stress and that the “darkest thoughts imaginable went through” his mind after the whereabouts of his elderly disabled mother were abruptly removed from the system, according to the petition.
请愿书指出，随着唐纳德·特朗普总统的政府展开大规模抓捕和驱逐非法滞留人员的行动，于2010年推出的移民及海关执法局在线查询系统已经成为“一个更加至关重要的工具”。请愿书提到，联合国该工作组曾游说创建该查询系统，并推动其在2024年进行扩大，将边境巡逻队关押的人员也纳入其中。
The petition said ICE’s online locator, launched in 2010, has become “an even more crucial tool” as President Donald Trump’s administration has carried out a sweeping campaign to arrest and deport people who are in the country illegally. It noted that the U.N. working group had lobbied for the locator’s creation and its 2024 expansion to include people detained by the Border Patrol.
请愿书请求联合国工作组敦促移民及海关执法局在逮捕被关押者后的一小时内，公开列出他们的所有关押地点，并在转移被关押者前24小时通知其律师。成立于1980年的联合国该工作组旨在协助家属寻找据称遭政府特工强迫失踪的亲人。该工作组由五名成员组成，现任主席是来自波兰的格拉齐娜·巴拉诺夫斯卡（Grazyna Baranowska）。
The petition asked the U.N. group to urge ICE to publicly list all detainees’ locations within an hour of their arrest and give detainees’ lawyers 24 hours’ notice before a transfer. The U.N. group, which was formed in 1980, helps families locate loved ones who have reportedly been subjected to enforced disappearance by government agents. It has five members and is currently chaired by Grazyna Baranowska of Poland.